W
hen Cole Escola first conceived their Broadway play Oh, Mary! in 2009, the premise was simple: How did Mary Todd Lincoln feel after the death of her husband, the 16th president of the United States? It was to be in the style of Nancy Meyers, all flowy white linen and second chances at love. But the play that scored Escola a Tony Award this year was much more of its time — and its creator’s mischievous mind. Taking place during the last days of Mary’s marriage, the madcap story morphed the first lady into a crazed alcoholic with a desperate love of cabaret. This Mary drunk-vomits into a bucket, mean-girl taunts her female minder, and lusts after her hunky acting coach while her husband gets secret blow jobs from a uniformed assistant. She is equal parts unhinged and ruthless, and so comically out of touch that when her husband, navigating the nation through the Civil War, mentions the South, she repeatedly asks, “The south of what?” In some ways, she’s even a distorted, kaleidoscopic picture of Escola themself, as they explained on the podcast Good Hang With Amy Poehler: “Can you root for someone who’s annoying? That’s what I wanted.”
When the show began its initial run — with Escola starring — in 2024, the actor was known primarily for playing “demon twinks” on streaming sitcoms (Difficult People, Search Party) and the unhinged next-door neighbor on At Home With Amy Sedaris. They particularly leaned into roles that portrayed middle-aged women as if they’d been plugged into a live socket. This take comes from a childhood spent in rural Oregon, they have said, spending time with their grandmother and her friends. “It always bothered me when people would think the joke was that I was playing a woman. I never saw myself as a boy making fun of women,” Escola told Rolling Stone last year. “They were my friends growing up. They were who I wanted to be.”
Escola channeled that inspiration into the play, which they wrote without much consultation to the actual history. Instead, it was a way to channel elements of themself — issues with addiction, the fear of being “too much,” a deep love of cabaret — while putting everything on the line. “This play is the most terrifying thing that I can think of doing,” they told Rolling Stone on the eve of the Oh, Mary! premiere. “I’m terrified — of doing a bad job, of disappointing audiences.”
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Those fears turned out to be misplaced. Though Escola has stepped aside, the show is going strong — its run in New York goes through July 2026, and performances start on the West End next month — and Mary Todd Lincoln is now the hottest role on Broadway. (As of this writing 30 Rock’s Jane Krakowski is helming it.) And leaving the show has just made room for bigger and better things: Escola’s next projects include a gig as a series regular in Netflix’s live-action manga adaptation One Piece, writing a Miss Piggy movie for Jennifer Lawrence and Emma Stone, and co-starring alongside Jesse Plemons in A24’s upcoming comedy Jonty, written by Jesse Armstrong and Lorene Scafaria.
Overall, Escola’s career seems to be proof that in a world of committee-made stories and AI slop, there’s still room for sheer creativity. The Tony Awards recognized as much this year, too. The standout moment of the 2025 ceremony was probably Escola rushing to the stage after winning Best Actor in a Play, hiking up their lavender ballgown — a tribute to Bernadette Peters, the Broadway legend they’ve long portrayed in cabaret acts — and booking it as quickly as they could. “They tell you you have 90 seconds from when they call your name to the end of the speech,” Escola said, recounting the experience on Poehler’s podcast. “So I was like, I wanna talk as long as possible. That’s always been my goal.”
