New York Drama Critics' Circle Awards

Updated September 9, 2022 | Infoplease Staff

The New York Drama Critics' Circle Awards are presented each May by critics from all New York City's newspapers, magazines and wire services except the New York Times.

2006–2007

Best Play The Coast of Utopia
Best American Play Radio Golf
Best Musical Spring Awakening
Special Citation The Broadway revival of Journey's End

2005–2006

Best Play Doubt, a Parable
Best Foreign Play The Pillowman
Best Musical Not awarded

2003–2004

Best Play Intimate Apparel
Best Musical Not awarded
Best Foreign Play Not awarded
Special Award Barbara Cook

2002–2003

Best Play Take Me Out
Best Musical Hairspray
Best Foreign Play Talking Heads

2001–2002

Best Play The Goat
Best Musical Not awarded
Special Award Elaine Stritch: At Liberty

2000–2001

Best New Play The Invention of Love
Best Musical The Producers
Best American Play Proof

1999–2000

Best New Play Jitney
Best Musical James Joyce's The Dead
Best Foreign Play Copenhagen

1998–1999

Best New Play Wit
Best Musical Parade
Best Foreign Play Closer
Special Citation David Hare

1997–1998

Best New Play Art
Best Musical The Lion King
Best American Play: Pride's Crossing
Special Citation Cabaret

1996–1997

Best New Play How I Learned to Drive
Best Musical Violet

Skylight
Joan Marcus
Best Foreign Play
Skylight
Special Award To the cast and creative team of Chicago for their distinguished contribution to the Broadway season.

1995–1996

Best New Play Seven Guitars
Best Foreign Play Molly Sweeney
Best Musical Rent
Special Citation Encores! Great American Musicals in Concert, for its concert performances of overlooked musicals

1994–1995

Best Play Arcadia, Tom Stoppard
Citation for Best American Play Love! Valour! Compassion!, Terrence McNally
Citation for Best Musical No award given
Outstanding Achievement Award Signature Theatre Company, which dedicated its season to the works by Horton Foote

1993–1994

Best Play Three Tall Women, Edward Albee
Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992, Anna Deavere Smith, writer/actress, received an award “for unique contribution to theatrical form.”

1992–1993

Best Play Angels in America: Millennium Approaches, Tony Kushner
Citation for Best Foreign Play Someone Who'll Watch Over Me, Frank McGuinness
Citation for Best Musical Kiss of the Spider Woman, John Kander, Fred Ebb and Terrence McNally

1991–1992

Best Play Dancing at Lughnasa, Brian Friel
Citation for Best American Play Two Trains Running, August Wilson

1990–1991

Best Play Six Degrees of Separation, John Guare
Citation for Best Foreign Play Our Country's Good, Timberlake Wertenbaker
Citation for Best Musical The Will Rogers Follies, Cy Coleman, Peter Stone, Betty Comden and Adolph Green
Special Citation Eileen Atkins, A Room of One's Own

1989–1990

Best Play The Piano Lesson, August Wilson
Citation for Best Foreign Play Privates on Parade, Peter Nichols
Citation for Best Musical City of Angels, Larry Gelbart, Cy Coleman and David Zippel

1988–1989

Best Play The Heidi Chronicles, Wendy Wasserstein
Citation for Best Foreign Play Aristocrats, Brian Friel
Special Citation Largely New York, Bill Irwin

1987–1988

Best Play Joe Turner's Come and Gone, August Wilson
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Road to Mecca, Athol Fugard
Citation for Best Musical Into the Woods, Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine

1986–1987

Best Play Fences, August Wilson
Citation for Best Foreign Play Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Christopher Hampton
Citation for Best Musical Les Misérables, Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil

1985–1986

Best Play Lie of the Mind, Sam Shepard
Citation for Best Foreign Play Benefactors, Michael Frayn
Special Citation The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe, Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner

1984–1985

Best Play Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, August Wilson

1983–1984

Best Play The Real Thing, Tom Stoppard
Citation for Best American Play Glengarry Glen Ross, David Mamet
Citation for Best Musical Sunday in the Park With George, Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine

1982–1983

Best Play Brighton Beach Memoirs, Neil Simon
Citation for Best Foreign Play Plenty, David Hare
Citation for Best Musical Little Shop of Horrors, Alan Menken and Howard Ashman

1981–1982

Best Play The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, adapted by David Edgar
Citation for Best American Play A Soldier's Play, Charles Fuller

1980–1981

Best Play A Lesson From Aloes, Athol Fugard
Citation for Best American Play Crimes of the Heart, Beth Henley

1979–1980

Best Play Talley's Folly, Lanford Wilson
Evita, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice
Citation for Best Foreign Play Betrayal, Harold Pinter

1978–1979

Best Play The Elephant Man, Bernard Pomerance
Citation for Best Musical Sweeney Todd, Hugh Wheeler and Stephen Sondheim

1977–1978

Best Play Da, Hugh Leonard
Citation for Best Musical Ain't Misbehavin', conceived by Richard Maltby, Jr.

1976–1977

Best Play Otherwise Engaged, Simon Gray
Citation for Best American Play American Buffalo, David Mamet
Citation for Best Musical Annie, Thomas Meehan, Charles Strouse and Martin Charnin

1975–1976

Best Play Travesties, Tom Stoppard
Citation for Best American Play Streamers, David Rabe
Citation for Best Musical Pacific Overtures, Stephen Sondheim, John Weidman and Hugh Wheeler

1974–1975

Best Play Equus, Peter Shaffer
Citation for Best American Play The Taking of Miss Janie, Ed Bullins
Citation for Best Musical A Chorus Line, James Kirkwood and Nicholas Dante

1973–1974

Best Play The Contractors, David Storey
Citation for Best American Play Short Eyes, Miguel Pinero
Citation for Best Musical Candide, Leonard Bernstein, Hugh Wheeler and Richard Wilbur

1972–1973

Best Play The Changing Room, David Storey
Citation for Best American Play The Hot I Baltimore, Lanford Wilson
Citation for Best Musical A Little Night Music, Hugh Wheeler and Stephen Sondheim

1971–1972

Best Play That Championship Season, Jason Miller
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Screens, Jean Genet
Citation for Best Musical Two Gentlemen of Verona, adapted by John Guare and Mel Shapiro

1970–1971

Best Play Home, David Storey
Citation for Best American Play The House of Blue Leaves, John Guare
Citation for Best Musical Follies, James Goldman and Stephen Sondheim

1969–1970

Best Play Borstal Boy, Frank McMahon
Citation for Best American Play The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, Paul Zindel
Citation for Best Musical Company, George Furth and Stephen Sondheim

1968–1969

Best Play The Great White Hope, Howard Sackler
Citation for Best Musical 1776, Sherman Edwards and Peter Stone

1967–1968

Best Play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Tom Stoppard
Citation for Best Musical Your Own Thing, Donald Driver, Hal Hester and Danny Apolinar

1966–1967

Best Play The Homecoming, Harold Pinter
Citation for Best Musical Cabaret, Joe Masteroff, John Kander and Fred Ebb

1965–1966

Best Play The Persecution and Assassination of Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade, Peter Weiss
The Man of La Mancha, Dale Wasserman, Mitch Leigh and Joe Darion

1964–1965

Best Play The Subject Was Roses, Frank D. Gilroy
Citation for Best Musical Fiddler on the Roof, Joseph Stein, Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick

1963–1964

Best Play Luther, John Osborne
Citation for Best Musical Hello, Dolly, Michael Stewart and Jerry Herman
Special Citation The Trojan Women, Euripides

1962–1963

Best Play Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Edward Albee
Special Citation Beyond the Fringe, Alan Bennett, Peter Cook, Jonathan Miller and Dudley Moore

1961–1962

Best Play The Night of the Iguana, Tennessee Williams
Citation for Best Foreign Play A Man for All Seasons, Robert Bolt
Citation for Best Musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Abe Burrows, Jack Weinstock, Willie Gilbert and Frank Loesser

1960–1961

Best Play All the Way Home, Tad Mosel
Citation for Best Foreign Play A Taste of Honey, Shelagh Delaney
Citation for Best Musical Carnival, Michael Stewart

1959–1960

Best Play Toys in the Attic, Lillian Hellman
Citation for Best Foreign Play Five Finger Exercise, Peter Shaffer
Citation for Best Musical Fiorello!, Jerome Weidman, George Abbott, Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick

1958–1959

Best Play A Raisin in the Sun, Lorraine Hansberry
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Visit, Friedrich Duerrenmatt-Maurice Valency
Citation for Best Musical La Plume de ma Tante, Robert Dhery and Gerard Calvi

1957–1958

Best Play Look Homeward, Angel, Ketti Frings
Citation for Best Foreign Play Look Back in Anger, John Osborne
Citation for Best Musical The Music Man, Meredith Willson

1956–1957

Best Play Long Day's Journey Into Night, Eugene O'Neill
Citation for Best Foreign Play Waltz of the Toreadors, Jean Anouilh
Citation for Best Musical The Most Happy Fella, Frank Loesser

1955–1956

Best Play The Diary of Anne Frank, Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett
Citation for Best Foreign Play Tiger at the Gates, Jean Giraudoux and Christopher Fry
Citation for Best Musical My Fair Lady, Frederick Loewe and Alan Jay Lerner

1954–1955

Best Play Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Tennessee Williams
Citation for Best Foreign Play Witness for the Prosecution, Agatha Christie
Citation for Best Musical The Saint of Bleecker Street, Gian Carlo Menotti

1953–1954

Best Play The Teahouse of the August Moon, John Patrick
Citation for Best Foreign Play Ondine, Jean Giraudoux
Citation for Best Musical The Golden Apple, John Latouche and Jerome Moross

1952–1953

Best Play Picnic, William Inge
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Love of Four Colonels, Peter Ustinov
Citation for Best Musical Wonderful Town, Joseph Fields, Jerome Chodorov, Betty Comden, Adolph Green and Leonard Bernstein

1951–1952

Best Play I Am a Camera, John Van Druten Based on Christopher Isherwood's Berlin Stories.
Citation for Best Foreign Play Venus Observed, Christopher Fry
Citation for Best Musical Pal Joey, Richard Rodgers, Lorenz Hart and John O'Hara
Distinguished and Original Contribution to Theater Don Juan in Hell, George Bernard Shaw

1950–1951

Best Play Darkness at Noon, Sidney Kingsley
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Lady's Not for Burning, Christopher Fry
Citation for Best Musical Guys and Dolls, Abe Burrows, Jo Swerling and Frank Loesser

1949–1950

Best Play The Member of the Wedding, Carson McCullers
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Cocktail Party, T. S. Eliot
Citation for Best Musical The Consul, Gian Carlo Menotti

1948–1949

Best Play Death of a Salesman, Arthur Miller
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Madwoman of Chaillot, Jean Giraudoux and Maurice Valency
Citation for Best Musical South Pacific, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II and Joshua Logan

1947–1948

Best Play A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Winslow Boy, Terence Rattigan

1946–1947

Best Play All My Sons, Arthur Miller
Citation for Best Foreign Play No Exit, Jean-Paul Sartre
Citation for Best Musical Brigadoon, Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe

1945–1946

Best Play No award

Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II
Archive Photos
Citation for Best Musical
Carousel, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II

1944–1945

Best Play The Glass Menagerie, Tennessee Williams

1943–1944

Best Play No award
Citation for Best Foreign Play Jacobowsky and the Colonel, Franz Werfel and S. N. Behrman

1942–1943

Best Play The Patriots, Sidney Kingsley

1941–1942

Best Play No award
Citation for Best Foreign Play Blithe Spirit, Noel Coward

1940–1941

Best Play Watch on the Rhine, Lillian Hellman
Citation for Best Foreign Play The Corn Is Green, Emlyn Williams

1939–1940

Best Play The Time of Your Life, William Saroyan

1938–1939

Best Play No award
Citation for Best Foreign Play The White Steed, Paul Vincent Carroll

1937–1938

Best Play Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck
Citation for Best Foreign Play Shadow and Substance, Paul Vincent Carroll

1936–1937

Best Play High Tor, Maxwell Anderson

1935–1936

Best Play Winterset, Maxwell Anderson

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