Fresh Air - Cole Escola's 'Stupid' Dream Came True With 'Oh, Mary!'

Episode Date: May 19, 2025

Escola gives former first lady Mary Todd Lincoln a wild second act in the Tony-nominated play Oh, Mary! "This play is about a woman with a dream that no one around her understands," Escola says. The actor spoke with Ann Marie Baldonado about growing up in rural Oregon, the inspiration for the play, and making sense of its surprise success. Maureen Corrigan reviews Ocean Vuong's new novel, The Emperor of Gladness.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Look, we get it. When it comes to new music, there is a lot of it, and it all comes really fast. But on All Songs Considered, NPR's music recommendation podcast, we'll handpick what we think is the greatest music happening right now and give you your next great listen. So kick back, settle in, get those eardrums wide open, and get your dose of new music from All Songs Considered, only from NPR. This is Fresh Air. I'm Terry Gross. The Broadway comedy, Oh Mary, is nominated for five Tony Awards, including Best Play and Best Leading Actor in a Play. The comedy follows a very fictionalized,

intentionally improbable version of First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln in the time leading to her husband's assassination. Our guest today, Cole Escola, wrote the play and stars as Mary. Escola uses they them pronouns. They spoke with Fresh Air's Anne Marie Boldenado. The New York Times calls the play Oh Mary unhinged, so campy, and so unexpected. They've also called it one of the best comedies in years. Those looking for a close to historically accurate version of Mary Todd Lincoln should definitely look

elsewhere, because this play is a reimagining based on very few facts. Here the First Lady is depressed, sad, beside herself, and constantly drinking, not because of the Civil War or even the deaths of her children. She longs for her only true love, Cabaret, and her husband, the President, will try anything to stop her. Just another ploy to keep me from drinking and tucked away in the drawing room where no one can see me. Contrary to what your paranoia tells you,

I'm not some evil mastermind conspiring to keep you miserable. When you keep me off the stage, you make the whole world miserable. God for God's sake, Mary, how would it look for the First Lady of the United States to be flitting about the stage right now in the ruins of war. How would it look sensational? That's Tony nominee, Cola Scola as Mary and Tony nominee, Conrad Ricamora as Abraham Lincoln. Cola Scola first received rave reviews for Oh Mary when it premiered off Broadway in 2024 before transferring to Broadway. In addition to all the Tony nominations,

the play was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Drama. Colas Gola first came up in the cabaret and alt comedy scenes of New York after moving to the city 20 years ago. They also gained a cult following through their online shorts. They have starred in shows including Search Party, Difficult People, and At Home with Amy Sedaris,

and have written for shows like Hacks, Z-Way, and the other two. Kola Skola, welcome to Fresh Air. Thank you for having me. I couldn't have put it better myself. That is exactly who I am. Okay, great. Well, do you remember when you first learned about Mary Todd Lincoln and what you learned about her or at least like what your early memories were of her or the

president? She's one of those people that everyone just has sort of background knowledge of, you know, like Mrs. Claus or like, you know, toasters have two slots. It's just things you accept. And those kinds of things and people are what interest me most because I guess comedy relies so much on expectation that if I know there's a shared expectation by the wide audience, then it's easier to subvert it. Well, can you talk about how you first came up with the idea? I think it was in 2009. Yeah. I don't remember what sparked it. I just remember walking around Lincoln Center

and I had the thought, what if Abraham Lincoln's assassination wasn't such a bad thing for Mary Todd? And it was just an idea that tickled me so much. And originally, in my mind, it was the seed of an idea for like Mary's second chapter. Like a sort of Nancy Meyers style divorcee rom-com. Like what did Mary Todd Lincoln do after? You know, like she fully leaned into herself. And then, yeah, slowly over 12 years, I kept having other little ideas that eventually added up to the play. Now, in an article about the play, one writer says, Escola malls American history.

And you do take dramatic license. When people ask you if you did research, you joke that you've tried to unlearn what you already knew. But can you talk about why you did not want to do research? Well, because it's a comedy and I had to make something with the same understanding that my audience has, like everyone in New York City. I have seen the first 20 minutes of Ken Burns' The Civil War documentary. And I do remember learning bits of information about her coming to New York, you know, during wartime and spending outrageous amounts of money shopping for furniture and clothes and, you know,

people in the government and people in America sort of being angry at her for doing that during wartime. And I don't know. I just really related to her. Yeah. And she also remodeled the White House with new China, new troops. Yeah. I mean, she was stuck there. What was she supposed to do? I sort of feel for her in a way that like the only option she was given is sit there and look sad. Sit there and be the nation's sadness. Yeah. Well, I mean, that's another thing that you kind of learn is that she was a grieving woman. I mean, even before her husband was assassinated, she had

children who died young. She was grieving. She suffered from mental illness. Were those also parts of the inspiration for the play? You know, the grieving mother stuff, I mostly, I didn't want to have to cast children or figure out children. So I just sort of decided, oh, she hates her kids. And that solved that. They both do. They both do, yeah. In the play. They both hate their kids. And then, you know, funny enough,

I read something not long ago about how the Lincolns were, you know, neglectful parents. Like Abraham would just let them run rampant in his work study when he was a lawyer. This is literally based on like reading three sentences of an article. It's true then. And so it's true and I'm saying it on NPR.

Yes. Well, you've said that this play is very personal. And I'll say it again. This play is very personal. Well, you've said, Mary is me. Yeah. How is this play about you? This play is about a woman with a dream that no one around her understands.

A dream that the whole world is telling her is stupid and doesn't make any sense. And I feel that way. You've also said that the feeling that Mary has that everyone is annoyed with her is something that you relate to because Abraham thinks that Mary is too much and her dreams are too much. And you worry about that with the way people felt about you.

Yeah, this play is about a person that everyone thinks is annoying, which is my worst fear. So I'm sort of playing out, basically, can the audience root for someone annoying? Can a character be so incredibly annoying and you still root for them? But is part of it that married, you know, she just wants to express herself. She wants to live her truth while, you know, when in her marriage, her role in society,

her gender have sort of prevented her from doing any of that. Yeah, yeah. And that also applies to the rest of the characters in this play. Every one of these characters is dealing with a deep secret desire that they think they shouldn't have. You know, Abraham Lincoln's sexuality, every character in this play has a want that they think they shouldn't want. For people who haven't seen you as Mary, can you describe your wig and your dress?

They're like so fun to put on and run and jump around in. I mean, the curls in the wig are high and tight, and they bounce in the most obnoxious, petulant way. And the skirt is so big and cumbersome and yet light enough that I can rip it around like I'm a Tasmanian devil in a tornado. I want to unpack what it is about cabaret that Mary loves and maybe that you love too. What sets cabaret apart from other kinds of performing? There are some things that are maybe factual about cabaret. It's intimate.

There's interaction with the audience. It's about personal storytelling. Yeah, it's about the story of the song rather than the singing mostly. Well, like Mary, you are a well-known cabaret singer and you came up through this downtown New York scene with people like Bridget Everett and Murray Hill, who people might know from the HBO series Somebody Somewhere, among other things. Can you describe what that scene was like? This is the mid to late 2000s? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So there was this monthly cabaret show called Our Hit Parade at Joe's Pub, and it was 10 different cabaret or musical or performance artists performing the top ten Billboard songs of the month, doing their own interpretations of those songs. And it was a monthly show, usually, you know, like over half of the same people and then a few, you know, special guests. And we did that every month for like three years and I was a regular guest and it's truly like I didn't go to school but I feel like that's where I cut my teeth so to speak and learned like how to perform and how to write for an audience. Well, there's footage online of you performing at the last show in 2012, which was kind of a celebration of, you know, the show coming to an end.

Would you mind if we played a little bit of your performance? I... I... I'll let you do that, yeah. Okay. Okay, thanks. When I was three, my dad chased my mom and me and my little brother out of our trailer because he thought the government was after him. They weren't.

But we ended up going to my grandmother's anyway. Actually we made a pit stop at my mom's AA sponsor's house, but that's for a different show. And I remember when we got there I was really scared and confused because I wasn't sure are we living here now and I remember going to my mom and telling her that I was really scared and afraid and she gave me the best piece of advice that I've ever received and she she said, cool, go away. And 15 years later I did.

I moved here to New York City. I followed, yes. That was seven years ago. And four years ago, I came on this stage and did my first star hit Parade and I sang this song. Take a deep breath as I walk through the doors, it's the morning of the very first day. Say hi to my friends who I ain't seen in a while. Try and stay out of everybody's way. It's my freshman year and I'm gonna be here for the next four years in this town. Hoping one of the senior boys will smile at me and say, you know, I haven't seen you around before.

Cause when you're fifteen and somebody tells you he loves you, you're gonna believe them. That's Cola Scola performing in 2012. I love that performance. And the joy of you singing a Taylor Swift song, that's the Taylor Swift song, 15 about being in high school. I mean, listening to that, I wanted to jump out of a window. I'm sorry. That was 13 years ago. It's not your to jump out of a window. Sorry.

That was 13 years ago. It's not your fault. It was a long time ago. Look, I would have done that a lot differently now, and I would have done it differently knowing that other people would listen to it later. Well, I will say that I would pay good money to hear you sing the Taylor Swift songbook just about all the phases. I'll see you at Carnegie Hall in a couple years.

Cole, can you describe where you grew up in Oregon? Yeah, I grew up in a town called Klatskany, Oregon. It's also the birthplace of Raymond Carver, by the way. So you will see a lot of similarities in our work. But it is a very rainy mill town. It's a gas station on your way from Portland to the coast. It's like 1,500 people, lots of trees, and nothing much else. And that story that you tell on stage during your cabaret act, is that true? You were young. Do you have memories of that?

I do have memories of that. And I remember being excited that we were going to my grandma's because I didn't like the trailer where we lived and I didn't like my father. And you ended up living with your grandmother. Yeah, and my grandmother and I shared a bedroom and she taught me how to read and yeah. Well, you said that you loved

to hear your grandmother's stories. Yeah, yeah. What were some of your favorite stories that she would tell you? She told this story a lot about her 10th birthday when she found out her dad had a stroke and died working in some sort of mine in Canada. And then there was also a story about how she really couldn't see, her eyesight was really bad, but her family couldn't afford glasses. But then one day a doctor came to town and gave her a free pair of glasses. These aren't great stories. It was always the way that she told them and the details and the way

she disappeared into the story in the telling of it., we didn't have a lot of money. We didn't have a lot of money. And mom made $3 a month. $3 a month. Six kids and $3 a month. And just the seriousness. I mean, I'm laughing because I'm just now realizing it was a cabaret act. I never put that together. That was my first exposure to cabaret was hearing my grandmother with Alzheimer's retell me stories about her childhood in Alberta, Canada. Well, I read that you used to stay at home on Mondays. Yes. Because on Mondays, your grandmother would have lunch with her friends.

Yeah. And you really wanted to hang out with them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I would go to lunch with them. I don't know why my mom, I'm sure she knew. I mean, it was literally every Monday of second grade that I would say, I'm sick. I need to go to grandma's.

And we would go to this burger joint or the diner with my grandma Irene and her friends Ruby, Grace, and Shirley. In your comedy, you often do characters that are middle-aged women like Mary and like these women that you're speaking of. Do you think your appreciation for women of that certain age sort of began with your grandmother and her friends? I mean, undoubtedly. I wanted to be with them.

I wanted to be them. Because they also loved me. They loved, I was so precocious. And they were always just shower, I mean, after my grandmother, her Alzheimer's got really bad and she had to move into a nursing home and the, you know, the sort of group of gals split up and all went their separate ways because of health issues. I started going to church by myself. I was like 11 years old because I needed that validation from older women. I needed someone brewing coffee for me and say, well, aren't you just so polite? That was life to me.

Did you actually become religious then or were you in it for the social? A little of both. No shade either way. No, no, no. A little of both. I mean, I definitely remember in that period, I was praying a lot to God to make me bisexual. My attraction to men was so strong, I knew, I was like, well, there's no way even God can take that away. I'm not asking you to take anything away.

Just give me, please, an attraction to women and I will only act on that, I promise, which, you know, in retrospect is, of course, sad, but also now that I'm safe, it's amusing. My guest is comic writer and actor Cole Escola. They're nominated for two Tony Awards, Best Play and Best Leading Actor in a Play for the Broadway show, Oh Mary. More after a break. I'm Anne-Marie Baldonado, and this is Fresh Air. Hi, this is Molly Sivinesper, digital producer at Fresh Air.

And this is Terri Gross, host of the show. One of the things I do is write the weekly newsletter. And I'm a newsletter fan. I read it every Saturday after breakfast. The newsletter includes all the week's shows, staff recommendations, and Molly picks timely highlights from the archive. It's a fun read.

It's also the only place where we tell you what's coming up next week, an exclusive. So subscribe at whyy.org slash fresh air and look for an email from Molly every Saturday morning. When did you find performing? I think your first play was when you were 11? That was my first professional acting job. But when I was, I think, five, we didn't have performing arts in our town in Klatsk

and I. But there was this company called Missoula Children's Theatre. And every year they would, two adults from this theatre company would come to town for one week. And in that one week they would do auditions on Monday and the show was on Friday. And I just lived for that one week a year. But then, yeah, my first professional acting job was in a production of Grapes of Wrath. I played Winfield Joad, and it was in a town 30 miles away from Klatsk and I, where I grew up. And during that time, my grandmother lived in a nursing home, and it was close, and it was much, much, much closer to the theater than where I lived. So some

nights after rehearsals, I would stay over at her nursing home. What was it like being a kid in the nursing home? Well, I wasn't sure that I was allowed to be there. Like, I knew I could visit. I was pretty sure I wasn't allowed to spend the night. But I did anyway, and it felt, it was weird. I was lying to so many adults just so that I could be in this play. I think I lied to my mom and I told her like, oh no, the play feeds us. And meanwhile, I wasn't eating because I knew if I said I need money for food, she would

say, well, we can't do that. I'm sorry, you can't do this play. And you know, I lied to the adults in the play saying like, oh yeah, no, I can stay with my grandma in the nursing home, so I can be late at rehearsal. And just 11 years old trying to keep everyone in the dark about the fact that I was a child. Well, you know, Grapes of Wrath, a serious play.

But you, like you're saying, but you ended up finding community there, like an extended family. Yeah, this woman that played Rose of Sharon, her name was Susan, she bought me food on our meal breaks every day. And it was never an issue, I never asked her. She just She never, like, it was never an issue. I never asked her. She just, she saw what was going on. And yeah, so she would buy me food and then other actors would give me rides

to my grandma's nursing home. And I was in heaven. Now you were in shows, like you said, you were in Fiddler on the Roof, Little Shop of Horrors, Les Miserables. What kind of parts did you play? Well, because I was a, you know, for all intents and purposes at the time, a boy who could

sing, I was always cast as, you know, like the romantic male lead, like Matt in the Fantasticks or Marius in the Ms. Seymour on Little Shop was a little fun because at least I got to dance a tango with Mr. Mushnik for Mushnik and Son, so I got to be girl in that one number. But yeah, for the most part, I played these really boring parts that didn't speak to me or spark me at all. And sort of for that reason, I didn't pursue acting after high school. I didn't think that that's what I wanted to do. So when you sort of pictured yourself as a performer in the future, it wasn't as an actor

in plays. No, I didn't even picture myself as a performer. I didn't know what I wanted to do yet, but I was like, oh, okay, so if I want to be an actor, I'm going to have to go to school and learn how to move less gay and talk less gay and play these boring boy parts. And I was like, I don't think I want to do that. Well, you've said that you always associated, quote unquote, theater with pretending to be straight.

Yes. That's what you're talking about? Yeah, yeah. Even back then you felt that way. Yeah, especially back then. Now I don't at all. And I would play the stage manager in our town like a bitter, bitchy old jaded queen and not think, nothing of it. Well, I read that.

In fact, someone please produce that. That would be great. I would love to try that out. Well, when you first were in New York, you weren't sure that you wanted to be a performer. What then inspired you to become one, to start making viral videos, which is what you did first? Well, it was a couple things. I was miserable.

I was truly suicidal. I was bulimic, you know. And I was walking around near Bloomingdale's. And I remember I was having these thoughts about not wanting to be alive. And then I started having those thoughts in a character's voice, a voice not unlike my grandma and her friends. And I came up with this character, Joyce Connor, who was a really sort of cheery, innocuous middle-aged woman who was just kept having to put off her suicide because so many things kept popping up over the weekend. And that, for some reason, was like this huge release valve. Like, it both allowed me to feel what I was feeling, but also relieved me from feeling burdened

by what I was feeling. My guest is Cole Escola. Again, if you or someone you know is considering suicide, you can call or text the number 988. More after a break. This is fresh air. Well, you were part, or maybe still are part, of what New York Magazine called at the time, a wave of new queer comedy, with comics like Bowen Yang and John Early

and all the people you've been mentioning in the 2010s, I guess. Were there places where queer comedians would perform outside of what could be considered quote unquote mainstream comedy clubs, whatever that means. I actually kind of predated it a little bit. You know, I was emceeing folk shows as characters at dive bars. I just sort of went where I was invited or like where I felt like I could get in. I never sought out new ground to break. I was just like, I want to do this

thing that I want to do. Where can I do it? There? OK. I'll make it good. And hopefully, if I make it good, people will come. I imagine that the shows that you were doing as being places where friends would gather and try to make each other laugh and maybe be silly or absurd as much as possible. Yeah.

Yeah. or absurd as much as possible. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, I didn't really and still don't identify really as a comedian because it's hard for me to just like plug and play as they say. Like, just like take what I do and stick it in a lineup. Like, I would perform with these, you know, other brilliant comedians like Bowen and John and Julio Torres and Joel Kim Booster and Matt Rogers, but you know, the list goes on and on. But I always felt a little like they were doing their old aunt a favor, letting her bring her wigs and do her little characters. And then, and it was hard to like,

it's hard to win an audience over by, you know, stand up is you're talking to the audience and then I come on in a wig and put up a fourth wall and it's like, what? Ew, go away. Well, is it out of this community that Omeri became possible? Did you workshop it and try it out in smaller venues?

Or did Omeri kind of come out fully formed? It basically came out fully formed. For three years, I did a solo sketch show every month at the Duplex. And I did it at the Duplex because if you got over 60 or 65 people, they let you keep 100% of the door because they made money off the two-drink minimum. I truly did it because I was like, oh, my God, I can perform and make like $900 a month. And so I set this challenge up for myself that I would write a whole new hour every month. And I did that and it was so challenging

and maybe the most like fun, rewarding thing that I ever did for myself. But in writing sketches I sort of learned how I think a scene should work. And then after doing those shows for three years, I thought, I wonder if I can build a show of scenes like this that makes sense altogether with an arc, but that also are, you know, like tight funny scenes. Basically a sitcom. I wanted to see if I could write a sitcom.

And is a play a sitcom? Yeah, sitcoms are plays. I mean- Oh, other way. Yeah, well, I mean, I think plays predate sitcoms. You'll have to fact check me on that. Get your research department on the phone. But yeah But yeah.

Was it surprising to you? Like did you ever in your mind imagine that it would become this phenomenon that it is? Never, never, ever, ever. I mean who would ever think like, okay Cole, a play where you're in drag playing Mary Todd Lincoln as a wannabe cabaret star. I think you should pursue this as a big Broadway hit. Like that, I mean, absolutely not. We were like over the moon that we got eight weeks at the Lucille Lortel Theater. And I still think that's really cool. I can't believe that we did get that. But like, yeah, I still can't really wrap my head around it. And I'm leaving the show, June 21st is my last performance

and I'm slowly starting to I'm slowly starting to wrap my head around the whole experience. And I will say I've been crying a lot. Well, you left the show earlier this year, took a few months off. But then you came back. I'm wondering if when you first left, did you know you were leaving the role for just a short period of time and coming back? Because it's rare for original cast members to return to a show after leaving. I, well, I wanted to come back because I was like, I want to close the show.

I thought this was when we were like, okay, we're closing at the end of June. And, you know, we intended to do this show eight weeks off Broadway. And then once it was going well, we were like, oh my god, I hope we can extend three weeks. And then we went to Broadway. And then suddenly it's, I was doing the play for a full calendar year. I had projects, like scripts that I had promised that I had been paid to write, that I didn't write because I was like, well, I'll do it after the eight week Omeri run. And then, okay, well, I'll do it after the three week extension. And I was just like, I need a break.

I also had to move out of my apartment. I was like, I just need time to like, get all of these things back in order and then I wanna come back to the show and say goodbye to the show and close it. When you first took your break, you handed it off first to actress Betty Gilpin and then to actor Titus Burgess.

Yes. What was it like handing off the role that you wrote for yourself? I was scared. I don't know. I was scared for all the reasons. Like, um, what if they're, like, what if they don't quite get it or what if they like what I don't know I I was just I was scared because I didn't know what to expect and then the way that they both embraced this role like it's like it was their dream role um is so satisfying. And I've said this before, but like as someone who is always begging their friends to like, please be in my movie, like, can we please like make this little

movie, can we please like put a skit together for the talent show, to now have like two of my favorite actors in the world, Betty Gilpin and Titus Burgess, who are both so deep and so funny, take on a role and like love it as if it was given to them by, you know, Mike Nichols or George Cukor. It's like, I can't think of a better feeling. What is making you so emotional about leaving the show? I mean, it is something you've devoted so much time to for decades. I can't believe that my big break came from doing what I wanted to do, like, you know, I ever had any sort of quote-unquote real career success,

you know, I would be the gay best friend on a sitcom I'm embarrassed to talk about on a panel. But it's also the best thing that's ever happened to me in my whole life. So I am excited to write what's next. Cole Escola, congratulations on the Tony nominations and thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much for having me. Cole Escola spoke with Fresh Air's Anne Rebaldonado. Escola will play the role of Mary Todd Lincoln until June 21st. Oh Mary continues its Broadway run through September. Coming up, our book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews a new novel from Ocean Vuong, which

she calls Truly Great. This is Fresh Air. One of this year's most anticipated novels has just arrived. The Emperor of Gladness is Ocean Vuong's second novel. It follows his celebrated 2019 debut On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous. Our book critic, Maureen Corrigan, says Vuong's admirers, of which she is one, will not be disappointed. Ocean Vuong's 2019 debut novel On On Earth Where Briefly Gorgeous,

was one of those novels that made me silently pledge, I'll follow you anywhere, whatever you write. And so I have, into Vuong's 2022 poetry collection, Time is a Mother, and now his second novel. The Emperor of Gladness, like its predecessor, explores what Vuong has called in a recent interview the loneliness of class movement. Sprawling where its predecessor was compact, the Emperor of Gladness opens on a view, sweeping in time and space, of East Gladness, Connecticut, a town that manufacturing left behind.

Our tour guides are the spirits of the place who speak to us in a collective voice. Follow the train tracks, the ghosts advise, till they fork off and sink into a path of trampled weeds leading to a junkyard packed with school buses in various stages of amnesia. Furred with ivy, their dented hoods pooled with crisp leaves, they are relics of our mislearning. If the novel's opening calls to mind Thornton Wilder glazed with Springsteen. What happens next reads like Wong's nod to Frank Capra and his classic 1946 film, It's a Wonderful Life. Our main character, a 19-year-old depressed Vietnamese-American boy named Hai, stands on the town bridge. Hai has lied to his immigrant mother. She knows he's dropped out of college, but in an effort to

make her feel better, Hai claims he's been accepted to med school, which she naively believes. Her joy fills him with self-loathing. As Hai is about to jump into the river below, he's stopped not by Clarence the Angel, but by an elderly woman whose house abuts the river. Grazina arrived in East Gladness as a Lithuanian refugee after World War II. She's now a widow suffering from dementia and stranded in what was once a thriving blue-collar neighborhood. in what was once a thriving blue collar neighborhood. Because she has an empty house and Hai can't return to his mother, the two settle in together with Hai becoming Grazina's caregiver.

This is one vision of a found family that Vuong presents in the Emperor of Gladness. And its miraculous lack of sentimentality surely owes something to the fact that he lived a similar story himself. In fact, Vuong dedicates this novel to his Grazina. Vuong's gifts of writerly restraint also keep things real here. About midway through the novel, Grazina asks Hai, who's giving her a bath, if he'll undress for once, so she doesn't feel like I'm some patient. High steps out of his boxers, and Grazina looks at him, the relationship silently equalized. But it's another type of found family that this novel even more deeply explores, that

is, the often fleeting but intense one that sometimes emerges through work. Hive finds a job at a local fast casual restaurant called Home Market, although he quickly catches on that, at Home Market, made by hand meant heating up the contents of High and his fellow workers as well as the drugs they take to get through the pain and exhaustion of those routines. Every day this crew spends more of their waking hours with each other than they do with anyone else. One result is that they can sniff each other's presence. Before long, High began to know which employee was behind him by their scent alone. The Johnson and Johnson baby lotion Wayne rubbed over grease burns on his arms. The traces of whiskey

coming through the Wrigley's Maureen chute, the bootleg Tom Ford BJ war cut with the strawberry starbursts Russia was always sucking on. The Emperor of Gladness is a truly great novel about work, still an under-acknowledged topic in American fiction. Hard work is supposed to get you somewhere, that's part of the promise of America. But the payoff feels much less certain to these characters. A winning lottery ticket, an inheritance, maybe even a union would have to come along to propel these characters to a place of greater humane possibility. Vuong's achingly austere artistic vision leaves it to his readers to imagine the

better world he won't let himself depict on the pages of this wonderful novel. Maureen Kargan is a professor of literature at Georgetown University. She reviewed The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong. Tomorrow on Fresh Air, I'll talk with CNN host Jake Tapper about his new book, Original Sin, President Biden's Decline, its cover-up, and his disastrous choice to run again. Tapper says the book goes to universal questions about groupthink, courage, cowardice, and patriotism. He adds, this doesn't excuse or normalize President Trump's actions. I hope you'll join us. To keep up with what's on the show and get

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