Earning Tony nominations as both the playwright and star of Broadway's Oh, Mary!, Cole Escola has become the first openly non-binary person nominated in the Best Play and Best Leading Actor in a Play categories (Escola decided to be considered in the latter gendered category). See the full list of 2025 Tony Award nominees here.
Escola's history-making nominations follow earlier non-binary milestones like Toby Marlow's 2022 win for the score of SIX: The Musical (co-written with Lucy Moss), the first Tony win for any non-binary person; and Alex Newell and J. Harrison Ghee's 2023 wins for Featured and Leading (respectively) Actor in a Musical, for their respective performances in Shucked and Some Like It Hot. Newell and Ghee's wins were collectively the first wins for a non-binary performer in any category.
A caveat: Taylor Mac, nominated in the Best Play category in 2019 for Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus, is not cisgender鈥擬ac famously uses the pronoun judy. But Mac has also been clear that judy is not non-binary, setting the stage for Escola's achievement May 1. Congratulations, queen!
Escola is currently back in an encore run starring as Mary Todd Lincoln in Oh, Mary! at the Lyceum Theatre, through June 28.
Cole Escola in Oh, Mary!
Cole Escola and Bianca Leigh in Oh, Mary!
Conrad Ricamora and Cole Escola in Oh, Mary!
Conrad Ricamora and Tony Macht in Oh, Mary!
Cole Escola and Conrad Ricamora in Oh, Mary!
Cole Escola and James Scully in Oh, Mary!
Conrad Ricamora, Cole Escola, and Bianca Leigh in Oh, Mary!
Tony Macht, Cole Escola, Conrad Ricamora, and Bianca Leigh in Oh, Mary!
