He’s Got a Good Wig on His Shoulders: Meet Cole Escola

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/06/theater/hes-got-a-good-wig-on-his-shoulders-meet-cole-escola.html

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When Cole Escola is shopping for wigs, he knows exactly what he wants.

“I’m looking for something a young girl would wear on a porch,” he said, perusing the displays at Mane Beauty on Eighth Avenue in Manhattan. “But then I’m also looking for something ‘Dynasty.’”

Mr. Escola, a cabaret performer and regular on the Hulu series “Difficult People,” tried on a blond hairpiece, attentively studying the effect in a mirror as he tilted his head this way and that. “I don’t know if it’s ’80s enough,” he concluded. “Although I love the way it moves.”

He left with three wigs, which he would add to the 35-strong collection he keeps under his bed, in 7-Eleven doughnut boxes. It helps him create his comic characters and neatly encapsulates the absurdism and detailed characterization that distinguish his style.

In just under 10 years, the lithe Mr. Escola, who is 30 but looks much younger, has become a ubiquitous presence on the downtown alt-cabaret circuit, often sporting little besides briefs and a boyish smile. Shortly after co-creating the Logo series “Jeffery & Cole Casserole” in 2009, he became a regular on the music revue “Our Hit Parade.” There he joined a cohort that also included Bridget Everett and Kenny Mellman (of Kiki and Herb), and often brought unexpected insights to Taylor Swift songs. Now Joe’s Pub is hosting his sketch-comedy solo “Help! I’m Stuck,” in which he takes on about 10 personae, including an office worker who happens to be a goblin and a daffy Bernadette Peters. (The next show is Monday, July 10.)

“All of his characterizations are both demented and affectionate,” the comedian and actor Billy Eichner said. “He has a bone-deep knowledge of who these people are.”

Among Mr. Escola’s most popular stints is his recurring role as Matthew, Mr. Eichner’s flamboyantly obnoxious co-worker in “Difficult People,” whose third season has its premiere on Aug. 8.

“Matthew was definitely written for Cole, and since then he’s become an integral part of the show,” said Julie Klausner, the series’ creator, co-star and main writer. “I call him our Kramer because he comes in, says something insane and just disappears. It’s been a challenge to use Matthew sparingly.” (Ms. Klausner did give him a juicy gift in the new season, casting Vanessa Williams as Matthew’s ex-wife and writing them a sex scene she described as “wackadoo.”)

Mr. Escola, who is as self-effacing in life as he is confident onstage, doesn’t appear to mind the limited screen time, noting, “I would much rather be in something for two minutes and have it be great than do those supporting-character parts that are like, ‘How did the date go?’”

Besides, these two minutes add up: Mr. Escola was wig-browsing after a day spent shooting Amazon’s “Mozart in the Jungle,” for which he plays Lola Kirke’s roommate; he recently was on Netflix’s “Girlboss” and will appear on TruTV’s “At Home With Amy Sedaris” in the fall.

Not bad for someone who left Clatskanie, Ore., when he was 18 to follow a boyfriend to New York, promptly got dumped, then dropped out of Marymount Manhattan College after a year. And still, that’s better than what he left behind. “I grew up in a trailer until I was 5 or 6, and then my dad chased us out with a gun,” Mr. Escola said. “We moved in with my grandma for a while and eventually to government housing.”

While Mr. Escola is now multiplying TV appearances, it is still best to catch him in less controlled settings, where his impish humor and willingness to do just about anything can fully bloom. A large part of what makes him so subversive is the way he looks utterly innocent while perpetrating assaults on propriety.

“He has such a wicked sensibility and a cherubic, angelic face, so he’s coming at you from both sides and you’re a prisoner to his charm,” said Ms. Everett, who recruited him to play her unborn baby in her stage musical “Rock Bottom.”

“He had to go to Duane Reade before every show and buy diapers,” said Scott Wittman, who was a co-creator of “Rock Bottom” and directed it. “He’s a great low comedian and a sophisticated satirist — that’s a great combo platter.”

Mr. Wittman (of “Hairspray” fame) also gave Mr. Escola his first meaty stage role, in “Jukebox Jackie,” an evening-length tribute to the Warhol superstar Jackie Curtis. The experience whet Mr. Escola’s appetite for lengthier workouts.

In 2013, he portrayed the kooky aspiring playwright Roland Maule in a well-received revival of “Present Laughter” at Two River Theater in Red Bank, N.J. In May, Mr. Escola and Aaron Jackson presented an uproarious staged reading of their joint effort “Thicker Than Water” at Ars Nova, in which they portrayed a mother and daughter who happen to be rival dolphin trainers at a water park called Oceantasia. “We were billing it as ‘All About Eve’ meets ‘Blackfish,’” Mr. Escola said. “We’re also working on this idea that’s ‘The Crucible’ meets Christmas: witches and snow and crazy teenage girls and decorating the tree.”

If there is an old-fashioned variety show feeling to his work, that is the point for someone whose sensibility lands closer to Carol Burnett than to “RuPaul’s Drag Race.” “All I listen to are bootlegs of dead ladies’ cabaret shows, like Dorothy Loudon, and some not dead,” Mr. Escola said. “Anyone who’s been on Merv Griffin, I’ve heard their cabaret show. I’m not so much into contemporary Broadway stuff. Not that there’s anything wrong with that — I do not want hate from fans of Pasek and Paul, who I love actually.”

Mr. Escola still has a ways to go before matching Ms. Burnett’s expansive repertoire, but he’s diligently working on it. One of the wigs he bought was for yet another character, whom he described as “an author who had one book in the ’80s that was really big, about eating right for your star sign.” He glanced at a display of beards and mustaches, and breezily dismissed them: “Things I’ll never need.”