If you’re looking for a bit of light relief in amongst all of the doom and gloom that is the first four months of 2025, you have to check out this viral clip of Cole Escola on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.
Multi-talented performer and playwright Cole Escola, who is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns, joined Stephen Colbert to talk about their hit Broadway production OH, MARY! which reimagines Mary Todd Lincoln as a miserable wannabe cabaret star struggling with a drinking problem in the weeks leading up to her husband Abe’s assassination. The play opened in July 2024 to huge acclaim and features Escola in the lead role.
However, it was another performance that actually captured hearts and minds during Cola Escola’s appearance on the talk show, which took place on Monday (28 April): namely, their impression of a “straight guy.”
@colbertlateshow What comes after @OH, MARY! on Broadway? For @Cole Escola, it’s playing a “straight guy.” #Colbert #ColeEscola ♬ original sound – colbertlateshow
When asked what they wanted to do next after OH, MARY!, Escola replied: “I’m dying to play a straight guy… I have this straight guy that… and people never think to cast me as a straight guy.”
Stephen Colbert, naturally, wanted to meet this “straight guy”, and Escola obliged: with a very convincing bit of mansplaining about eggs.
“The worst thing for a straight guy… is being understood”
They went on to do other impressions about trucks, and wrecking their shoulder last night before explaining: “The key is, you have to keep in your mind that enunciating is gay… so you have to be like, really scared, to, like, enunciate. Basically the worst thing for a straight guy… is being understood.”
Stephen Colbert was encouraged to try and nail his very own straight guy impression, and absolutely nailed it with a very poorly-enunciated phrase, specifically: “You guys catch the highlights?”
The two minute clip has gone seriously viral since it was initially posted on TikTok, with over one million views so far.
A thousand people have also left comments, almost all complimentary. The top response is: “This reminds me of the Birdcage when Robin Williams and Nathan Lane were trying to learn to act straight.”
Another person wrote: “I don’t know this person but I love them.”
A third said: “I love Cole. they should do an Austin Powers reboot with Cole as a ladies’ man.”
We’re here for it, frankly.
If you happen to be in New York, you can catch OH, MARY! at the Lyceum Theatre on West 45th Street until June 28 2025.
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