See the show’s star, Cole Escola, disappoint Sarah Jessica Parker and Cynthia Nixon in teaser
The hit Broadway satire, Oh, Mary!, about how supposedly unhappy Mary Todd Lincoln was in the weeks leading up to her husband President Abraham Lincoln’s assassination, is headed to HBO. The version of the play, which has featured several notable stars playing Mary, will feature its writer and original star, Cole Escola, as Lincoln, alongside Giles Terera (in the role of “Mary’s Husband”), Bianca Leigh, Tony Macht And Michael Urie. The show’s original director, Sam Pinkleton, directed the production this past July in London. The special will air on an unspecified date in 2027.
A teaser for the production shows Escola in full Mary Todd Lincoln regalia arriving at HBO’s office. “Would you like some water?” asks a receptionist, who turns out to be Sarah Jessica Parker. Cynthia Nixon is standing there holding a tray, as Sex and the City–style music plays. “No, I wouldn’t,” “Mary” replies. Parker comments, “That will be nice to have around.”
“I’m so happy to share this show with a wider audience and spread Oh, Mary! awareness,” Escola said in a statement. “Knowing about Oh, Mary! is the first step in getting rid of it.”
“I fell in love with theater as a kid by absolutely wearing out the VHS tapes of Cats and Into the Woods and I am honored to continue that legacy with Oh, Mary! on HBO,” Pinkleton said. “Shepherding Oh, Mary! through its many lives (and Marys) has been an ecstatic experience and I’m giddy that the genius of original idiot Cole Escola will now be immortalized on televisions across America and beyond.”
Oh, Mary! opened off Broadway in January 2024 and moved to the Great White Way that July. It went on to win Tonys for Escola’s acting and Pinkleton’s directing and the Olivier for Best New Entertainment or Comedy Play. Escola was the first nonbinary person to win a Tony in the actor category. “It always bothered me when people would think the joke was that I was playing a woman,” Escola told Rolling Stone in 2024. “I never saw myself as a boy making fun of women. They were my friends growing up. They were who I wanted to be.”
