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Margaret Cho is one of the more visible Asian-American women of her time. Although probably best remembered for her short-running sitcom All-American Girl, Korean-American comedian Cho has come a long way since then. Cho is a living example of what can happen to you when you become a poster child for someone else's idea of political correctness. Having survived a media blitz, her startling career charts her professional (in fits and starts) as well as personal growth. In her self-produced off-Broadway show I'm the One That I Want (and autobiographical book by the same name) Margaret Cho tells all -- and doesn't leave out the gory parts. From her rise to fame to the network's shame (telling a thin girl to get thinner to play herself on television) and how she overcame a lifetime of culture-driven self-hatred manifested in the form of bad boyfriends and career moves, drug and alcohol abuse, and a chronic eating disorder, Cho lays it on the line -- humorously, of course. This time, with Cho given (a gift to herself) full creative control, instead of being panned by the critics, she won New York Magazine's Performance of the Year, with a series of other accolades to follow.
The Notorious C.H.O. (as she refers to herself in the title of her second show) received a GLAAD (Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) Award honoring her specifically, as "an entertainment pioneer who has made a significant difference promoting equal rights for all, regardless of sexual orientation or identity." For addressing the concerns of women and women's changing roles, Cho was granted the distinguished Gracie Allen Award. She was also featured on Remarkable Journey, a show highlighting the accomplishments of women of color. Although she spent a few years out of the (critical) public eye, Cho "redeemed her good name" by speaking candidly about her nightmare with network television on shows like NPR's Fresh Air and Comedy Central's Politically Incorrect -- a far cry from the more mainstream Bob Hope-type circuit that jump-started her earlier career. Like a phoenix, the Notorious C.H.O. has risen to much fanfare and to the delight of a huge non-network television-watching following.
Margaret Cho was born in San Francisco, after her parents moved there from Seoul. She grew up on Haight Street in the '70s and got kicked out of high school before being accepted to McAteer High School for the Performing Arts. At age 16 she started performing comedy in a club called the Rose and Thistle, which was above her parents' bookstore. There she won a comedy contest. First prize: opening act for Jerry Seinfeld. She has toured the country extensively, been nominated for Campus Comedian of the Year, and in 1994 she won the American Comedy Award for Best Female Comedian. Cho has also contributed writing and acting to several movies. In August 2002, Cho issued The Notorious C.H.O., a double-disc set capturing the last night of her 2001 North American comedy tour at Carnegie Hall. A film of the same name followed in late September. Two years later, Cho once again captured her sold-out Revolution tour on both CD and DVD. Revolution went on to be nominated for a Grammy for best comedy album of the year. Assassin, which was filmed at the Warner Theatre in Washington D.C., was released in October 2005. Cho Dependent, her first long-player devoted to music, arrived in 2010. The album featured guest appearances from Tegan and Sara, Ani DiFranco, Fiona Apple, and others.
from Wikipedia:
Margaret Cho (born December 5, 1968) is a Korean American comedian, fashion designer, actress, author, and singer-songwriter. Cho is best known for her stand-up routines, through which she critiques social and political problems, especially those pertaining to race and sexuality. She has also directed and appeared in music videos and has her own clothing line. She has frequently supported LGBT rights and has won awards for her humanitarian efforts on behalf of women, Asians, and the LGBT community.
As an actress she has played more serious parts, such as that of John Travolta's FBI colleague in the action movie Face/Off. She is part of the TV series Drop Dead Diva on Lifetime Television, playing the role of Teri Lee, a paralegal assistant.
Early life
Cho was born into a Korean family in San Francisco, California. She grew up in a racially diverse neighborhood in the 1970s and 1980s, which she described as a community of "old hippies, ex-druggies, burn-outs from the '60s, drag queens, Chinese people, and Koreans. To say it was a melting pot — that's the least of it. It was a really confusing, enlightening, wonderful time."
Cho's parents, Young-Hie and Seung-Hoon Cho, ran Paperback Traffic, a bookstore on Polk Street at California Street in San Francisco. Her father writes joke books and a newspaper column in Seoul, South Korea. After Cho expressed an interest in performance, she auditioned and was accepted into the San Francisco School of the Arts, an area arts high school. While at the school, she became involved with the school's improvisational comedy group alongside actor Sam Rockwell.
Early career
After doing several shows in a club adjacent to her parents' bookstore, Cho launched a stand-up career and spent several years developing her material in clubs. Cho's career began to build after appearances on television and university campuses. In 1992, she appeared on the unsuccessful Golden Girls spin-off The Golden Palace in a small role. In 1994, Cho won the American Comedy Award for Best Female Comedian. In 2010, on The View, she discussed her nervousness about doing The Golden Palace and thanked the late Rue McClanahan for her help with rehearsing. Also in the early years of her career, she secured a coveted spot as opening act for Jerry Seinfeld and was featured on a Bob Hope special. She was also a frequent visitor to The Arsenio Hall Show.
Television career
All American Girl
That same year, ABC developed and aired a sitcom based on Cho's stand-up routine. The show, All American Girl, was initially feted as the first show prominently featuring an East Asian family, although the short lived sitcom Mr. T and Tina preceded it by nearly two decades.
Cho has expressed subsequent regret for much of what transpired during the production of the show.
After network executives criticized her appearance and the roundness of her face, Cho starved herself for several weeks. Her rapid weight loss, done to modify her appearance by the time the pilot episode was filmed, caused serious kidney failure.The show suffered criticism from within the U.S. East Asian community over its perception of stereotyping. Producers told Cho at different times during production both that she was "too Asian" and that she was "not Asian enough". At one point during the course of the show, producers hired a coach to teach Cho how to "be more Asian".Much of the humor was broad, and at times stereotypical portrayals of her close Korean relatives and gay book-shop customers were employed.The show was canceled after suffering from poor ratings and the effect of major content changes over the course of its single season (19 episodes).
After the show's 1995 cancellation, Cho became addicted to drugs including alcohol. As detailed in her 2002 autobiography, I'm the One That I Want, in 1995 her substance abuse was evident during a performance in Monroe, Louisiana, where she was booed off the stage by 800 college students.
New Year's Rockin' Eve
At the same time All American Girl underwent a difficult period, Margaret Cho hosted the New Year's Rockin' Eve 95 show with Steve Harvey.
Other appearances
Cho and her family and friends appeared in an episode of NBC's series Celebrity Family Feud, which premiered on June 24, 2008. Later that summer, Cho appeared in her own reality show for VH1. The Cho Show premiered on August 21, 2008 and lasted one season. She next appeared as a supporting actress on the series Drop Dead Diva, which debuted in July 2009.
In April 2011, Cho guest starred on the comedy 30 Rock in the episode "Everything Sunny All the Time Always". She played North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il. The role had her speak Korean as well as English. In 2010, Cho appeared as a contestant on the 11th season of Dancing with the Stars.
She appeared on the YouTube comedy show Equals Three as the Comment Question of the Day.
Books
I'm the One That I Want
Cho's career and personal life were challenging after the cancellation of the show, but Cho eventually sobered, refocused her energy and developed new material. In 1999, she wrote about her struggles with the show in her first one-woman show, I'm the One That I Want. Cho then released her book of the same name, and the show was filmed and released as a concert film in 2000. Her material dealt with her difficulties breaking into show business because of her ethnicity and weight and her resulting struggle with and triumph over body image issues and drug and alcohol addiction.
I Have Chosen to Stay and Fight
Also in 2005, Cho released her second book, I Have Chosen to Stay and Fight, a compilation of essays and prose about global politics, human rights, and other topical issues. Cho launched a national book tour in support of the collection. An audio reading of the book was also released. A DVD of a live taping of the Assassin tour was released in conjunction with the book.
Film career
In late 2004, Cho began work on her first self-written film in which she starred. Bam Bam and Celeste, a low-budget comedy about a "fag hag" and her gay best friend, co-starred Cho's friend and co-touring act Bruce Daniels. The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2005. On Valentine's Day of 2004, Cho spoke at the Marriage Equality Rally at the California State Capitol. Her speech can be seen in the documentary Freedom to Marry.
Shows and tours
Cho appeared in an episode of the HBO comedy Sex and the City's fourth season. The episode, titled "The Real Me", first aired on June 3, 2001, and also guest-starred supermodel Heidi Klum.
In 2002, the show Notorious C.H.O. (the title derived from slain rapper The Notorious B.I.G.) dealt with the comedian having been raised in 1970s San Francisco and her bisexuality.
In 2003, Cho made another stand-up film, Revolution, which was released in 2004.
In 2005, Cho started promoting and touring with her new show, Assassin. The show became her fourth live concert film and premiered on the gay and lesbian premium cable network Here! TV in September 2005. In this DVD, she notably includes herself when talking about gays, saying "we" and "our community". Posters for Assassin featured Cho in paratrooper gear and holding a microphone in the style of an automatic rifle, a reference to the infamous 1974 photo of heiress Patty Hearst.
Cho launched "The Sensuous Woman" burlesque-style variety show tour in Los Angeles, California on August 10, 2007, with tour dates scheduled through November 3, as of October 10. Past and scheduled tour stops after Los Angeles are Chicago, Illinois and New York, New York. On August 10, 2007 the San Francisco Chronicle reviewed the show, Cho's work, key events in her personal life and characterized the show as, "In fact, as bawdy and bad-behaving as the cast gets, the whole show feels more like a crazy family reunion than a performance."
The premiere performance of Cho's "Beautiful" tour was on February 28, 2008, in Sydney, Australia as part of the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Festival. Cho was also the Chief of Parade for the festival's annual parade along Oxford Street on March 1. During her stay in Sydney, Cho was filmed shopping for parade outfits in a drag store with Kathy Griffin and Cyndi Lauper for Griffin's reality series Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List. The episode featuring Cho aired on June 26, 2008.
Music
In September 2008, Cho released her single, "I Cho Am a Woman", on iTunes. The song, produced by Desmond Child, was featured on her VH1 series.
Throughout 2010, she worked on a full length album, going through the titles "Guitarded" and "Banjovi" before finally settling on Cho Dependent. The album was released on August 24, 2010. It was supported by music videos for "I'm Sorry", "Eat Shit and Die", and "My Lil' Wayne"; Liam Kyle Sullivan directed the first two. The album was nominated for a 2010 Grammy award for Best Comedy Album.
In May 2010, Cho directed and appeared in the music video for "I Wanna Be a Bear," a song by "Pixie Herculon" (a pseudonym of Jill Sobule).
Nature of material and political advocacy
Cho is also well known for discussing her relationship with her mother, particularly in imitating her mother's heavily accented speech. Her depictions of "Mommy" have become a popular part of her routine. Cho's comedy routines are often explicit. She has covered substance abuse, eating disorders, her bisexuality and obsession with gay men, and Asian-American stereotypes, among other subjects, in her stand up.
A substantial segment of her material and advocacy addresses LGBT issues. In addition to her shows, Cho also developed an additional outlet for her advocacy with the advent of Margaretcho.com and her daily weblog. When San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom directed that San Francisco's city hall issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples in San Francisco in 2004 (until reversed by the state supreme court), Cho started Love is Love is Love, a website promoting the legalization of gay marriage in the United States.
Cho's material often features commentary on politics and contemporary American culture. She has also been outspoken about her dislike of former President George W. Bush. She began to draw intense fire from conservatives over her fiercely anti-Bush commentary; a live performance in Houston, Texas was threatened with picketing. Although protesters never showed up, she held a counter protest outside the club until security told her she had to go inside.
In 2004, Cho was performing at a corporate event in a hotel when after ten minutes her microphone was cut off and a band was instructed to begin playing. Cho claims this was because the manager of the hotel was offended by anti-Bush administration comments. Cho's payment, which was issued by way of check directly to a non-profit organization, a defense fund for the West Memphis Three, initially bounced but was eventually honored.
In July 2004, during the Democratic National Convention, Cho was disinvited to speak at a Human Rights Campaign/National Stonewall Democrats fundraiser out of fear that her comments might cause controversy. In November 2005, she campaigned to pardon Stanley Tookie Williams, an early Crips gang leader, for his death sentence for four murders. On December 13, 2005, after exhausting all forms of appeal, Williams was executed by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison, California.
She emceed the multi-artist True Colors Tour, which traveled through 15 cities in the United States and Canada. The tour, sponsored by the Logo channel, began on June 8, 2007. Headlined by Cyndi Lauper, the tour also included Debbie Harry, Erasure, The Gossip, Rufus Wainwright, The Dresden Dolls, The MisShapes, Rosie O'Donnell, Indigo Girls, The Cliks and other special guests. Profits from the tour helped to benefit the Human Rights Campaign as well as PFLAG and The Matthew Shepard Foundation.
On January 25, 2008, Cho officially gave her support to Barack Obama for the nomination on the Democratic ticket for the 2008 U.S. presidential election. After Republican Presidential candidate John McCain announced his running-mate, Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska, Cho said of Palin, "I think [Palin] is the worst thing to happen to America since 9/11."
After same-sex marriage became legal in California in May 2008, Cho was deputized by the City of San Francisco to perform marriages there.
Other projects
In 2002, Cho founded a clothing line with friend and fashion designer Ava Stander called High Class Cho. The company eventually went defunct.
In 2004, Cho took up bellydancing and in 2006 started her own line of bellydancing belts and accessories called Hip Wear (sold through her website). She also had extensive tattooing done to cover the majority of her back. She co-wrote and starred in a sitcom pilot based around the "Mommy" character of her stand-up, but it was not picked up. She began releasing comedic rap animated videos on her website under the moniker "M.C. M.C." (MC Margaret Cho) including the tracks "Finger" and "Roofies."
In November 2006, Cho joined the board of Good Vibrations. She co-wrote a rap song with fellow comedian Diana Yanez entitled "My Puss", which was recorded by the duo as "Maureen and Angela". She then appeared in and directed the music video for the song. In December 2006, Cho appeared on the Sci-Fi Channel's miniseries The Lost Room as Suzie Kang.
In 2007, Cho appeared in The Dresden Dolls' video of their song "Shores of California", which was MCed by Amanda Palmer and in The Cliks' video for "Eyes in the Back of My Head", in which she played Lucas Silveira's lover. She also voiced a character, Condie Ling, on the Logo animated series Rick & Steve: The Happiest Gay Couple in All the World. Her episodes began airing in 2007.
Recently on an episode of The Hour with host George Stroumboulopoulos, Cho mentioned that she loved Broken Social Scene and wishes to be a part of the band (offering to play the rainstick or the triangle). On air, Stroumboulopoulos called Kevin Drew from his cell phone and Cho made her request to join the band via his voicemail.
In April 2009, Cho was photographed by photographer Austin Young and appeared in a Bettie Page–inspired "Heaven Bound" art show.
In September 2010 she competed in the eleventh season of Dancing with the Stars partnered by Louis van Amstel. She was the third star to be eliminated on week three of the show, landing her in 10th place.
The online human rights awareness project America 2049 had Margaret portray one of the main characters, whose videos were played as part of the main storyline. The facebook-interfaced game uses a fictional, fractioned future in order to highlight today's social inequities.
Personal life
In 1994 Cho was in a relationship with Quentin Tarantino and he appeared in the Pulp Fiction-parody episode of her All American Girl sitcom, Pulp Sitcom, as Desmond, a bootleg-video salesman.
Cho married Al Ridenour, an artist involved in the production of Cacophony Society and the Art of Bleeding, in 2003. Margaret was featured in an Art of Bleeding performance in March 2006. In a Bond interview, she reveals that her marriage is "very conventional and conservative, I think. I mean we're such weird people that people just can't imagine that we would have a conventional marriage. But, yeah, we are very conventional."
Cho began getting major tattoo work done in 2006 and has become an enthusiast; as of March 2007 she estimates that 15–20% of her body is currently tattooed.
As of 2009, Cho lives in Peachtree City, Georgia, as Drop Dead Diva is filmed in the Atlanta area.
She is openly bisexual.
