NYDCC Awards Purpose, Maybe Happy Ending, Scott, Liberation Cast

Helen J. Shen and Darren Criss in
Maybe Happy Ending,
Best Musical winner from the NYDCC.
Credit: Matthew Murphy and 
Evan Zimmerman

Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' Purpose and Will Aronson and Hue Park's Maybe Happy Ending were voted Best Play and Best Musical of the 2024-25 season by The New York Drama Critics Circle on May 5. Purpose had won the Pulitzer Prize and the American Theater Critics Association's Steinberg Award earlier the same day. The 89th meeting of the Circle took place at the offices of Time Out New York and lasted three and a half hours. The group introduced two new categories this year with Best Individual Performance going to Andrew Scott for Vanya and Best Ensemble to the cast of Liberation. Special citations were awarded to Cole Escola, performer and playwright for Oh, Mary!, Cats: The Jellicle Ball, and to David Greenspan for Lifetime Achievement. (There are rumors this production of Cats will transfer to Broadway next season, but nothing has been confirmed.) The awards will be presented on May 15 in a private ceremony at 54 Below. The Best Play prize includes a $2,500 check from the Lucille Lortel Foundation.

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 is the nation's second-oldest playwriting award, after the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Adam Feldman of Time Out New York serves as President, Zach Stewart of Theatermania is Vice-President, and 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. Four members (Cote, Evans, Holdren, and McDonald) voted by proxy and one member (Windman) attended via Zoom. All other voting members were present.

The meeting began with voting for Best Play of the season. On the first round, Purpose received 9 votes, Liberation 6, The Hills of California and John Proctor Is the Villain 3 each, and Here There Are Blueberries 2. According to Circle rules, there was not enough of a majority for a clear winner, so a vote was taken to determine if an

Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' Purpose was named 
Best Play by the NYDCC.
Credit: Marc J. Franklin

award should be given at all. This second round of voting resulted in the affirmative and the third round called for members to list their top three choices with a weighted-ballot system. On the third ballot, Purpose, Liberation, John Proctor, and Hills received the most support but there was still no clear winner. Blueberries, The Antiquities, Becoming Eve, Cult of Love, Deep Blue Sound, Give Me Carmelita Tropicana, Glass. Kill. What If If Only. Imp, Grangeville, The Great Privation (How to Flip Ten Cents Into a Dollar), Kara and Emma and Barbara and Miranda, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Vanya, and We Had a World received five or fewer votes each. 

On the fourth round, only the top four vote-getters were considered on the weighted-ballot system and Purpose emerged victorious with 34 votes, just edging out The Hills of California with 31. John Proctor got 27 and Liberation 22. 

From 1936 to 1962 the Circle would vote for a Best American Play, Best Foreign Play and Best Musical. In 1962, the rules changed to awarding a Best Play no matter its country of origin, and then presenting a Best American or Foreign winner depending on the Best Play victor. This year, the scribes voted to change the rules to eliminate this practice and just vote for Best Play. 

The Circle then moved on to choosing a Best Musical. On the first round of voting, Maybe Happy Ending easily sailed to victory with 18 votes. Operation Mincemeat garnered 4 and Death Becomes Her 1.

Individual Performance was next. This is the first year for this category. In previous seasons, performers such as Christine Ebersole (Grey Gardens), Viola Davis (Fences), Angela Lansbury (Blithe Spirit and Lifetime Achievement), and Deirdre O'Connell (Dana H.) received special awards. On the first round, Andrew Scott of Vanya and Audra McDonald of Gypsy earned 5 votes each, Cole Escola of Oh, Mary! and Jasmine Amy Rogers of BOOP! The Musical got 3 each, Sarah Snook of The Picture of Dorian Gray garnered 2 and Louis McCartney of Stranger Things: The First Shadow, Steve Mellor of The Barbarians, Nicole Scherzinger of Sunset Blvd., Richard Schiff of Becoming Eve, and Michelle Wilson of The Fires got 1 a piece.

Andrew Scott of Vanya,
winner of the first Individual Performance Award
from the NYDCC.
Credit: Julieta Cervantes

After voting to give the award, the third round moved on to the weighted ballot with the top three choices. Scott, McDonald, Rogers, Escola, and Snook were the top vote-getters, but there was not enough a majority to declare a winner. Scherzinger, McCartney, Mellor, Schiff, Wilson, Jonathan Groff (Just in Time), Jeremy Jordan (Floyd Collins), F. Murray Abraham (Krapp's Last Tape: Beckett Briefs), Kara Young (Purpose), Sadie Sink (John Proctor Is the Villain), David Greenspan (I Assume You Know David Greenspan), Jessica Hecht (Eureka Day), Justina Machado (Real Women Have Curves), Laura Donnelly (The Hills of California), and Kit Connor (Romeo and Juliet) received some support.

In the fourth round, every candidate but the top five contenders was eliminated. There was still no clear winner, so McDonald, who received the least votes in the fourth round was dropped and the fifth ballot was a battle between Scott, Rogers, Escola and Snook. In the end, Scott was declared the winner with 29 votes, followed by Escola and Snook with 26 each, and Rogers with 21.

The cast of Liberation won the new
Best Ensemble Award.
Credit: Joan Marcus

For the new Best Ensemble category, the first round resulted in five votes for Liberation, 4 for Purpose, 3 each for Cats: The Jellicle Ball, John Proctor Is the Villain, and Operation Mincemeat, 2 for The Hills of California, and 1 each for Burnout Paradise, Dead Outlaw, Deep Blue Sound, and Hold On to Me Darling. After the second-round vote to give the award, the third, weighted ballot vote resulted in Liberation, Purpose, Cats: The Jellicle Ball, and The Hills of California as the top picks, but there was still no clear majority. Eureka Day, Dead Outlaw, Deep Blue Sound, Buena Vista Social Club, The Antiquities, Henry V, and Wine in the Wilderness were also in the mix. On the fourth ballot, Liberation garnered enough votes to win with 29 votes, closely followed by Hills with 27, Cats with 26, and Purpose with 20. The Liberation cast consists of Betsy Aidem, Audrey Corsa, Kayla Davion, Susannah Flood, Kristolyn Lloyd, Irene Sofia Lucio, Charlie Thurston, and Adina Verson). The Drama Desk also voted the Liberation cast an Ensemble Award.