Cho Guevara Demands Revolution!

Margaret Cho
Revolution Tour
Friday, May 2, 2003 at the Wiltern Theatre

Margaret Cho Leads The Minority Herd To Declare Our Own War

By Minnie Chi

As a Korean-American, sometimes I honestly don’t know if I’m proud of Margaret Cho. The times when she does inspire me, I question why it is. Yeah she’s hilarious, raunchy, outspoken and self-affirming, but Korean? Hardly. By looks, yes, and that’s about the only thing because culturally, she is as American as they come. I mean no offense when I apply the metaphor of a “twinkie” to Cho – yellow on the outside but fluffy white in the inside whereas I’m an uneven colored and not fully cooked scrambled egg that doesn’t stand as firm. But it’s not her Korean-ness that stirs my pride, but her very lack thereof. As a result of Cho’s individuality-over-cultural tradition drive and mentality, her detachment places her so far outside of the box that she is able to pinpoint the cultural absurdities and idiosyncrasies that she was raised with but isn’t consumed by and joke about them mercilessly and wholeheartedly. That doesn’t mean that she’s anti-Korean or that she should be more culturally sensitive in order for the Korean community to appreciate her as a legitimate public figure. It just means that we shouldn’t be loving or hating her because she’s “Korean” (that is definitely up for debate) but because she voices that certain kind of struggle toward integration and respect that not only Korean-Americans are susceptible to.

Cho’s Revolution performance at Los Angeles’ Wiltern theatre was packed with every type of minority (and you know L.A. has got all types): gays, lesbians, straights, blacks, yellows, browns, etc. – a true rainbow of unity. After a brief stand-up opening routine by proud-to-be-out Bruce Daniels, Cho walks out in a ‘60s stripper outfit of black skin-tight leotards, a white fur boa, gold go-go boots, an orange wig and a ridiculously large lamp over her head. She decided to dress up for the occasion. Then she decided to dress down, taking off her shimmery boots before she got down to business and indicated how appropriate it is now that she’s in Koreatown.

Cho was heavy on the politics, poking fun at the way President Bush enunciates ‘nuclear’ and voicing her aggravation at the question she’s often approached with, “So what’s up with the guy in North Korea?” as if Kim Jong Il is her uncle. “Quit asking me to page him!” Cho exclaims then she contorts her sweet face into his lunatic smile and mentions that Kim’s joyous expression resembles a happy baby who exerted his first solid poo.

The openly bi-sexual Cho reveals that “monogamy is so weird” and living with someone is equal to being a prostitute at a really low rate since you’re always negotiating house chores with sexual favors. Cho’s succinct explanation of her non-existent maternal instincts is brilliant. “When I see children, I feel nothing. I ovulate sand,” she declares.

Her visit to Bangkok, Thailand became a thematic recurrence throughout her performance. She shares a myriad of absurd phrases that Thai bouncers would use to lure her into the sex shows, at which point she turns her head as if these distasteful promotional words spark her interest.

She mentions that visiting Asia is fun and that it is reminiscent of her childhood days, which she says were spent “half in America and the rest in a foreign land,” meaning her own immigrant spawned home where her mother would use rice as an adhesive for just about everything. She states that she was deprived of scotch tape, a staple item in just about any American household. Cho was frustrated and embarrassed during school lunchtime because of what her mom would pack for her: dried fish and peanuts. “You can’t trade that,” Cho replies shaking her head and mocking the hurt of an outcast.

The risqué comedienne understands what it’s like to grow up without any real Asian role models in entertainment and how her dream to be a glamorous movie star would never become. She says she rejects movie roles all the time because she’s not interested in playing a manicurist, a pissed off liquor storeowner, a Chinese immigrant with a chicken under her arms, a student tourist, a geisha, or a tragic opera singer. She boils it down to Hello Kitty as the only feasible character she can play although the animated kitty has no mouth and can’t even say ‘hi’ back!

Cho admits that she forgets she’s Asian and is usually crudely reminded of it. She recalls being in an airplane waiting for the stewardess to hand her her Chinese Chicken Salad. She did so but only by consciously deleting the word ‘Chinese’ and nervously offering her just a ‘chicken salad.’ “What did she think I was going to do?” Cho asks. Then immediately she crouches her little body, contorting her face into a wrinkly old ancient Chinese sage and slowly whispers, “This… is … not…the salad of my people!”

This top selling stand-up activist has kept her momentum going with her new tour, Revolution. She’s as confessional as she was in “I’m The One That I Want” but now a bit more demanding, forthrightly encouraging her listeners to start a self-revolution instead of simply sharing her own revelations and inner triumphs. Cho states that our collective voice leads to power, which leads to change, which leads to revolution (you can imagine the applause that followed this powerful logic). She swayed just a tiny bit from the dense sexual vulgarity that fueled “Notorious C.H.O.” and focused heavily on pertinent racial, political, and social issues that have currently risen and still exist. Though I still share an ethnic affinity with this awesome social kvetcher, I know Cho is more than just an Asian-American entertainer and I’m positive that there are all kinds of different people out there who have been touched in a variety of ways who’d certainly agree.

www.margaretcho.com

May 20, 2003