Cole Escola on Their Off Broadway Debut, ‘Oh, Mary!’

The latest in pop-culture news, recaps, and reviews, plus close reads, profiles, interviews, and more from Vulture.com. [Brand Logo]( encounter Cole Escola on Their Off Broadway Debut, Oh, Mary! In comedian Cole Escola’s debut play, Oh, Mary!, Mary Todd Lincoln gets to be an unstoppable diva, and so do they. Photo: Matthew Leifheit for New York Magazine It’s 28 degrees outside in mid-January, and [Cole Escola]( is leading me around Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetery in search of the gravestone of an actress-producer who died in 1873. “My lips are gone,” Escola tells me as they clutch their phone with gloveless hands. We’re spinning around, attempting and failing to follow directions from a combination of Google Maps, Apple Maps, and findagrave.com. They assume the voice of a prototypical audiobook narrator: “Two faggots walk into a cemetery …” We’re looking for the grave of Laura Keene, who was performing in Our American Cousin at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C., when Abraham Lincoln was shot in 1865. Escola chose to bring me to Keene’s grave in honor of their debut play, [Oh, Mary!](, which they wrote and star in as [Mary Todd Lincoln]( in the days leading up to the assassination of her husband. Keene told people she had rushed into Lincoln’s box with a glass of water and cradled the dying president’s head in her arms. Some scholars have since theorized that she lied about this melodramatic moment, which would make her a spiritual predecessor of Oh, Mary! One of the show’s central tenets is that the truth matters less than a worthwhile fabrication. [read more]( Devour pop culture with us. [Subscribe now]( to save over 60% on unlimited access to Vulture and everything New York. 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