David Choe's The Choe Show works, even if it is a chaotic, emotionally exposed mess

The Hollywood Reporter

"The idea that if some of your favorite personalities want to hang out with Choe (and collect his art) then you probably will as well drives FX’s The Choe Show, and very frequently proves to be accurate," says Daniel Fienberg. "As a TV series guest, Choe is an unruly force of anarchy and I’m confident that he’d only feel complimented by my calling The Choe Show a chaotic, emotionally unguarded mess. It’s a talk show in which the subject matter sometimes leads to the host talking more than the guests. It’s an art show in which the creation of individual canvasses is sometimes forgotten entirely. The Choe Show exists as an anxious and cacophonous counterpoint to the slow-jazz chill of HBO’s Painting With John, which premiered earlier this year and was built around another member of the Anthony Bourdain traveling cohort, John Lurie." Fienberg adds: "Most viewers won’t know exactly what to make of The Choe Show, since its artistic artifice can make even the most extreme bouts of candor seem as if they’re planned and performative. FX doesn’t know what to make of The Choe Show either, which is probably why all four episodes are airing in a two-hour block June 25 before moving to FX on Hulu, where audiences can choose to either embrace or mess with the strange continuity between installments. Either way, if you’ve ever seen Choe passing through another of your favorite shows, The Choe Show is a fascinating glimpse at what makes him tick — or maybe it’s the artistic representation of what he wants TV audiences to think makes him tick."

ALSO:

• Part of what makes The Choe Show work is that David just puts himself out there, like he did in our conversation, and then his guests respond in kind
• David Choe admits he lied when he repeatedly said a decade ago he turned down two shows, one from Scott Rudin and one from Anthony Bourdain: “I told you I turned those down,” he says. “They actually turned those down. And then in my head, I go, ‘You won’t reject me — I reject you.’ So I started telling people, ‘Oh, yeah, I walked away from it.’ And that makes me feel better. I’ve told that story so many times that I believed it.”