Pushing the Limits

Margaret Cho can't get past the numbers in the Elliot Spitzer scandal.

"I just can't believe somebody would pay $31,000," the comedian says, referring to the top tier of the Emperor's Club prostitution ring (the Web site's price for a "seven-diamond woman" for a full day).

"They must be doing stuff that I don't even know about."

That's significant coming from Cho, who has made her own sexual exploits the fodder of stand-up routines involving everything from S&M clubs to a lesbian dwarf.

"Normally I have a lot of respect for prostitutes," she is quick to add. "I wish I had thought to charge back in the day. I didn't have that ambitious of a spirit, and maybe I should have."

The comedian visits the Palms on Saturday with a new stand-up tour called "Beautiful." She says the title is both sincere and ironic; the latter because the show is "so raunchy and so dirty and so filthy."

"It's a test of how far can I go. How gross can it be?" she says. "Just seeing how far I can take it."

It's a stand-up version of "The Sensuous Woman," the burlesque show Cho did off-Broadway last fall. She showed off her own newly tattooed body and shared the stage with all sorts of strippers and a drag comic.

After the Iraq invasion in 2003, the comedian was on a more political track with her "Revolution" tour. She even annoyed a Las Vegas morning radio show team by doing the whole phone-in with the voice of a Black Panther-style militant.

She hasn't completely reversed direction, she says. "Beautiful" also covers "the political nature of beauty."

The theme of the show is "we can feel good about ourselves and not have to do anything (artificial). It's exciting, that idea."

Once that's understood, "I think that if we feel beautiful, we're more willing to have our voices heard and more willing to speak up about issues and talk about things and fight for our rights," she says. "Beauty is sort of linked in with confidence and a kind of self-actualization that I think is a really good thing."

Cho will have camera coverage of the Palms show and whatever else happens in Las Vegas. The footage may end up in the VH1 reality series "The Cho Show," set to debut this summer.

In the 1990s, a sitcom was the brass ring for any stand-up comedian, and Cho scored one with "All American Girl." Now, the likes of Kathy Griffin's "My Life on the D-List" have made reality the new vehicle of choice.

"I brought the first Asian-American family to television 13 years ago, and now I'm bringing the second Asian-American family to television," she says. Cho made her mother famous in her early stand-up routines, and now people can see her for themselves.

Now that she's pushing 40, with her heavily chronicled drinking and dieting disorders behind her, will Cho be giving the reality cameras enough to entertain them?

"I think you can be responsible and totally rock 'n' roll at the same time," she says.

She admits, however, that life would have been different if her off-the-track days had been in the era of TMZ and YouTube. "It's a lot harder to stay sane in this whole world where you're always being observed. It's tough for these girls," she says.

Cho works out at the same Los Angeles gym as "this famous singer," and says the paparazzi are always staked outside. She feels sorry enough for the singer to play decoy.

"I was, like, yelling at them the other day to get them off her: 'Why aren't you taking pictures of me?'

'We already got you.'

'Well I'm not wearing any underwear.' "

So, this means she was outraged and a little insulted all at the same time?

She agrees and laughs. "I'm glad they're not stalking me, but I wish they would. Maybe with the reality show they will."

Contact reporter Mike Weatherford at mweatherford@reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0288.