Pop Quiz: what movie holds the record for highest per-print gross in Hollywood history? Titanic? Star Wars? Spiderman? Nope, none of the above. The answer is a 1999 film version of comedian Margaret Cho’s acerbic one-woman show, I’m The One That I Want, about Margaret’s (mis)adventures trying to fit in to the world of network television. Thought-provoking and hysterically funny, I’m The One That I Want marked a new direction for Margaret Cho’s career and she hasn’t looked back. She brings her special brand of comedy to Buffalo’s Kleinhans Music Hall on Tuesday, August 21 for a live performance to benefit AIDS Community Services.
Margaret Cho grew up in San Francisco during the 70s. She attended grammar school in the epicenter of counterculture – the city’s famed Haight Street – immersed in a world of hippies, druggies, burnouts, drag queens and more. Margaret recalls it as “a really confusing, enlightening, wonderful time.” At sixteen, she began performing at a comedy club in the building her parents owned. She attracted some attention, but it wasn’t until her early twenties when Margaret moved to Los Angeles and hit the college circuit that her career really took off. She quickly became the most booked act on the market, and television offers poured in, from Arsenio Hall to Bob Hope. In 1994 Margaret starred in ABCs All-American Girl, and the experience of fighting to be accepted the way she was rather than a watered-down cookie cutter stereotype the network wanted helped her realize who she was and where she wanted to go with her comedy.
Dazzling critical and commercial acclaim have followed, as each subsequent project has become more ambitious, riskier, and more personal. I’m The One That I Want was followed by Notorious C.H.O., the politically-charged Assassin, Bam Bam & Celeste, and I Have Chosen to Stay and Fight.
Margaret has won numerous awards for her work’s social awareness from organizations such as the ACLU, National Organization for Women, GLAAD, American Women in Radio and Television and PFLAG. She doesn’t make a big deal out of it. “I didn’t mean to be a role model,” says Margaret. “I just speak the truth.”
Margaret Cho LIVE in Buffalo at Kleinhans Music Hall on Tuesday, August 21. Special guest Ian Harvie. This show is intended for mature audiences. Call 885-5000 or visit tickets.com for tickets.
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