Search - Margaret Cho - Notorious C.H.O. on DVD

Perfect Follow-up

John Bliss | Chicago, IL USA | 01/06/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I had my doubts about "Notorious C.H.O." After all, "I'm the One That I Want" is the pinnacle of stand-up: revelatory while screamingly funny, a trip through dark times to self awareness, angry without being self pitying. All served up with salty language and the kind of insight only experience can bring. And topped off with the hilarious routine about her mother looking at gay porn in their bookstore in San Francisco.After all that, what was left for "Notorious?"As it turns out, plenty. Margaret Cho wisely avoids the inner demons that fueled "I'm the One," and instead just piles on the laughs. There are sad moments, as when she remembers her friends who have died of AIDS, but since she recalls them with tales of their drag queen performance pieces at Baskin Robbins (you'll never look at sprinkles the same way again) and then decides they've become her guardian angels ("Girl, you're going out dressed in that?!"), there's no time for tears.As she says in one of the features, if "I'm the One" was about coming of age, "Notorious" is about being of age. It's mostly about sex, and is quite often nasty without being offensive. Cho takes such a cheerful view of offbeat sexuality (getting fisted by a lesbian dwarf?) that there's no way to be put off by it. Yes, she focuses a lot on her gay friends and fans, but to say she shouldn't is no different from saying she shouldn't talk about being Korean. These are the people in her life, and she turns them all into memorable characters.Finally, the commentary track by her "mother" (Cho in character) is wonderfully bizarre. It wanders a bit, especially as other people join her, but it demonstrates Cho's remarkable grasp of character. It's not always funny, but it's a brilliant acting job, and provides insight into how Cho thinks and develops her work. It's worth the price of admission.Before "I'm the One That I Want," I wasn't much of a Margaret Cho fan. After that film and now this, I'm a convert."

Hilarious, outrageous. . . notorious!

Michael J. Mazza | Pittsburgh, PA USA | 09/14/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

""Notorious C.H.O." is a concert film starring the outrageous Margaret Cho. The film begins with some short interview segments with Margaret, her parents, and fans. This prelude is an effective warm-up for Cho's stage performance.Cho starts off with an outrageous post-9/11 joke; she makes it clear that she's not letting terrorists stop her from loving life or from bringing others joy through laughter. From there she takes on a number of topics: pornography, straight sex, gay sex, eating disorders, media images of Asians, gay marriage, menstruation, and more. Her humor is in-your-face and often very political. She goes into graphic and hilarious detail about her own sexual adventures (including a trip to an S&M sex club): believe me, it's definitely not for the prudish or squeamish!Along the way, she performs some very funny characters: a Sharon Stone-ish dominatrix, a video store clerk, and (best of all!) her own mom. As funny as Cho is, I also find her performance to be often very poignant and ultimately quite inspirational. Cho is all about coming to terms with painful episodes from one's past and using them to learn and grow; she's also about celebrating diversity and making a space for those who, for whatever reason, feel left out or abused by society. She may make you scream with laughter (as I did), but she also may make you think."

Funny but a one-note show

Craig Clarke | New England | 09/10/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

"After reading Margaret Cho's autobiography, I'm the One That I Want, I knew that sex was a large part of her life. Unfortunately, I did not expect that it would in turn comprise a large part of her comedy routine in this movie, The Notorious C.H.O. I don't have anything against it, per se, it's simply that it grew tiring over an hour and a half to hear all the ways that she has experimented with sex. From going to an S&M club to being "fisted," Cho covers it all, in fairly explicit detail. After the first half hour, I lost interest and it just stopped being funny. I don't watch many stand-up films (the last one was Eddie Izzard), so when I do, I want them to be really hilarious--and varied in subject matter. So, since generally I'm pretty picky, I guess I just lost out this time. I'll probably look out for Margaret's next film, though, just in case, because she is one of the funniest comics working today.Love that cover shot."

Absolutely hilarious

Erica Anderson | Minneapolis, MN | 06/30/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I am not a big fan of stand up comedy. I find most comedians annoying and/or simply not funny. One of the few comedians I do like is Margaret Cho. I have been a fan of her since her short lived sitcom "American Girl" which was way ahead of its time for tv (and still is). At the time I didn't realize she was a stand up comedian until I saw a comedy special in the late '90s on comedy central. I never laughed as hard before as I did then. I love her irreverance sense of humor. Her humor is definitely blue but it is honest coming from her POV.

"Notorious C.H.O" is easily one of my favorite dvds of her stand up work. My favorite moments during the film was when she talked about her drag queen friends from high school at the local Baskin Robbins. I was literally laughing so hard, tears were rolling down my eyes. I also had a good laugh when Margaret discussed about her experience in an S&M club. I thought Margaret did an excellent job at weaving poignancy of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 with humor as well as with the topic of gay marriage (which was not a big issue then as it has been in the past year).

Margaret's sense of humor is not for everyone. Her humor certainly crosses over on to the raunchy side. A lot of her content on "Notorious C.H.O" is sex-related but it is coming from her own personal experiences. I thoroughly enjoyed "Notorious C.H.O". It is one of the funniest pieces of work Margaret has done in years."