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My Turnby Toni Tabora-Roberts |
 |
From The Asian Reporter, V18, #40 (October 7, 2008), page 6.
Margaret Cho returns to TV via celeb-reality
Let’s get this straight from the top. I’m a huge Margaret Cho fan. I think she’s brilliant, talented, beautiful, hilarious, intelligent, and important. The illustrious Ms. Cho is the star of a new TV show on VH1, which has become the cable TV-playland for celebrity-fuelled reality TV madness. "The Cho Show" recently completed a seven-episode run (no word yet on whether it will last another season).
"The Cho Show" follows Margaret and her entourage, which includes her parents (simply called "Mr. and Mrs. Cho"), her "assistant" Selene Luna, her stylist Charlie Altuna, make-up artist John Stapleton, and John Blaine, Margaret’s hair stylist. By far the scene-stealers in the show are the genuine and always surprising Mr. and Mrs. Cho, as well as the darling and sassy Selene.
Originally I was going to analyze the show: whether it debunks stereotypes, what is Margaret Cho like on screen, how are the other characters portrayed, what themes come up, etc. The quick review is it wasn’t a total slam-dunk for me, but I certainly did not hate it. I think Margaret is amazing, and she’s trying to do something interesting through the venue of American reality. So yes, a thumb slightly up, as I’d like to see another season and the evolution of this idea of reality situation-comedy, as she puts it.
What actually intrigued me as I watched the show had more to do with our role as the audience. It’s still painful to hear Margaret lament her awful experiences trying to produce the first Asian-American TV sitcom, "All-American Girl." She got blasted from every angle — the studios thought she was too fat, white American viewers thought the show was too Asian, and Asian-American viewers thought it was too white. As an Asian-American TV viewing audience, we finally got something we’ve longed for — the faces of an Asian-American family as central characters on network television — and yet we were ungrateful somehow. Yes, there were problems with the show, but did we need to be so critical coming out of the gates? No easy answer here.
Asian Americans continue to have hard luck with TV. For a while there was hope with AZN Television, a Comcast-owned cable-TV network aimed at Asian Americans (yes, the English-speaking, young, educated, and affluent). They closed their doors earlier this year. ImaginAsian also pledges to be an Asian-American television network (as well as a New York City movie theater, film distributor, and creator of other entertainment ventures). The problem is, ImaginAsian is non-existent on most U.S. television sets.
Why is it so difficult for us to support programming that specifically targets Asian Americans? To me that’s precisely the problem. Targeting "Asian America" is like trying to match blacks. You know what I mean — two different pieces of black clothing are almost never the exact same color. It’s useful to label something with a color such as black, but when it comes down to getting dressed, it doesn’t matter what it’s called. The color is what it is, regardless of what you call it.
Some of the most successful TV programs watched by Asian Americans are shows that include Asian Americans as part of the cast, but with a diverse, multicultural landscape. Various blogs list "Lost" and "Heroes" as well as "America’s Best Dance Crew" and other reality shows featuring the occasional Asian American as more popular programs. I know I constantly seek out those connections. We need to continue to push to see Asian-American faces onscreen and fight the tired stereotypes and nasty racism that still exists.
Could "The Cho Show" be one of the success stories? Hopefully, if we all give it a little love and a little time to grow into something exciting. Margaret explores important issues on her show — the definition of beauty, gay marriage, and growing older — in an irreverent and smart way that only she would do. It’s definitely worth a look and a conversation. Episodes of the show can be viewed online at <www.vh1.com>.