“This new show is very much a club show,” says the comedian/actress from her Los Angeles home. “It’s really funny, it’s really hardcore, very much about body issues and about the body observed from the outside as opposed to its inhabitant. It’s explicit – it’s a lot of fun.”

While body politics may not sound like fun, be sure that wherever Cho chooses to go, laughter follows. The 32-year-old Korean-American brings her latest stand-up show, The Notorious C.H.O., to the Royal Oak Music Theatre for two shows on Saturday.

Some of the themes in the new material are ones that Cho explores in her book, I’m the One That I Want. Released earlier this year by Ballantine Books, it details Cho’s struggles with body image, racial identity/discrimination, substance abuse, romantic relationships and the ups and downs of the entertainment industry.

“I always wanted to write a book – something that I thought was meaningful and interesting, funny and sad and full of humanity,”

Cho says. “That was really important for me. It was great to expand and do something different and to have people respond to me in a different way.”

A San Francisco native, Cho honed her sharp wit performing in comedy clubs and at colleges across the United States. Star of the short-lived sitcom about an Asian-American family, All-American Girl, she learned firsthand about the struggles of minorities in the entertainment industry – a situation that she says is changing, but not very quickly.

“It’s getting a little bit better, but not much,” Cho says.

But she has learned to take the good with the bad while forging her own path.

“I used to get really concerned with the day-to-day things about this business, and I used to get really paranoid about it. Now, I kinda just don’t care. I just really like doing my work, and I’m really satisfied with it – so things don’t bother me so much.”