Reviews

WINNER OF TWO TONY AWARDS
Including Best Direction of a Play

“Oh, Mary! may be silly, campy, but ‘stupid,’ I think not. Rather, the play is one of the best-crafted and most exactingly directed Broadway comedies in years.”

THE NEW YORK TIMES

“The playwright might describe it as stupid, but any comedy that liberates audiences from the despair of the current political climate with 80 minutes of almost uninterrupted laughter is a work of genius.”
THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

“What is has to say (beneath the ‘bratty curls’, bouncing hoop skirts, and spit-take-inducing jokes about inbreeding) is that you’ve got to find your parade, a freaky or frightening as it might be, and refuse to let anyone rain on it. It is, in essence, a liberation story, a celebration of funny girls of all stripes, of self-actualization beyond the oppressive confines of social normativity and cultural — big air quotes — ‘legitimacy.’”
NEW YORK MAGAZINE / VULTURE

“What makes Oh, Mary! such a fulfilling theatrical experience is that it also has a real message about the dangers of repression, both societal and personal. Letting people express themselves and live their truth may not solve every political problem, but it can certainly make life way more fun. Escola's doing that, and the rest of us should too.”
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY

“Cole Escola’s gleefully irreverent comedy is the funniest play in years. I can’t remember the last time I saw a play that made me laugh, helplessly and loudly, as much as Oh, Mary! It’s not just funny: It is dizzyingly, breathtakingly funny, the kind of funny that ambushes your body into uncontained laughter.”
TIME OUT NEW YORK

“The delights of Oh, Mary! are many, varied, and all-winning. If, like many, the world and life in general has left you tense, this Broadway show will liberate waves of plentiful laughter from within. In the best way that only theater can, the hilarity is communally shared by your fellow audience members, who are losing it merrily all around you. For 80 minutes, the Lyceum is a rumbling sea of giggling and guffaws.”
THE DAILY BEAST

“Howlingly funny. I have a pretty low threshold for the coarseness of much low comedy, and plenty of the humor in Oh, Mary! is so low it qualifies as subterranean, but Escola’s brilliantly loopy writing won me over. And the finale concludes the show on a note, or rather many notes, that are as satisfying as they are surreal.”
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

“Believe the hype about Broadway's gloriously irreverent 'Oh, Mary!' Escola’s brilliant lunacy is the real deal. Like the play’s unhinged diva, “Oh, Mary!” will not and should not be ignored.”
USA TODAY

“The funniest show on Broadway. What elevates “Oh, Mary!” from a hilarious and raunchy skit to an unexpectedly juicy yarn, though, is Escola’s oddly suspenseful plot. Multiple revelations get shocked gasps in this laugh-riot. It’s a show for the history books.”
NEW YORK POST

“The puns, bits, and gags zip by in quick succession, and the audience laughs nearly the entire 90 minutes. It is unquestionably the funniest, gayest, campiest play Broadway has seen in years. To borrow from the play itself, it is ”one hell of a night at the theater.”
VARIETY

“The funniest show on Broadway. ”
NEW YORK POST

There’s funny, there’s very funny, and then there’s Oh, Mary!
DEADLINE

“Oh, Mary! marks the arrival of an exhilarating new voice on Broadway, a place that has been wanting for laughter. With this deliriously funny, slanderously inaccurate historical comedy, Escola gives it to the audience good and hard. Provided you can stop laughing long enough, it’s a breath of fresh air.”
THEATERMANIA