Comedian Brings National Tour Home to SF’s Warfield March 14-16

For Margaret Cho, her upcoming three-day engagement at The Warfield is a double homecoming. Not only does it bring Cho back to the Bay Area, it returns the San Francisco-born stand-up comedian to the artform which made her famous.

With comic Liam Sullivan opening – and his “Shoes”-loving alter-ego, YouTube sensation Kelly, as special musical guest – Cho plays her hometown March 14-16 as part of her national Beautiful Tour. Here the funny lady who has carved an indelible niche for herself within the LGBT community discusses her return to stand-up, touring the country and an evolving sense of “beauty.”

(Bay Times) Tell me about your off-Broadway experience in The Sensuous Woman.

(Cho) I really had a great time doing that show. It was a lot of fun. It was very different to be able to work with a bunch of different people to do some dancing, some singing, a lot of different things. I imagine I’ll return to it at some point, bring it back somewhere, but right now I’m really happy going back to stand-up.

What is the biggest difference between that show and stand-up?

The Sensuous Woman [has] pretty heavy-duty costume changes. It’s physically very taxing dancing and singing. It’s really a monster of show. It was very tough because it was a lot of moving and changing. With stand-up, it’s just so simple. It’s just you and the mic, and you’re just going for it. That’s where I really come from and am most comfortable. I’m really thrilled to be doing that.

Liam Sullivan, who was part of The Sensuous Woman, is opening your Beautiful Tour.

Yes, he’s opening for me in quite a few cities. The rest of the time, Ian Harvey is opening for me. He’s the transgendered comedian I work with pretty often. Liam is so great. He’s such a great performer and talented in so many ways. I’m really excited to be working with him again.

Ian might be many audiences’ first encounter with a transgender man.

The transgendered community is really kind of underground in so many ways. In some of these places, they haven’t seen it before. That’s really exciting. It’s really important we’re seeing different images as queers and different kinds of queers. I think it’s really cool to work with him and Liam, who is really different. Liam is straight, which is so amazing to find out. (Laughing.) That’s the wildest thing, I think, about him. He’s a straight guy, but his comedy is so queer. It’s really, really cool.

My first thought about Kelly’s “Shoes” video was “This is a very funny queen.”

I know!  That’s what I thought, too. He’s very comfortable with himself. I think it’s great. The new breed of straight guys, they’re kind of like the new fag hags. Among my gay friends, it’s kind of chic to have a straight, male friend who is totally cool and down with everything. It’s become very en vogue to be “the straight guy.”

As an Asian-American woman aligned with queers, have you been in awkward or uncomfortable situations while touring?

I’m also surrounded by queers wherever I go. My opening act, whoever is on tour with me, is also very, very queer. We’re always in a bubble to ourselves. Of course, people stare and point. Of course, we get a lot of attention, but I don’t know… It doesn’t bother me really. I think when you’re queer, and you’re in the world, you get sort of used to being stared at. You get used to people maybe looking or saying things. You get used to people saying “fag” or “dyke.” You get used to people throwing food out or yelling from their car windows. It’s really kind of sad, but we’re conditioned to expect that when we’re queer. It’s something so common I almost don’t notice. That’s just sad, but it also just is.

Why did you name this the Beautiful tour? 

I really wanted to do something which looks at the nature of beauty, how we feel about beauty and how beauty is political. When we say “I’m beautiful,” that’s a really positive and important statement. It just seemed like a really good tour name, the perfect word. I also really like that Christina Aguilera song.

How has your perception of self-beauty changed and evolved?

I just feel really good. I feel like I’ve survived a lot, and that is really beautiful. I take really good care of myself. I’m really into getting tattooed, which is another beautiful thing I enjoy doing. I feel like I’m growing old with a sense of dignity and excitement. Many women my age in Los Angeles are really in fear of getting older and really angry at younger women and resentful. I think it’s really wonderful to be older. I treasure all I’ve learned. I feel much better in my body because I’ve become a dancer over the years, wild sorts of dancing: belly dancing, burlesque dancing. That’s helped me enormously with my self-esteem and feeling good about my physical body. I’m in a really positive place right now.

For those who rely on beauty, aging jeopardizes their ability to utilize that tool.

Right! That’s not the case at all. We enter a different kind of beauty, which I think is really much more profound and, ultimately, more beautiful. It’s about going into it with a kind of dignity, acceptance and enjoyment. That’s really important.

For more information, visit:  http://www.MargaretCho.com