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Oh, Mary! Is Excellently Uncivil
Cole Escola’s Mary Todd Lincoln farce transfers uptown, preserving the union between absurdity and hilarity.
took the West Village deliriously captive in its big gay pirate ship back in the spring, and while the wickedly clever Escola — who made their name first on YouTube playing wonderfully unhinged characters, then as a scene-stealer on shows like Search Party and Difficult People — is on record calling the uptown transfer “a mistake,” they and director Sam Pinkleton have wisely left funny enough alone. When their Mary announces her life’s great passion, or reminds her husband that “people traveled the world over for my short legs and long medleys,” or — as she begins acting lessons with a worrisomely hunky teacher — launches into a burring, lisping, writhing delivery of iambic pentameter that makes her sound like “a horny snake,” she is, for all her diegetic disempowerment, in total control of us. Not only does Mary herself put on one hell of a show, it’s also a joy to see Escola — who dropped out of college after one year because they couldn’t take out more loans, and who turned their own very real suffering into such generous flights of hilarity — kick down the doors of what Ricamora’s Abe Lincoln calls, with a pompous sniff, “the legitimate theater.” Sometimes, the most loving creations are the least reverent.
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