“I think it’s so unique, and such a fresh perspective, and it’s a fresh take on what we think of as a BDSM community"
Margaret Cho is producing a web series about a queer Asian dominatrix.
IndieWire reports that Margaret Cho is producing Mercy Mistress – a web series about a queer Asian dominatrix.
Mercy Mistress is based on a memoir of the same title by BDSM educator and activist Yin Quan. Poppy Liu stars as Mistress Yin – a queer, first-generation, Chinese-American professional who has is also a dominatrix.
Each episode in the series sees Mistress Yin’s encounter with a new client as she pushes him to embrace his kinky lifestyle.
“I think it’s so unique, and such a fresh perspective, and it’s a fresh take on what we think of as a BDSM community and the queer community and also Asian-American-ness,” Cho said.
Cho herself has been exposed to the BDSM and leather communities in San Francisco where she grew up. “My experience of the leather community really comes from queer kink,” she said. “I used to work at this company called Stormy Leather in the 90s making leather dildos, I mean just incredibly grassroots, like actually making sex toys and selling them, so this world to me has really come alive in this series.”
I think [‘Mercy Mistress’] is actually very true to the lifestyle and what people really do, which is much sexier, and a lot more fun, and much more relatable and interesting.”
Quan said she was inspired to write a more authentic representation of the community after seeing negative and inaccurate portrayals of it in the media.
“Media tends to glorify sex work…where it seems glamorous but also shows the person’s completely destitute, or amoral,” said Quan. “I’m tired of that. The two narratives are like the happy hooker or the person who’s completely down and out who’s just doing it for some kind of hustle.”
Mercy Mistress season 1 was directed by Amanda Madden. Cho was the Executive Producer with Sarah Martin and Jessie Boemper.
The series will be launched on 7 January 2019 but you can catch the first episode below.