Margaret Cho’s resume goes all over the place.

Cho is a stand-up comedienne, a gay activist, a “Dancing with the Stars” celebrity, an actress, an author and a songwriter.

Is there anything she hasn’t tried?

The stand-up part of Cho does a one-night stand at Caesars this weekend, part of her Cho Dependent tour. The dancer part got voted off the show earlier this month. The actress part agreed last week to be part of “Thugs: The Musical,” a short film written by her friend, comedian Kevin Avery – if Avery can raise $10,000 in 90 days.

And Cho the activist? That’s never far from her consciousness. On “The View,” after her ouster from ‘Dancing,’ Cho used the platform to talk about fighting to end to anti-gay bullying in schools.

Despite being voted off the dance show, Cho enjoyed the competition.

“It’s kind of like training for the Olympics,” she said in an interview. “You have a partner, you wear lots of fabrics that are supposed to wick the sweat away from your body, you have combinations, you have lots of eyes on you, you’re competing against other people, you are judged with number scores. The only thing missing are the medals.”

The Cho Dependent Tour will feature new stand-up material.

“It’s very exciting, very funny – all about gay rights, living in the south, sex, race, immigration, death, songs,” Cho said.

The performance will also include live renditions of songs on her comedy music album of the same name. “I wanted to create a new genre of music that is hilarious but also seriously good, so I turned to some of my music heroes to help me out,” Cho said on her website.

The lyrics on “Cho Dependent,” which tackle issues of sex, drugs, rock ‘n roll (and lice), may be laugh-inducing, but Cho has made no compromises when it comes to the quality of the songwriting and production.

“Over the years of being an intense music geek, I got to meet a lot of my heroes and I tricked them all into writing songs with me,” she said. “Most comics want to be rock stars, and most rock stars want to be comics, so it was an easy exchange.”
The talent list included Fiona Apple, Ani DiFranco, Garrison Starr, Brendan Benson, Rachael Yamagata, Patty Griffin and Kevin Barnes.

Cho, who turns 42 in December, grew up in San Francisco at a time she describes as “really confusing, enlightening and wonderful.”

She won a comedy contest where first prize was opening for Jerry Seinfeld. The initial success led her on the college circuit tour, appearances with Arsenio Hall and Bob Hope and a short-lived ABC sitcom called “All-American Girl,” a failure which still resonates today.

“There were just so many people involved in that show, and so much importance put on the fact that it was an ethnic show. It’s hard to pin down what ‘ethnic’ is without appearing to be racist. And then, for fear of being too ‘ethnic,’ it got so watered down for television that by the end, it was completely lacking in the essence of what I am and what I do,” she said.

Cho chronicled her experience in an off Broadway one-woman show called “I’m The One That I Want,” which toured the U.S, turned into a concert film and a best-selling book of the same name. In 2008, Cho returned to TV in the VH1 series, “The Cho Show.” Describing it as a ‘reality sitcom,’ she said, “It’s the closest I’ve been able to come on television to what I do as a comic.”

She also stars these days in a comedic drama series, “Drop Dead Diva,” on Lifetime. The show tells the story of a shallow model-in-training who dies in a sudden accident only to find her soul resurfacing in the body of a brilliant, plus-size and recently deceased attorney. Television newcomer and stage actress Brooke Elliott stars as lawyer Jane Bingum, and Cho plays her gal Friday, Terri.

“This show, I absolutely love. It’s really funny, but it’s also touching. It has a lot of heart, and I think the acting is really incredible,” she said on her website.

If You Go:
Margaret Cho plays Caesars Circus Maximus Theater at 9 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $35 to $50 and can be purchased through Ticketmaster by calling 800-736-1420, logging onto ticketmaster.com or by visiting the Caesars Box Office, 2100 Pacific Avenue.