broadway

Cole Escola is the star and creator of Oh Mary!, an upcoming Broadway play about Mary Todd Lincoln, the wife of President Abraham Lincoln. But there's a twist: Mary is reimagined as a raging alcoholic with cabaret dreams and Lincoln is portrayed as an evil closeted gay man plotting on her misery. On the cusp of the show's Broadway debut, Brittany chats with Cole about the inspiration behind Oh Mary!, their favorite joke and why it's fun to play older women.

This week, Brittany Luse sits down with playwright Jocelyn Bioh, whose new play, Jaja's African Hair Braiding, is up for five Tony Award nominations, including Best Play. The two discuss Bioh's unique approach to comedy, what it took to bring a hair affair to Broadway, and how to find humor in dark situations.

Want to be featured on the show? Record your response to Brittany's question at the end of 'Hey Brittany' via voice memo and send it to ibam@npr.org.

Actor Michael Imperioli talks about his Broadway debut in An Enemy of the People and the relevance of this adaptation of the play, roughly 150 years after the original.

Larissa FastHorse is updating the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade to make it "less harmful" to Indigenous people. She's also consulting on a new Peter Pan and has a satire called The Thanksgiving Play.