Michael Urie on manifesting Oh, Mary! and exploring the challenges of queer parenting on Shrinking
Twenty years after his breakout role as Marc St. James on Ugly Betty, Michael Urie is experiencing one of the most creatively rich and personally meaningful chapters of his career.
Over the past year alone, Urie filmed a new season of Apple TV+’s Shrinking, raced across the country to step into the Broadway phenomenon Oh, Mary! for a limited eight-week run, briefly flew back to Los Angeles for the Emmy Awards, and capped the year starring in a queer-forward revival of Shakespeare’s Richard II. It’s the kind of artistic sprint that feels both exhilarating and slightly surreal.
“I’m like, who am I?” Urie jokes. But the answer is clear: he’s an actor hitting his stride at exactly the moment queer stories are demanding more depth, complexity, and emotional honesty.
Returning to Shrinking and Brian’s biggest evolution yet
Urie earned an Emmy nomination for his role as Brian on Shrinking, the therapy-centric dramedy co-created by Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein and co-starring Jason Segel and Harrison Ford. From the start, Brian has been sharp, funny, confident, and often wildly self-involved.
Season 3 forces that confidence to crack.
As Brian and his partner Charlie prepare to adopt a child, the character is confronted with responsibility in a way he’s never experienced before. It’s a storyline that pushes Brian beyond quips and bravado and into vulnerability, fear, and growth.
Urie has described Brian as the most immature character on the show, which makes the parenting arc especially compelling. Watching someone who believes “everything goes my way” slowly realize that adulthood demands compromise is where Shrinking finds its emotional power.
Why queer parenting stories still hit differently
For Urie, the adoption storyline resonates deeply. He comes from a generation of gay men who didn’t grow up imagining parenthood as a realistic option. Marriage wasn’t legal. Families weren’t reflected on screen. Even dreaming about kids often felt impractical or impossible.
That’s what makes Brian and Charlie’s journey feel quietly radical.
The show doesn’t treat queer parenting as a novelty or a political statement. It treats it as messy, stressful, and imperfect, just like any other attempt at building a family. Brian isn’t suddenly transformed into an ideal dad. He panics. He resists change. He messes up.
That honesty is what makes the representation land.
Urie points to queer parents in his own life who were pioneers long before legal recognition or mainstream support existed. Their experiences weren’t tidy, and Shrinking doesn’t pretend otherwise.
Manifesting Oh, Mary! and a Broadway dream realized
Between seasons of Shrinking, Urie found himself stepping into one of the most talked-about Broadway productions of the year.
His casting in Oh, Mary! came almost absurdly fast. After casually discussing the show with his partner and joking about how fun it would be to be part of it, Urie received the call the very next day.
It felt manifested.
Playing Mary’s Teacher allowed Urie to tap into a wildly different comedic rhythm, one that thrived on absurdity, timing, and theatrical precision. Sharing the stage with performers like Jinkx Monsoon and Kumail Nanjiani only added to the magic of the experience.
The run was short, but its impact was lasting. It marked a moment where Urie’s career momentum felt undeniable.
Letting characters grow the way people do
One of the rare gifts of long-form television is time. Unlike a play or a film, a TV series allows characters to evolve gradually, sometimes painfully, in ways that mirror real life.
Brian’s arc across three seasons of Shrinking reflects how maturity often sneaks up on people. Growth isn’t dramatic. It’s incremental. It’s uncomfortable.
For Urie, that evolution is deeply satisfying. It allows him to explore adulthood not as an endpoint, but as an ongoing process. Brian doesn’t arrive at wisdom. He stumbles toward it.
That kind of storytelling feels especially important for queer characters, whose narratives have historically been cut short or flattened into symbolism.
A rare glimmer of hope on TV right now
At a moment when queer families are once again being politicized and challenged, Shrinking offers something rare: warmth without denial, optimism without fantasy.
Seeing Brian and Charlie supported by their friends, allowed to fail without being punished by the narrative, feels quietly powerful. The show doesn’t claim everything will be easy. It simply insists that queer people deserve futures filled with possibility.
For Michael Urie, that may be the most meaningful role of all.
Season 3 of Shrinking is now streaming exclusively on Apple TV+, with new episodes dropping weekly.