About the Play:

Finalist for the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for Drama

Oh, Mary! is a full-length dark comedy by Cole Escola. A riotous, campy, outrageous comedy that dares to ask: What won't Mary Todd Lincoln do to be a star? Unrequited yearning, alcoholism and suppressed desires abound in Oh, Mary! that finally examines the forgotten life and dreams of Mrs. Lincoln through the lens of playwright Cole Escola.

Oh, Mary! is a wildly over-the-top, not-at-all historically accurate look at a miserable, suffocated Mary Todd Lincoln in the weeks leading up to Abraham Lincoln's assassination. Mrs. Lincoln is tired of Washington, DC. The nation's capital is so boring; she cares very little about her first lady duties, yearning to return to her glory days as a cabaret star. And if she can't do that, she might as well drink. Or push her chaperone down the stairs. Or drink. The entire White House is fed up with Mary's antics, most of all her bore of a husband, who has lots of stuff going on, like the Civil War. To get her out of his hair, Abe hires a handsome, up-and-coming actor to give Mary acting lessons, hoping to keep her busy and out of trouble, but the distraction ends up working a little too well. A 2025 Tony Award nominee for Best Play and a 2025 Pulitzer Prize finalist for Drama, Oh, Mary! is a riotous comedy brings a fabulous First Lady into the light.

Oh, Mary! premiered in 2024 off-Broadway at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in a run that was extended three times. The production earned two 2024 Outer Critics Circle Awards, including Outstanding New American Play and Lead Performer in an Off-Broadway play, both for Cole Escola. The show also won the 2024 Off Broadway Alliance Award for Best New Play. Declared “one of the best comedies in years” by The New York Times, it transferred to Broadway's Lyceum Theatre, where it became the first show in the theatre's 121-year history to gross more than $1,000,000 in a single week and became the first show of the 2024-25 Broadway season to recoup its investment. Both productions starred author Cole Escola as Mary Todd Lincoln – who became the first openly nonbinary performer to win a Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play.

Cast: 5 actors (any gender)

What people say:

"One of the best crafted Broadway comedies in years." — New York Times

"Oh, Mary! is not just funny: It is dizzyingly, breathtakingly funny, the kind of funny that ambushes your body into uncontained laughter… An instant classic." — Time Out New York

"Oh, Mary! is hilarious and, underneath the mayhem, both structurally rock solid and sneakily moving." — New York Magazine

"A zany portrait of Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln's family life whose outrageous humor also serves as an empathetic celebration of anyone who's been marginalized or misunderstood.." — Pulitzer Prize Jury

About the Playwright:

Cole Escola is an American comedian, actor, and writer. This Difficult People and Search Party actor is best known as the star and creator of the Broadway hit Oh, Mary!