Margaret Cho Hangs Out

MC: Yup! I’m ordained. I’ve done two weddings – a gay male couple and a lesbian couple. It’s amazingly great because I’ve been working for this for such a long time. It’s been like another job since 1994, really trying to make this happen.

MB: Is there a long line to have you marry someone?

MC: No. I’m doing it for free and just asking the couples to make a donation to Equality California. I want to marry as many couples as I can. I’d love to do a trans couple.

MB: So how can someone get married by you?

MC: They can email me at Margaret@margaretcho.net or they can MySpace me and we can try to work it out.

MB: We love you for your support, but back in 2004, the HRC and Stonewall Dems revoked their invitation for you to speak at their convention. What is it like to have a group you’ve worked so hard for diss you like that?

MC: It’s hard. They don’t always make the same decisions I would make. They don’t have such a high regard as I do for trans people. I want them to be much more aggressive when it comes to trans rights—like really pay attention to the whole community. They need to step it up when it comes to trans people. But in the end I think we all have to work together. I’m not going to turn my back on any organization and I’m not going to turn my back on the HRC. I think what they are doing is great.

MB: You endorsed Barack Obama pretty early on. What do you say to the gays and women who are still apprehensive about this guy?

MC: I was a Hillary supporter, too! I just started to notice that America was more sexist than they were racist and that is why the campaign was so hard on Hillary. I just felt that we just needed to get rid of the Bush administration and the conservatives and that the best chance would be to go with Obama. I also identify with him in a lot of ways, too. That was a really difficult decision because I think they’re both great.

MB: Do you think you may have related to Obama because you are both racial minorities?

MC: I really connected with him on the whole thing when people were saying he wasn’t black enough or he was too black. That’s something people have talked to me about like oh, ‘You’re too Asian,’ or ‘You’re not Asian enough.’ Those weird kind of racial evaluation questions are so odd and they really cooked me in. I got it. I became close to him with that.

MB: Do you feel that your celebrity ever works against what you’re trying to do? Like the message gets lost?

MC: I don’t know, I mean I’m not at the point where that’s a worry yet. The causes I believe in are so important to me, like gay rights and AIDS-phobia, that they go beyond any kind of personal importance or career.

MB: And your career is doing might well! Your Beautiful tour, which began in the spring has been extended through at least the fall. Is this the first time your tour has been made longer?

MC: Yeah! Now it’s like a second tour! It’s weird. We’re all over the place and I’m doing places I’ve never done before, like Radio City.

MB: Is this going to be on DVD?

MC: Yes, I’m shooting in October so it will be out after that.

MB: What do you think made this tour so popular?

MC: It’s really filthy dirty, I surprise myself sometimes! It’s all about assholes. It’s all really deep into the asshole and rectum of life. It’s super asshole focused. It’s really intense.

The Cho Show starts on VH1 on August 21st For more Margaret Cho and to find stop on her tour near you, log onto Margaretcho.net.