Margaret Cho plays snarky assistant Teri on Lifetime's acclaimed series Drop Dead Diva, which is returning for a second season this summer. And in the season premiere, Cho partakes in a big musical number that is part of a dream sequence and features lots of hunky shirtless dancers. The stand-up comedienne who once had her own sitcom talked to Examiner about this beloved role and the added challenges she has found while filming season two.
On similarities and differences between herself and her character:
- "I think the main similarities...well, she's the oldest one, that I feel for sure! I'm the oldest one in the whole cast and the oldest character. I think, you know, we probably have the same sensibility here, the same sense of humor...The differences are I don't work in an office. I've never worked in an office. I don't even know how to work in an office, although my character and myself we both type very, very quickly. So I can say we both share that trait [as well]."
On the ever-changing challenges of Teri:
- "I keep finding out new things about the character as things develop. So this year, I find out that my character is a singer, [and] I open the second season with a big music and dance number, which is a lot of fun. I also have a soundtrack song. I made a record this year called "Cho Dependent," which will be out in August, and one of the songs that I wrote that didn't make it on the album, I put on the soundtrack record."
On how much of Teri's humor comes from Cho herself:
- "Sometimes I think a lot of the character has developed between my conversations just with Josh Berman and hanging out and things that I've said and done, they wind up in script. She's kind of, like, you know, in a sense what she reminds me of is kind of like an old, like an office crone. It's a kind of a character out of a Nine to Five or something. She is just a fun gal who has been around that place forever, and she knows everything, and so I'm kind of the source for information."
On if Teri will be getting a love interest this season:
- "Now we're shooting the ninth episode [or so]; we have about four more to go. I haven't seen a love interest so far. There's been a lot of talk about, but I’ve not seen it. So I can't answer that [definitively]."
On her budding music career:
- "I was working on my album doing music stuff. I've been working on it for a couple of years now. I was recording and writing with one of my producers, who is just fabulous-- Ben Lee-- who is an incredible singer/songwriter. So he and I would get together for our writing sessions, and for several months every time we get together we would end up talking about Lil Wayne, who we are both big fans of. So when Lil Wayne was going to prison, I thought we should write a song about it...It was really, really fun. For my writing, I kind of, as a musician, I kind of approach it as I would as a comedian. If I want to write something about somebody, or if something strikes me as funny, then I'll write about. Sometimes it'll become a song or sometimes it'll become a joke, but it's a very similar writing process."
On the differences between doing TV and a comedy tour:
- "It's a very different lifestyle. I mean, I feel like it's a chance to stay in one place, which is very different for me. I'm quite a traveling person. It's a different lifestyle...It's [also] fun to be able to work on a show that I really believe in, that I really love, and you know to just be able to see how it progresses and how it grows from week to week and how it changes, you know, and it's really a lot of fun."
Drop Dead Diva returns to Lifetime on June 6th. Cho will be starting a new stand-up tour at the end of the summer and continuing that through the year before she begins work on a potential third season for Lifetime. Where do you think she will play in Los Angeles? Many comedy greats (including Kathy Griffin and Chelsea Handler) have been stopping at the Gibson Amphitheatre in Universal City of late. Stay tuned for Cho's local tour dates and location!
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