Video: Cole Escola Shares Their Next Dream Role After OH, MARY!
Escola is back in Oh, Mary! for the rest of the show's Broadway run through June 28, 2025.
By: Josh Sharpe Apr. 29, 2025
Cole Escola is back on Broadway, returning to their iconic role of Mary Todd Lincoln as Oh, Mary! finishes its celebrated run with its original stars. Escola, who also wrote the play, visited The Late Show with Stephen Colbert to discuss the production and tease what they might want to do next.
Of Oh, Mary!'s success, Escola said, "It's still surprising to me. I don't know what to make of it. And if I knew how to process my feelings in real time, I wouldn't be in show business, would I?" Though Escola came up with the idea in 2009, it took several years to get it out into the world, which, they said, was mostly out of fear. "I was so scared that, once I got it on paper, I would be faced with my own mediocrity."
On their next project, Escola shared that they are "dying to play a straight guy...People never think to cast me as a straight guy." They went on to do their impression of what their version of a straight guy would sound like, which included lots of mumbling. "[A] straight guy's number one fear is being understood." Watch the full interview now.
Directed by Tony Award Nominee Sam Pinkleton, Oh, Mary! opened on Broadway on July 11, 2024 at the Lyceum Theatre, following a twice-extended, sold-out engagement at the Lucille Lortel Theatre Off-Broadway. At the Lyceum, it became the first show in the theater’s 121-year history to gross more than $1,000,000 in a single week and has since broken its own box office record eleven times.
Since Escola originally departed the show on January 19, 2025, Betty Gilpin and Tituss Burgess have both donned the now-infamous bratty curls. Escola returned to the role on April 8, 2025, with other members of the original cast for an encore run through June 28, 2025. Escola has received an Obie, Drama Desk, Theatre World, and Outer Critics Circle Award for their work on the show.
