Margaret Cho struggled with eating disorders for most of her life, so when she discovered a new weight-loss drug during the peak of the skinny Y2K era she decided to try it.
‘I started taking all these weird drugs,’ the 57-year-old comedian told How To Fail With Elizabeth Day on Tuesday.
‘There [were] also foods that would move food through your body quickly. All these sweeteners would make you just have diarrhea constantly. I just started eating only that and then taking these drugs that would remove the fat from the food that you ate.’
Cho noted the pill was ‘orange,’ which points to the drug being Orlistat.
‘There was one time I was wearing all white at a show, and I was killing,’ the Emmy-nominated actress recalled.
‘I was doing well and I was almost at the end, and I started to s*** out. I couldn’t control it. It was starting to come out because it was all oil [and] it was just grease because it was fat.’
2026 vs. 2001: Margaret Cho struggled with eating disorders for most of her life, so when she discovered a new weight-loss drug during the peak of the skinny Y2K era she decided to try it
Cho continued: ‘I started spurting orange grease out of my a**hole while I’m onstage. I ended the show while the s*** is coming out. I got a standing ovation, they wanted an encore [and] all I could do was back out of view through the curtains.’
The heavily-tattooed funnywoman ran to the parking lot and ‘squatted on the ground’ to relieve herself before peeling away in her car.
‘As I drove away, I had a huge orange oil stain in the front seat of my car that I could not get out. I had to just get a new car,’ Cho said.
‘Disgusted’ with the whole ordeal, the five-time Grammy nominee immediately quit taking the unnamed drug.
Cho famously suffered kidney failure while trying to get ‘skinny like the Friends’ actresses as she made history as the first Asian American to lead an ABC sitcom in Gary Jacobs’ All-American Girl, which only aired for one season spanning 1994-1995.
‘The show was cancelled and replaced by Drew Carey because he’s so thin,’ the pansexual LGBTQIA advocate wisecracked.
‘It was really awful and it was really damaging and I still have some residual effects from it now, you know, more than 30 years on. You can really damage your body with starvation. Anorexia is what it is. It’s anorexia. You can really damage your body. I didn’t understand that.’
The 57-year-old comedian told How To Fail With Elizabeth Day on Tuesday: ‘I started taking all these weird drugs. There [were] also foods that would move food through your body quickly. All these sweeteners would make you just have diarrhea constantly. I just started eating only that and then taking these drugs that would remove the fat from the food that you ate’
Cho recalled on early aughts standup show: ‘There was one time I was wearing all white at a show, and I was killing. I was doing well and I was almost at the end, and I started to s*** out. I couldn’t control it’ (pictured in 2000)
The Emmy-nominated actress continued: ‘I started spurting orange grease out of my a**hole while I’m onstage. I ended the show while the s*** is coming out. I got a standing ovation, they wanted an encore [and] all I could do was back out of view’
Cho famously suffered kidney failure while trying to get ‘skinny like the Friends’ actresses as she made history as the first Asian American to lead an ABC sitcom in Gary Jacobs’ All-American Girl, which only aired for one season spanning 1994-1995
At the time, during the nineties, the heavily-tattooed funnywoman was taking fen-phen, noting: ‘It’s outlawed now because it killed people, but I loved it’
At the time, during the nineties, Cho was taking fen-phen (fenfluramine/phentermine), noting: ‘It’s outlawed now because it killed people, but I loved it.’
The Will Trent guest star is next scheduled to bring her Choligarchy Tour to the Louisville Comedy Club in Louisville, KY on January 15.
Cho has two films premiering at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, UT this month.
The Lucky Gift singer plays a mystery role in Gregg Araki’s erotic thriller I Want Your Sex premiering January 23, and she portrays Principal Linda in NB Mager’s teen drama Run Amok premiering January 26.
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