Margaret Cho's first stand-up was at 16 years old (after she dropped out of school) in a small club above the bookstore that her parents owned. Soon after, she won a contest and became the opening act for Jerry Seinfeld, prompting her to move to Los Angeles where she began gaining notoriety amongst college-age audiences. This notoriety boomed when Bob Hope put her on a prime time special, and ever since then Cho became a comedic celebrity. Her show "I'm the One that I Want" was originally an off-Broadway show she put on in 1999, but it was so well-received that it ended up becoming a filmed special as well as a best-selling book, all with great reviews. In this show she chronicles her work and life experiences- how she started doing stand-up and was able to start an ABC show project with the first all-Asian family, how she had to lose 30 lbs. in two weeks for the show and ended up in the hospital, how producers wanted her to have a consultant to ensure she seemed "more Asian," how she dealt with the show getting canceled and fell into a haze of "booze, pills, and self-loathing", and how all these things led her to gradually lose her own identity (Cho 1999). But most of all, "I'm the One That I Want" is about Cho rising as a person of her own with her own voice, her own jokes, and essentially to become the one that she wants.In this particular short taken from the show, Cho tackles some of the issues of being an Asian-American through anecdotes about accents and language, her relationship with her mom, interracial marriage (or almost-marriage), racial relations, how it feels to be the only Asian amongst Whites, and what happens when someone is the only White amongst Asians. It is through these explorations that she gains insight not only into the ups and downs of life but also towards growing into oneself and being comfortable as you are. And so, Margaret Cho realizes that despite the fact that she does not embody what outside forces expect of a 31-year-old female Asian-American, it is probably because she doesn't embody those expectations or stereotypes that she learns to be happy with who she is.
"Margaret Cho- Asian-American," October 24, 2007, Youtube video, accessed March 29, 2009, < v="kc6mLwOa2Ig&feature="related">
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