‘Oh, Mary!’ Live Capture Starring Cole Escola To Debut On HBO & HBO Max In 2027

A live capture of Oh, Mary!, the hit, award-winning Broadway and West End stage comedy written by and starring Cole Escola will debut on HBO in 2027, the network announced today.

The program is the filmed capture of the July 28, 2026, performance that took place at the Trafalgar Theatre in London’s West End, with Escola back in his original role of Mary Todd Lincoln. The performance also features Giles Terera as Mary’s Husband, Bianca Leigh as Mary’s Chaperone, Tony Macht as Mary’s Husband’s Assistant and Michael Urie as Mary’s Teacher.

The taped performance will debut on HBO and be available to stream on HBO Max in 2027. A specific premiere date was not announced.

“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.”

Nina Rosenstein, Executive Vice President, HBO Programming, Late Night and Specials, took a slightly more straightforward approach: “Some shows stay with you long after you’ve seen them. Oh, Mary! is one of them. It’s 80 minutes of meticulously choreographed chaos…so wildly original that everyone who sees it immediately needs someone else to see it too. Cole has pulled off the almost impossible…they created a comedy that feels completely unlike anything else, while making it look effortless. We’re so incredibly proud to welcome Cole Escola and Sam Pinkleton’s Oh, Mary! to HBO.”

Director Sam Pinkleton said, “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. 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.”

Described as a “dark comedy about a miserable, suffocated Mary Todd Lincoln in the weeks leading up to Abraham Lincoln’s assassination,” Oh, Mary!, as the synopsis continues, “finally examines the forgotten life and dreams of Mrs. Lincoln, through the lens of an idiot (playwright Cole Escola).”

The laugh-out-loud comedy, in which a reimagined Mary Todd Lincoln drinks too much, gets mean too much, schemes too much and wants only to become a niche cabaret icon much to the dismay of a sexually confused husband who happens to be President, opened Off Broadway in January 2024. In July of that year the play (with music) transferred to Broadway’s Lyceum Theatre where it became the first show in the venue’s 121-year history to gross over $1 million in a single week.

Since its Broadway opening, Oh, Mary! has broken its own box office record fifteen times and became the first show of the 2024-25 Broadway season to recoup its investment. The Broadway production was capitalized at a reported $4,525,000.

The London staging debuted on the West End in December 2025, and will launch a North American tour this month.

The live capture of Oh, Mary! is executive produced by Escola, Alex Bach and Daniel Powell for Irony Point, Carlee Briglia and Mike Lavoie for Mike & Carlee Productions, and Kevin McCollum and Lucas McMahon for Alchemation.