Fitzdog Radio: Margaret Cho

Mike Gibbons: Every comic I could name – I know has damage. So that’s why I’m asking you guys… The Regan Brothers? What about those fucking guys? They’re so funny.

Greg Fitzsimmons: Well, they have seven brothers. It’s like the Brennans (Neal). When You have that many siblings you can’t not feel cheated of attention, at some point.

Margaret Cho: Yeah, everybody’s got something… like the people that I know, the people that I’m closest with are more – they’re issues are like, not necessarily familial but what they’re own experience is like… My best friend, Celeny Luna is 3-foot-10. So all of her comedy is about being a little person. And so its not necessarily about like child damage, but being the eternal childhood of being in this body. So that is (where) an amazing comedy comes from: not necessarily from her family so, I don’t know, those are the comics I relate to… that are using their body and they’re experience in their body and illuminating that. But about damage, I think we’re all fucked up.

GF: Well, I think damage is actually a bad word because I think that, and again this is an ‘inside comic studio’, but I think that comedians are people that have been made to feel ‘other’. ‘Otherly’. And have fought back against it. Whether by directly by talking about being a little person or by virtue of standing on a stage when they were made to feel that they weren’t worth listening to. It’s a fighting back. That’s where the voice comes from.

MC: Yeah, that’s right. That’s right.

GF: So I wouldn’t say damage in that we didn’t get damaged. We avoided the damage by taking it on, on some level. And I think any artist you can say that about.

MG: And I guess the reason I use damage is just because, you’re right, its maybe the wrong word. But I think you develop. Like even in… I’m not a comic nor do I have crazy damage but the sense of humor develops from deflecting and from trying to make light and trying to you know, cope and manage, and you’re injecting humor to what could, the flip… like your book (Dear Mrs. Fitzsimmons: Tales of Redemption from an Irish Mailbox) the other side of it is crying. Clearly.

Fitzdog Radio: Margaret Cho / aprox 00:49:00

CNN LARRY KING LIVE / Interview With Roseanne Barr

Larry King: Tough audience?

Roseanne Barr: No, they were just awesome. It's funny how I did it because I had stage fright to do stand-up, so I put in a — in order to like force myself to do stand-up I put in a part of my act where I take my clothes off because I'm like, "If you think this is bad, wait until you take your clothes off." That's how I kind of like tricked myself over my fear and stuff plus meditation.

But then after the taking your clothes off, I come out and I say, I say "Dancing in my underwear is nothing compared to the fear of singing in public, which I'm about to overcome now." So, it's like I have to trick myself to do stand-up. I have to like do my other worst fears, dancing in my underwear and singing a song but I don't know why it works.

LK: You're still a little nuts right?

RB: Yes, I know I am but you could get your mental illness and stuff to work for you. You could actually direct it and get it to work for you.

LK: That's right, take it and let it -- use it you can...

RB: Yes, because I do have a lot of fear of people and being in public and, you know, I have a lot of fear period but I just like try to always overcome my fear and for some reason that works for me.

CNN LARRY KING LIVE / Interview With Roseanne Barr / Aired March 2, 2006 - 21:00 ET