Tony nominee Conrad Ricamora is currently wowing audiences portraying a closeted, hypermasculine Abraham Lincoln in the wacky Broadway comedy Oh, Mary!, playwright and star Cole Escola’s ‘fever dream about Mary Todd Lincoln.’ –according to Ricamora.
The truly phenomenal show had a critically-acclaimed sold-out run off-Broadway last season at the Lucille Lortel Theater before moving uptown to the Lyceum, where it opened last June to more raves and has extended a number of times. The original cast, including Ricamora, have now returned for the final extension (or is it?)
Oh, Mary! is an outrageous, side-splittingly hilarious, subversive look at the relationship between Ricamora’s lusty, closeted-gay Abe and his wacky, boozer wife, Mary (Escola), who’s desperate to become a cabaret performer. The entire ensemble plays the farce to perfection with Ricamora a riotously funny stand-out as our ill-fated 16th President, a role that gifted him a much deserved first Tony nomination.
The Out actor first came to national prominence when he was featured in the Viola Davis series, How to Get Away with Murder, playing hacker Oliver, the boyfriend of Jack Falahee’s brazen Connor. The couple had quite a number of hot, steamy love scenes, rare for network TV at the time (and still). Ricamora was only supposed to make a few guest appearances, but the creatives were so taken with him (as were the viewers) that he ended up being featured in 82 episodes!
His other TV credits include The Resident, How to Die Alone and a wild turn as Michelle Williams’s sexual ‘pet’ in a truly memorable episode of Dying for Sex.
His most notable screen role is as the judgy gay attorney Will in Andrew Ahn’s queer-themed rom-com, Fire Island (2022).
On stage, he played Lun Tha in the LCT Broadway revival of The King and I (2015), co-starred in David Henry Hwang and Jeanine Tesori’s musical Soft Power at the Public Theater (2019), and played Seymour in the Little Shop of Horrors revival (2022). He portrayed Ninoy Aquino in the underrated musical Here Lies Love, which bowed on Broadway in 2023, but had a busy off-Broadway history, which Ricamora was part of, from 2012 to 2017.
Audiences can enjoy his brilliantly lunatic work in Oh, Mary!, currently playing at the Lyceum Theatre, NYC, through September 28, 2025.
The Contending had a blast video chatting with Ricamora.
