Drama Desk Award for Outstanding One-Person Show
Encyclopedia
The Drama Desk Award for Outstanding One-Person Show is presented by the Drama Desk, a committee of New York City
theatre critics, writers, and editors. It honors an individual presenting a solo performance in a Broadway
, off-Broadway
, off-off-Broadway
, or legitimate not-for-profit theater production.
It was not until the 30th Annual Drama Desk Awards in 1984 that a specific category for Outstanding One-Person Show was created. The first recipient was Ian McKellen
for Acting Shakespeare
.
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
theatre critics, writers, and editors. It honors an individual presenting a solo performance in a Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
, off-Broadway
Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...
, off-off-Broadway
Off-Off-Broadway
Off-Off-Broadway theatrical productions in New York City are those in theatres that are smaller than Broadway and Off-Broadway theatres. Off-Off-Broadway theaters are often defined as theaters that have fewer than 100 seats, though the term can be used for any show in the New York City area that...
, or legitimate not-for-profit theater production.
It was not until the 30th Annual Drama Desk Awards in 1984 that a specific category for Outstanding One-Person Show was created. The first recipient was Ian McKellen
Ian McKellen
Sir Ian Murray McKellen, CH, CBE is an English actor. He has received a Tony Award, two Academy Award nominations, and five Emmy Award nominations. His work has spanned genres from Shakespearean and modern theatre to popular fantasy and science fiction...
for Acting Shakespeare
Acting Shakespeare
Acting Shakespeare is a one-man show of Shakespearean monologues devised and performed by Ian McKellen. McKellen first performed the recital in Scandinavia in 1980 and later performed it throughout the world. It was broadcast by PBS in 1982. For the 1984 Broadway engagement, McKellen received the...
.
Winners
- 1984: Ian McKellen for Acting Shakespeare
- 1985: Whoopi GoldbergWhoopi GoldbergWhoopi Goldberg is an American comedian, actress, singer-songwriter, political activist, author and talk show host.Goldberg made her film debut in The Color Purple playing Celie, a mistreated black woman in the Deep South. She received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress and won...
- 1986: Eric BogosianEric BogosianEric Bogosian is an American actor, playwright, monologist, and novelist of Armenian descent.-Personal life:Bogosian, an Armenian-American, was born in Woburn, Massachusetts, the son of Edwina, a hairdresser and instructor, and Henry Bogosian, an accountant. After graduating from Oberlin College,...
for Drinking in America - 1987: Barbara CookBarbara CookBarbara Cook is an American singer and actress who first came to prominence in the 1950s after starring in the original Broadway musicals Candide and The Music Man among others, winning a Tony Award for the latter...
for A Concert for the Theatre - 1990: Robert MorseRobert MorseRobert Morse is an American actor and singer. Morse is best known for his appearances in musicals and plays on Broadway. He has also acted in movies and television shows. His best known role is that of J. Pierrepont Finch in the 1961 Broadway musical, and 1967 film How to Succeed in Business...
for TruTru (play)Tru is a play by Jay Presson Allen.Adapted from the words and works of Truman Capote, it is set in the writer's New York City apartment at 870 United Nations Plaza the week before Christmas 1975... - 1991: Eileen AtkinsEileen AtkinsDame Eileen June Atkins, DBE is an English actress and occasional screenwriter.- Early life :Atkins was born in the Mothers' Hospital in Clapton, a Salvation Army women's hostel in East London...
for A Room of One's OwnA Room of One's OwnA Room of One's Own is an extended essay by Virginia Woolf. First published on 24 October 1929, the essay was based on a series of lectures she delivered at Newnham College and Girton College, two women's colleges at Cambridge University in October 1928... - 1992: Patrick StewartPatrick StewartSir Patrick Hewes Stewart, OBE is an English film, television and stage actor, who has had a distinguished career in theatre and television for around half a century...
for A Christmas CarolA Christmas Carol (Patrick Stewart)A Christmas Carol is a 1988 one-man stage performance by English actor Patrick Stewart of the Charles Dickens novel of the same title.-Awards:Awards* 1992 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding One-Person Show* 1994 Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor... - 1993: Anna Deavere SmithAnna Deavere SmithAnna Deavere Smith is an American actress, playwright, and professor. She is currently the artist in residence at the Center for American Progress.-Early life:...
for Fires in the MirrorFires in the MirrorFires in the Mirror is a play by American playwright, author, actress, and professor Anna Deavere Smith. It chronicles the viewpoints of people connected to the Crown Heights, Brooklyn, crisis of 1991.-Context:... - 1994: Anna Deavere Smith for Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992
- 1995: James Lecesne for Word of Mouth
- 1996: Mary Louise WilsonMary Louise WilsonMary Louise Wilson is an American stage, film and television actress.-Stage:Broadway* Hot Spot — 1963 as Sue Ann* Flora, The Red Menace — 1965 as Comrade Ada* Lovers and Other Strangers — 1968 as Bernice...
for Full Gallop - 1997: Fiona ShawFiona ShawFiona Shaw, CBE is an Irish actress and theatre director. Although to international audiences she is probably most familiar for her minor role as Petunia Dursley in the Harry Potter films, she is an accomplished classical actress...
for The Waste LandThe Waste LandThe Waste Land[A] is a 434-line[B] modernist poem by T. S. Eliot published in 1922. It has been called "one of the most important poems of the 20th century." Despite the poem's obscurity—its shifts between satire and prophecy, its abrupt and unannounced changes of speaker, location and time, its... - 1998: John LeguizamoJohn LeguizamoJonathan Alberto "John" Leguizamo is an Colombian-American actor, producer, voice artist, and comedian.-Early life:...
for FreakFreak (play)Freak was a one-man show, written and performed by actor/comedian John Leguizamo. The play debuted at Cort Theater on Broadway in 1998 and won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding One-Person Show.... - 1999: David HareDavid Hare (playwright)Sir David Hare is an English playwright and theatre and film director.-Early life:Hare was born in St Leonards-on-Sea, Hastings, East Sussex, the son of Agnes and Clifford Hare, a sailor. He was educated at Lancing, an independent school in West Sussex, and at Jesus College, Cambridge...
for Via Dolorosa - 2000: Dame Edna EverageDame Edna EverageDame Edna is a character created and played by Australian dadaist performer and comedian, Barry Humphries, famous for her lilac-coloured or "wisteria hue" hair and cat eye glasses or "face furniture," her favorite flower, the gladiola and her boisterous greeting: "Hello Possums!" As Dame Edna,...
for Dame Edna: The Royal Tour - 2001: Pamela Gien for The Syringa TreeThe Syringa TreeThe Syringa Tree is a deeply personal memory play of a childhood under apartheid. Written and often performed by Pamela Gien it has received excellent reviews in New York and across the USA as well as in London...
- 2002: Elaine StritchElaine StritchElaine Stritch is an American actress and vocalist. She has appeared in numerous stage plays and musicals, feature films, and many television programs...
for Elaine Stritch At Liberty - 2003: Tovah FeldshuhTovah FeldshuhTovah Feldshuh is an American actress, singer and playwright.-Early life:Terri Sue Feldshuh was born to a Jewish family in New York City, the daughter of Lillian and Sidney Feldshuh, who was a lawyer. She was raised in Scarsdale, New York, an affluent community in Westchester County and graduated...
for Golda's BalconyGolda's BalconyGolda's Balcony is a play by William Gibson.It follows the trajectory of the life of Golda Meir from Russian immigrant to American schoolteacher to a leader of international politics as the fourth Prime Minister of Israel. Much of its focus is on the period surrounding the 1973 Yom Kippur War, when... - 2004: Jefferson MaysJefferson MaysJefferson Mays is an American theatre and film actor.A Connecticut native, Mays trained at Yale College, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree, and the University of California, San Diego, where he earned an Master of Fine Arts...
for I Am My Own WifeI Am My Own WifeI Am My Own Wife is a play by Doug Wright based on his conversations with German transvestite Charlotte von Mahlsdorf. The one-man play premiered Off-Broadway in 2003 at Playwrights Horizons. It opened on Broadway later that year. The play was developed with Moisés Kaufman and his Tectonic... - 2005: Billy CrystalBilly CrystalWilliam Edward "Billy" Crystal is an American actor, writer, producer, comedian and film director. He gained prominence in the 1970s for playing Jodie Dallas on the ABC sitcom Soap and became a Hollywood film star during the late 1980s and 1990s, appearing in the critical and box office successes...
for 700 Sundays - 2006: Antony SherAntony SherSir Antony Sher, KBE is a double Olivier Award winning South African-born British actor, writer, theatre director and painter.- Early years :...
for PrimoPrimo (2005 film)Primo is a 2005 film directed by Richard Wilson, starring the BAFTA-nominated Antony Sher and broadcast by HBO and the BBC.This film is a recording of the Royal National Theatre production of the play Primo, also directed by Wilson... - 2007: Vanessa RedgraveVanessa RedgraveVanessa Redgrave, CBE is an English actress of stage, screen and television, as well as a political activist.She rose to prominence in 1961 playing Rosalind in As You Like It with the Royal Shakespeare Company and has since made more than 35 appearances on London's West End and Broadway, winning...
for The Year of Magical ThinkingThe Year of Magical ThinkingThe Year of Magical Thinking , by Joan Didion , is an account of the year following the death of the author's husband John Gregory Dunne . Published by Knopf in October 2005, the book was immediately acclaimed as a classic in the genre of mourning literature... - 2008: Laurence FishburneLaurence FishburneLaurence John Fishburne III is an American film and stage actor, playwright, director, and producer. He is perhaps best known for his roles as Morpheus in the Matrix science fiction film trilogy, as Cowboy Curtis on the 1980's television show Pee-wee's Playhouse, and as singer-musician Ike Turner...
for Thurgood - 2009: Lorenzo Pisoni for Humor Abuse
- 2010: Jim BrochuJim BrochuJim Brochu is an American actor, writer, director, and playwright. Born in Brooklyn, he studied at Carnegie-Mellon University and received his B.A. from St. Francis College. His stage debut was in a production of William Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew...
for Zero HourZero Hour (play)Zero Hour is a 2006 one-person play written and performed by playwright and actor Jim Brochu and directed by actress Piper Laurie. In a biographical reflection on Zero Mostel, Brochu portrays the Jewish actor and comedian giving a fictional interview with an unseen New York Times reporter shortly... - 2011: John Leguizamo for Ghetto Klown