When Taylor Mac set out to write a sequel to Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus, judy (Mac's chosen pronoun) didn’t intent to write a particularly controversial play. But, despite its seven Tony nominations, the playwright and performer thinks Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus might just be the most divisive show on Broadway right now.

“I was interested in telling a story about the cycles of revenge and the current state of the world,” Mac tells NewNowNext. “My revenge on revenge tragedy is to make something that brings in comedy and hope; that isn’t perpetuating the violence, but is trying to find a solution for it.”

Nathan Lane and Kristine Nielsen in Gary: A Sequel to Titus Andronicus.

Mac zeroed in on The Clown, a minor, unnamed character in Shakespeare’s bizarre and bloody work, and built Gary around him. At Broadway’s Booth Theatre, Nathan Lane takes on the role, a clown-turned-custodian tasked with mopping up the bodies after the curtain falls on Titus’ action. Gary is joined by the far more experienced Janice (Kristine Nielsen)—Julie White also appears as addlebrained nursemaid Carol—and the two spar over how exactly they, and the world, should deal with such unimaginable violence.

NewNowNext spoke with Mac about turning tragedy into comedy, how Gary fits into the playwright's body of work, and what these characters have in common with Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

What was so compelling to you about The Clown?

Shakespeare used The Clown not as a professional clown, but as an everyman. I just thought, wow, this everyman is the comic relief and is just there to go get killed. Isn’t that funny? He has no agency in his own life. I’m just tired of telling stories from the perspective of the status quo—not that I’ve done that a lot in my life, but I’m tired of seeing them, certainly. I thought it would be really nice to spend some time with a person who doesn’t have the power and see what power they could have.

I was curious if you think people should watch Julie Taymor’s film version of Titus before seeing Gary?

Titus Andronicus might say that people need to read Titus Andronicus to understand [Gary]. The people that haven’t read Titus Andronicus usually walk away going, Oh, you don’t need to read it! [Laughs] It’s always people protecting other people from their own ignorance!

The play boils down to the friction between how Gary and Janice choose to cope with tragedy. How would you describe their approaches?

I see [Gary and Janice] as people who are trying to improve the world instead of destroy the world—or win the world is maybe a better way of framing it. They’re not trying to win the world, they’re just trying to improve it. They have a debate about how to do that. Certainly, Janice is more incremental—maintain the status quo so the systems don’t fall, maintain the system—and Gary is working outside of the system. If you really want to reduce it you could say that Janice is the Hillary voter, Gary is the Bernie voter, and Carol is the voter who could vote for Hillary, Bernie, or Donald Trump. [Laughs] It’s really that argument, and also the ways that we tear each other down and build each other up in order to win our argument. How does that help us or stop us from helping the world instead of destroying it?

In the play, Gary seems to think that he can turn tragedy into comedy and that will help the world. That made me think about what Malcolm Gladwell has said about satire as a political tool: that rather than delegitimize racism, bigotry—that kind of thing—it tends to defang them and make them seem less dangerous. Do you think of comedy as an effective tool for change?

I think that satire is a very specific kind of comedy. I do think that satire sometimes does that. One of the things I talk about in another one of my plays in my Dionysia is the way that the various humorists dress. You can tell that the satirist is working within the system because they always wear a suit. So, someone like Stephen Colbert, who I love and admire and have so much respect for—there is an argument to be made that you’re wearing the suit and you’re working within the system and you’re defanging the person in power, but you’re not really changing anything. I tend to think it’s a little more complex than that. A clown or a buffoon or a fool—a fool wears something so phantasmagorical it’s not recognizable by the status quo as anything other than something that’s outside the norm. And the clown tends to wear the clothes of the poor. So, that tells you it right there: Where are they speaking from? What power do they have when they’re speaking? I don’t think that all comedy is defanging and normalizing. I do think that certain things can be dangerous.

Much of your work is about deconstructing and rethinking theatrical genres and experiences. How does Gary fit into that aspect of your work?

Well, there are many different ways to say “no observation without participation.” It doesn’t mean that you have to get up and sing a song with the performers or do what I have been doing, which is sort of ritual audience participation. It’s as simple as writing a play that’s surprising. It’s about edge-of-your-seat theater-making. When you make a mess on the stage...

I was going to mention that there is definitely a splash zone at Gary.

There’s a splash zone, yeah. I wish there was more of a splash zone! [Laughs] But I think people participate through their engagement with the characters and the ideas. So, that’s a more traditional theater way of doing it. I’m good with that. I just don’t want people to take. I’m not interested in theater where the audience can just sit back and take and get what they paid for.

So, what are you going to wear to the Tonys?

[Laughs] I’m havin’ Machine [Dazzle] make me an outfit! I got so depressed at the idea of wearing a tuxedo ’cause I was a cater waiter for so many years. I’m gonna wear something that makes me happy, which is always whatever Machine makes me!

The Tonys air Sunday, June 9, at 8pm EST on CBS.