MAYBE HAPPY ENDING and PURPOSE Take Top Prizes At New York Drama Critics' Circle Awards
The selections were made at the organization’s 89th annual voting meeting.
By: A.A. Cristi May. 05, 2025
The New York Drama Critics' Circle has named Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’s Purpose Best Play of the 2024-25 season. The award for Best Musical went to Maybe Happy Ending, book by Will Aronson and Hue Park, music by Will Aronson, lyrics by Hue Park. The selections were made at the organization’s 89th annual voting meeting.
This year the Circle introduced new awards, for the first time since 1962: Best Individual Performance, which went to Andrew Scott for Vanya; and Best Ensemble Performance, which went to the cast of Liberation.
Special Citations were awarded to: Cole Escola for Oh, Mary!; Cats: The Jellicle Ball; and David Greenspan for lifetime achievement.
The awards, which will be presented in a private ceremony on Thursday, May 15, include a cash prize of $2,500 for Best Play, made possible by a grant from the Lucille Lortel Foundation.
Purpose, written by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins and directed by Phylicia Rashad, had its New York premiere on March 17, 2025, at Broadway’s Hayes Theater, where it currently runs. The play received its world premiere at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre on March 24, 2024.
Maybe Happy Ending, book by Will Aronson and Hue Park, music by Will Aronson, lyrics by Hue Park, directed by Michael Arden, received its New York premiere at Broadway’s Belasco Theatre on November 12, 2024. The musical had its world premiere in Seoul, South Korea at Lifeway Hall in the DCF Daemyung Cultural Factory in 2016.
The New York Drama Critics’ Circle comprises 23 drama critics from daily newspapers, magazines, wire services and websites based in the New York metropolitan area. The New York Drama Critics' Circle Award, which has been awarded every year since 1936 to the best new play of the season (with optional awards for foreign or American plays, musicals and special achievements), is the nation's second-oldest playwriting award, after the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Adam Feldman, theater critic and editor for Time Out New York, has served as president of the NYDCC since 2005. Zachary Stewart of TheaterMania serves as vice president; Helen Shaw of The New Yorker is treasurer.
In addition to Feldman, Stewart and Shaw, the members of the New York Drama Critics' Circle are David Barbour, David Cote, Joe Dziemianowicz, Greg Evans, Rhoda Feng, David Finkle, Elysa Gardner, Robert Hofler, Sara Holdren, Charles Isherwood, Chris Jones, Soraya Nadia McDonald, Jackson McHenry, Johnny Oleksinski, Brittani Samuel, Frank Scheck, David Sheward, Tim Teeman, Elisabeth Vincentelli and Matt Windman. Emeritus members include Melissa Rose Bernardo, Brian Scott Lipton, Michael Sommers, Steven Suskin and Linda Winer.
For more information on the New York Drama Critics' Circle, please visit www.dramacritics.org. A full breakdown of this year’s voting will be posted tonight on the organization’s website.
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