10 Notable Names With At Least One Recurring TV Voice Role
4. Lily Tomlin
Seatbelts, everyone!
An extraordinary model for career longevity, Lily Tomlin's résumé spans nearly 55 years and counting. Following her first TV appearance on The Merv Griffin Show in 1965, and subsequent casting on final incarnation of The Garry Moore Show a year later, it was being tapped as a featured player on Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In in 1969 that opened the floodgates.
For the last half-century, Tomlin has been almost unreasonably prolific in film and television, running the gamut from Nashville and 9 to 5 (the second-highest grossing film of 1980, only The Empire Strikes Back tops it) to recurring TV roles on celebrated series like The West Wing, Eastbound and Down and Netflix's Grace and Frankie, to more recent film roles like 2015's Grandma and a voice role as Aunt May in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.
For kids watching PBS in the '90s, however, it was a distinctly different vehicle that drove them to her... or vice-versa.
From 1994-97, Tomlin sat at the helm of The Magic School Bus as Ms. Valerie Frizzle, the science teacher whose impromptu field trips brought interactive to a new level while bringing her students to the brink of oblivion and somehow back in one piece on a weekly basis. Her portrayal was so well-received that Tomlin came away with a Daytime Emmy in 1995 for Outstanding Performance in an Animated Program and even reprised her role, this time as Professor Emeritus, for the 2017 reboot, The Magic School Bus Rides Again.