Margaret Cho is the veritable Renaissance lady. As a slapstick comedian, Cho has boldly focused each social and political points in her routines, and is a fierce advocate for the LGBTQ+ group. As a musician, Cho has launched three albums, and as an actress has lent her skills to comedy — her three-episode run as Kim Jong-il on 30 Rock is a standout — and the dramatic, incomes prime marks from Collider for her efficiency in 2024’s All That We Love. Any considered one of these may function an inspiration, however for American Pickers’ star Danielle Colby, what Cho impressed in her has little to do with the aforementioned skills, however with one other of Cho’s passions: burlesque.
Margaret Cho Turned Burlesque From Taboo to Terrific for Danielle Colby, AKA Dannie Diesel
Colby grew up in Davenport, Iowa, by which she calls “a really loving however strict family” of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Regardless of taking an curiosity in burlesque at round age 10 or 12, her upbringing painted the artwork type as taboo, so she shelved the fascination. However in 2004, Colby attended Cho’s selection present The Sensuous Lady in Chicago, the place the present’s mixture of comics, singers, dancers, and striptease artists reignited that curiosity with burlesque, solely stronger, saying:
“What I noticed after I left that occasion was how completely liberating it was, to be in a room with girls on stage who have been starting from a measurement zero to a measurement of, simply, 28 – all several types of girls, with all completely different strengths… That is the sensation I left with, and it was life-changing, and at that time I knew I needed to do it [burlesque].”
She started by taking courses, which become educating burlesque courses. Colby in the end toyed with the concept of forming an area burlesque group, however family and friends weren’t precisely supportive of Colby’s proposed enterprise. “Oh yeah, individuals thought I used to be insane,” she admits within the beforehand cited River Cities’ Reader, however — as any fan of American Pickers would know — Colby is not one to care about what individuals assume. Shortly after, Colby fashioned knowledgeable performing troupe, Burlesque Le’ Moustache, and took on the stage moniker Dannie Diesel, which she’s saved ever since.
A Well being Scare Took Dannie Diesel Offstage
Colby has been very upfront about how burlesque has helped her on her life journey, which allowed her construct a more healthy relationship together with her physique and sexuality, educating her “about what I do not wish to be and what I do wish to be.” However life had completely different plans for Colby.
In a December 2024 Instagram video, Colby introduced that she was pressured to cancel her upcoming burlesque reveals — now and for the foreseeable future — due to a household well being problem, which deeply involved followers. It wasn’t till April nineteenth, 2025, that Colby introduced that she was bringing Dannie Diesel again to the stage after confessing that she was the one coping with the well being problem.
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As American Pickers prepares to enter a six month hiatus, the primary actual break for the solid in over 15 years, Colby is utilizing the chance to open up a museum devoted to burlesque and the “ecdysiast arts” (as Colby explains, “‘ecdysiast’ is simply an old-timey phrase for peeler, stripper, burlesque — anyone who works within the nude arts”). Apparently, her day job on American Pickers has been a boon to her love of burlesque historical past. She’s come throughout some nice costumes from the previous, together with a Nineties Lillie Langtry authentic costume from the Follies Bergere in Paris, a banana skirt believed to have been owned by Josephine Baker, and various bras from “the First Woman of Burlesque, April March (per the beforehand cited Fox Information).
It’s all a part of her objective to encourage different girls, as she was impressed by Margaret Cho, together with her Dannie Diesel performances on stage, and the preservation of treasures from the previous off of it, saying, “It could be a disgrace if this historical past that includes all of those sturdy, proficient, wonderful girls have been misplaced due to the disgrace of being a striptease artist, as a result of there’s no disgrace in that. It’s a ravishing artwork.” And who is aware of? Perhaps she’ll encourage Cho to develop into a picker for the twenty eighth Season of American Pickers when the cameras begin rolling once more in January 2026.
