Grace and Frankie star Jane Fonda is loving her 70s, writes Luaine Lee.
If orange is the new black, then 70 is the new 40. At least that's what Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda think. And they are proving it as ageing cohorts in the second season of Grace and Frankie.
"I think 70, that's when things started to really happen for me,'' Fonda says.
For one thing, she's found happiness, she declares.
"Why don't we just start with that? I mean, sort of knowing what to look for in a partner, for example ... having a steady job, a man. I've never had to go to a studio every day - for five months. It's fabulous. When you're 78, having a steady job like that, I absolutely love it.
"And then, working for a company where the product that you're making ... was released on a Thursday last April. We were in New York promoting it. The next morning, Friday, we got on a plane to fly to LA. By the time I got home, I was getting calls and emails from people who already saw the whole of season one. I mean, to have what to me was like a revolutionary experience like that when you're my age, that's pretty great. So I love 70s!''
Tomlin, who is the less talkative of the two, says she probably felt the freest in her life when she was 15 and managed to avoid "juvenile delinquency school''.
However, "the first 20 years of your life everything is so imprinted and you spend the next 20 trying to get that out. The next 20 trying to remember where it all started ... I don't cling to those things in the past. I think I probably had a pretty good time [then]. I think I did''.
Grace and Frankie is about two very different women who find themselves pals when their husbands come out of the closet and leave their wives for each other. The husbands are played by Sam Waterston and Martin Sheen (West Wing).
Waterston, who played the stiff Deputy District Attorney Jack McCoy on Law & Order for 16 seasons, says people are astonished by the show.
"They don't expect such delicate and difficult and hard subjects as late-in-life sexual orientation changes and divorce and death itself and ageing to be funny at all. And so I think people are frankly astonished. They were astonished to see Jack McCoy claiming that he was a homosexual, and they were astonished to see the president of the United States want to marry him.''
Fonda says she and Tomlin (76) share a special bond in real life. "I love being with her for all kinds of reasons, but she has a funny bone. I come from a long line of depressed people. And she has a true funny bone. That's one of the reasons I love going to work every day. I get to spend time with somebody whose take on everything comes from a place of funny, which for me is total catharsis,'' she says.
Their history dates back to 1980 when the two starred with Dolly Parton in 9 to 5, a working-girl comedy about three female employees who dream of wreaking revenge on their chauvinist boss. The film was such a success that a TV sitcom and musical followed. Ever since, there's been talk of a sequel, but so far it's only talk.
Tomlin and Fonda are conspiring, however, to bring Parton on Grace and Frankie as a guest star. But executive producer Marta Kauffman says now is not the time.
"We're still, I feel, creating a world, and the world is Grace and Frankie ... . These are characters you want to know and invest in. And the minute you bring Dolly Parton in - who I love by the way - it's 9 to 5. No matter what you do, the thought is, 'Oh, look, it's a 9 to 5 reunion!'.''
This season there will be several guest stars including Sam Elliott as Fonda's new love interest and Amy Madigan as his wife. That's fine with her, says Fonda, who's had a crush on Elliott since he starred in Lifeguard in 1976.
So what does it take to be vital and gainfully employed in your 70s?
"Health, attitude,'' Fonda nods.
"Denial,'' Tomlin says.
Seasons one and two of Grace and Frankie are available to stream via Netflix.
