If these distressing times cry out for something silly to laugh at, an elfin young man named Cole Escola has emerged to deliver it with Oh, Mary. He wrote the 80-minute romp and stars as Mary Todd Lincoln, in a bouncy hoop skirt and ringlets wig. A spiritual descendant of Charles Ludlum and his Ridiculous Theater, Oh, Mary is too silly for my taste, but that is clearly a minority opinion in an audience that roared with laughter throughout the five-member cast’s over-the-top performance.
It is a little known fact — OK, made up by Escola — that Abe Lincoln’s unstable wife yearned to sing in a cabaret and she gets her wish in Oh, Mary’s finale. I did laugh at Escola’s antics, but not as much as I hoped to.