It feels like Margaret Cho’s done just about everything in the entertainment industry. She’s a Grammy nominee for her comedy work, an Emmy nominee for her performance on 30 Rock, she’s part of the voice cast of the Academy Award-nominated animated feature Over the Moon, and she’s been a contestant on two of the hottest reality TV shows out there - The Masked Singer and Dancing with the Stars. Suffice it to say, we had a lot to cover on Collider Ladies Night as we paved the way to her latest release, the FX documentary Hysterical.
The Andrea Nevins-directed documentary puts the spotlight on the women making waves and making a difference in the comedy scene. Stand-up comedy has always been a male-dominated field, but Cho along with others featured in the film like Fortune Feimster, Nikki Glaser, Iliza Shlesinger and Sherri Shepherd are making the moves necessary to break boundaries and change the game moving forward.
As an iconic trailblazer in stand-up comedy and someone with so much variety on her resume, I had to begin the Ladies Night conversation by asking Cho what the dream - or “making it,” so to speak - initially looked like. Here’s what she said:
“I don’t even know what I pictured ‘making it’ as. I never really had a clear vision, just because I never saw other Asian American women doing comedy or even sort of a path to follow. I just really loved the art form of stand-up comedy and I just wanted to do it. So I didn’t necessarily have an idea [of], ‘Oh, this will mean I made it.’ And I’ve never actually even thought, ‘Oh, now I’ve made it!’ [Laughs] There was never a sense of that.”
It’s near-impossible to find security and stability in the ever-changing, always-challenging entertainment industry, so I most certainly understand that sentiment, but Cho is a mighty accomplished individual who’s already got so much to celebrate at this point. Like, for instance, an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series, an honor that had a hugely positive impact on how the industry viewed Cho as an actor:
“I was just really excited to be nominated and excited to experience that. It’s really fun to be nominated for things. It’s really exciting. And I like award shows, I like attending. To me it’s really exciting, too. I think it really helped sort of legitimize my position as an actor. There’s so [many] comedians who are actors yet it’s something that they don’t always transform, and so I was able to fully transform into somebody else, which for me is very satisfying as an actor, but also that’s what you want to be able to do, sort of disappear into the reality of somebody else.”
This right here is only the tiniest fraction of Cho’s experience in the industry thus far. (And to be fair, a 35-minute Collider Ladies Night episode only covers a small amount of the steps Cho took in her career that contributed to paving the way to her involvement in Hysterical.) If you’d like to hear more about Cho’s early days being part of a comedy duo with Sam Rockwell, advice she’d offer to up-and-coming actors leading their first project given her experience on All-American Girl, how much she admired Will Smith as a leader on the set of Bright and more, be sure to check out our full chat in the video at the top of this article or in podcast form below.
Hysterical is now available to stream exclusively on FX on Hulu.
Margaret Cho:
- 00:48 - When Cho first dreamed of “making it” in entertainment, what did the dream initially look like?
- 01:33 - How doing television changed the game for Cho.
- 02:13 - Acting wasn’t something Cho even considered early on.
- 03:26 - Given Cho’s experience working on All-American Girl, what advice would she give to other actors who might find themselves in a similar situation?
- 04:33 - Why Cho chose to study at the San Francisco School of the Arts; having a comedy duo with Sam Rockwell.
- 06:12 - What surprised Cho most about working on film and television productions.
- 07:41 - Who’s Cho’s on-set unsung hero?
- 09:25 - Cho revisits working with John Travolta and John Woo on Face/Off.
- 13:48 - How did the Face/Off experience compare to making a movie like Bright?
- 15:59 - Cho highlights how Will Smith democratizes the process of moviemaking.
- 16:53 - Cho revisits 30 Rock and pinpoints Tina Fey as a standout leader on set.
- 18:40 - What was it like getting nominated for an Emmy for her work on 30 Rock?
- 20:00 - How did Cho get involved in the Academy Award nominated animated feature Over the Moon?
- 21:20 - Cho discusses her first reaction to being offered a spot on Season 1 of The Masked Singer.
- 23:19 - Did Cho feel the intense pressure of the secrecy required while participating on The Masked Singer?
- 24:20 - How did her Dancing with the Stars experience compare to Masked Singer?
- 26:04 - Is there anything entertainment-wise that Cho’s yet to try that she’s eager to dive into?
- 26:47 - If Cho could appear on the game show of her choice, what would she pick?
- 27:40 - Why Cho was eager to be part of Hysterical.
- 28:08 - What is it about what Cho’s doing now that would make her younger self go, “Huh, I never imagined that’d be possible?”
- 28:51 - Even though she’s a big part of the community, what struck Cho the most while watching Hysterical?
- 29:25 - Cho names three up-and-coming comics you need to keep an eye out for.
- 30:12 - Random questions begin! Hear all about the new hobbies Cho picked up during lockdown, the second season of her podcast, her pets, the meal she’d choose to have over and over, who she thinks is changing the entertainment industry for the better and her biggest fear overcome.