The Special Tony Award category includes the Lifetime Achievement Award and Special Tony Award. These are non-competitive awards, and the titles have changed over the years. The Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre is to "honor an individual for the body of his or her work." (The Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event

Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event

The Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event was awarded from 2001 to 2009 to live theatrical productions that were not plays or musicals.The category was created after the 2000 controversy of Contact winning Best Musical; the show used pre-recorded music and featured no singing...

 was a competitive award, given from 2001 to 2009.) Another non-competitive Tony award is the Tony Honors for Excellence in Theatre

Tony Honors for Excellence in Theatre

The Tony Honors for Excellence in Theatre is a non-competitive award created by the American Theatre Wing in 1990. They are presented to institutions, individuals and/or organizations that have demonstrated extraordinary achievement in theatre, but are not eligible to compete in any of the...

, to "recognize the achievements of individuals and organizations that do not fit into any of the competitive categories."

Special Award winners

Sources: 1947-1994 Special Awards, BroadwayWorld1976-1980; 1997-2010 Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre, BroadwayWorld Tony Awards, Special Tony Award, 1947-present

1940s

1947

• Dora Chamberlain for unfailing courtesy as treasurer of the Martin Beck Theatre
• Ira and Rita Katzenberg for enthusiasm as inveterate first-nighters
• Jules Leventhal for the season's most prolific backer and producer
• Burns Mantle
  Burns Mantle
  Robert Burns Mantle was a well-known American drama critic. He founded the Best Plays annual publication in 1920.. , The New York Times...
  
   for the annual publication of The Ten Best Plays
• P. A. MacDonald for intricate construction for the production of If the Shoe Fits
• Vincent Sardi for providing a transient home and comfort station for theatre folk at Sardi's
  Sardi's
  Sardi's is a restaurant in New York City's theater district at 234 West 44th Street in Manhattan. Known for the hundreds of caricatures of show-business celebrities that adorn its walls, Sardi's opened at its current location on March 5, 1927....
  
   for 20 years

1948

• Rosalind Gilder Contribution To Theatre Through A Publication for Editor, Theatre Arts
• Vera Allen Distinguished Wing Volunteer Worker Through The War And After
• Experimental Theatre Inc., For Experiment In Theatre, John Garfield
  John Garfield
  John Garfield was an American actor adept at playing brooding, rebellious, working-class character roles. He grew up in poverty in Depression-era New York City and in the early 1930s became an important member of the Group Theater. In 1937 he moved to Hollywood, eventually becoming one of Warner...
  
   Accepted
• The Cast of The Importance of Being Earnest
  The Importance of Being Earnest
  The Importance of Being Earnest, A Trivial Comedy for Serious People is a play by Oscar Wilde. First performed on 14 February 1895 at St. James's Theatre in London, it is a farcical comedy in which the protagonists maintain fictitious personae in order to escape burdensome social obligations...
  
  Outstanding Foreign Company
• June Lockhart
  June Lockhart
  June Lockhart is an American actress, primarily in 1950s and 1960s television, but with memorable performances on stage and in film too. She is remembered as the mother in two TV series, Lassie and Lost in Space. She also portrayed Dr...
  
   For Love or Money Outstanding Performance By Newcomers
• James Whitmore
  James Whitmore
  James Allen Whitmore, Jr. was an American film and stage actor.-Early life:Born in White Plains, New York, to Florence Belle and James Allen Whitmore, Sr., a park commission official, Whitmore attended Amherst Central High School in Snyder, New York, before graduating from The Choate School in...
  
   Command Decision Outstanding Performance By Newcomers
• Robert W. Dowling
  Robert W. Dowling
  Robert W. Dowling was a real estate investor and philanthropist in the New York City area. Dowling College is named for him.-Biography:...
  
   Progressive Theatre Operators to President of City Investing Company,
• Paul Beisman Progressive Theatre Operators to Operator of the American Theatre, St. Louis
• George Pierce for twenty-five years of courteous and efficient service as a backstage doorman (Empire Theatre)
• Mary Martin
  Mary Martin
  Mary Virginia Martin was an American actress and singer. She originated many roles over her career including Nellie Forbush in South Pacific and Maria in The Sound of Music. She was named a Kennedy Center Honoree in 1989...
  
   Annie Get Your Gun
  Annie Get Your Gun (musical)
  Annie Get Your Gun is a musical with lyrics and music written by Irving Berlin and a book by Herbert Fields and his sister Dorothy Fields. The story is a fictionalized version of the life of Annie Oakley , who was a sharpshooter from Ohio, and her husband, Frank Butler.The 1946 Broadway production...
  
  Spreading Theatre To The Country While The Originals Perform In New York
• Joe E. Brown
  Joe E. Brown (comedian)
  Joseph Evans Brown was an American actor and comedian, remembered for his amiable screen persona, comic timing, and enormous smile. In 1902 at the age of nine, he joined a troupe of circus tumblers known as the Five Marvelous Ashtons which toured the country on both the circus and vaudeville...
  
   Harvey
  Harvey (play)
  Harvey is a 1944 play by American playwright Mary Chase. Produced by Brock Pemberton and directed by Antoinette Perry, the play premiered on 1 November 1944 at the 48th Street Theatre on Broadway where it was staged for 1,775 performances before closing on January 15, 1949. The original production...
  
  Spreading Theatre To The Country While The Originals Perform In New York

1950s

1950

• Maurice Evans
  Maurice Evans (actor)
  Maurice Herbert Evans was an English actor noted for his interpretations of Shakespearean characters. In terms of his screen roles, he is probably best known as Dr...
  
  --special recognition for guiding City Center theatre company through a highly successful season.
• Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt
  Eleanor Roosevelt
  Anna Eleanor Roosevelt was the First Lady of the United States from 1933 to 1945. She supported the New Deal policies of her husband, distant cousin Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and became an advocate for civil rights. After her husband's death in 1945, Roosevelt continued to be an international...
  
   presented a special award to volunteer worker Philip Faversham of the American Theatre Wing's hospital program, representing those workers who had performed hospital volunteer work outside of New York.
• Brock Pemberton
  Brock Pemberton
  Brock Pemberton was an American theatrical producer, director and founder of the Tony Awards.Pemberton was born in Leavenworth, Kansas and attended the University of Kansas. Before becoming a producer he was a press agent in New York...
  
   founder of awards and its original chairman (posthumous)

1951

• Ruth Green for her services as a volunteer in arranging reservation and seating for the five Tony Awards.

1952

• Judy Garland
  Judy Garland
  Judy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage...
  
   for an important contribution to the revival of vaudeville through her recent stint at the Palace Theatre.
• Edward Kook for his contributing to and encouraging the development of stage lighting and electronics.
• Charles Boyer
  Charles Boyer
  Charles Boyer was a French actor who appeared in more than 80 films between 1920 and 1976. After receiving an education in drama, Boyer started on the stage, but he found success in movies during the 1930s. His memorable performances were among the era's most highly praised romantic dramas,...
  
   for distinguished performance in Don Juan in Hell, thereby assisting in a new theatre trend.

1953

• Beatrice Lillie
  Beatrice Lillie
  Beatrice Gladys "Bea" Lillie was an actress and comedic performer. Following her 1920 marriage to Sir Robert Peel in England, she was known in private life as Lady Peel.-Early career:...
  
   for An Evening with Beatrice Lillie.
• Danny Kaye
  Danny Kaye
  Danny Kaye was a celebrated American actor, singer, dancer, and comedian...
  
   for heading a variety bill at the Palace Theatre
  Palace Theatre, New York
  The Palace Theatre is a Broadway theatre located at 1564 Broadway in midtown-Manhattan.-History:Designed by architects Kirchoff & Rose, the theatre was built by Martin Beck a California vaudeville entrepreneur and Broadway impresario. The project experienced a number of business problems before...
  
  . Equity Community Theatre.

1954:no award

1955

• Proscenium Productions, an Off-Broadway company at the Cherry Lane Theatre
  Cherry Lane Theatre
  The Cherry Lane Theatre , located at 38 Commerce Street in the borough of Manhattan, was New York City's oldest, continuously running off-Broadway theater...
  
  , for generally high quality and viewpoint shown in The Way of the World
  The Way of the World
  The Way of the World is a play written by British playwright William Congreve. It premiered in 1700 in the theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields in London...
  
  and Thieves Carnival. Presented to Warren Enters, Robert Merriman
  Robert E. Merriman
  Robert E. Merriman , was an actor, a Tony award winning producer, and a director for Broadway theatre, Off Broadway and television...
  
   and Sybil Trubin.

1956

• City Center
• Fourth Street Chekov Theatre
• The Shakespearewrights
• The Threepenny Opera
  The Threepenny Opera
  The Threepenny Opera is a musical by German dramatist Bertolt Brecht and composer Kurt Weill, in collaboration with translator Elisabeth Hauptmann and set designer Caspar Neher. It was adapted from an 18th-century English ballad opera, John Gay's The Beggar's Opera, and offers a Marxist critique...
  
  distinguished Off-Broadway production; Carmen Capalbo
  Carmen Capalbo
  Carmen Capalbo was a theater director on and off Broadway.Among Capalbo's notable productions were a revival of The Threepenny Opera, which was a major Off-Broadway success, and the 1957 premiere of A Moon for the Misbegotten...
  
  , Stanley Chase, producers.
• The New York Public Library Theatre Collection twenty-fifth anniversary for its distinguished service to the theatre. George Freedley, founder and curator, accepted.

1957

• American Shakespeare Festival Stratford
  Stratford, Connecticut
  Stratford is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States, located on Long Island Sound at the mouth of the Housatonic River. It was founded by Puritans in 1639....
  
  , Connecticut
  Connecticut
  Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...
  
  
• Jean-Louis Barrault
  Jean-Louis Barrault
  Jean-Louis Barrault was a French actor, director and mime artist, training that served him well when he portrayed the 19th-century mime Jean-Gaspard Deburau in Marcel Carné's 1945 film Les Enfants du Paradis .Jean-Louis Barrault studied with Charles Dullin in whose troupe he acted...
  
  --French Repertory
• Robert Russell Bennett
  Robert Russell Bennett
  Robert Russell Bennett was an American composer and arranger, best known for his orchestration of many well-known Broadway and Hollywood musicals by other composers such as Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, and Richard Rodgers. In 1957 and 2008, Bennett received Tony Awards...
  
  
• William Hammerstein
• Paul Shyre
  Paul Shyre
  Paul Shyre was an American director and playwright who won a Tony and an Emmy. He is noted for the plays Hizzoner, Will Rogers' USA and The President Is Dead....
  
  

1958

• New York Shakespeare Festival
  New York Shakespeare Festival
  New York Shakespeare Festival is the previous name of the New York City theatrical producing organization now known as the Public Theater. The Festival produced shows at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park, as part of its free Shakespeare in the Park series, at the Public Theatre near Astor Place...
  
   for presenting free performances in Central Park and the Hecksher Theater.
• Mrs. Martin Beck
  Martin Beck
  Martin Beck is a fictional Swedish police detective who is the main character in a series of ten novels by Sjöwall and Wahlöö, collectively titled The Story of a Crime...
  
   for fifteen years of untiring dedication to the American Theatre Wing, which she served as treasurer, secretary and chairman of the board of directors. Presented by Elaine Perry, daughter of Antoinette Perry
  Antoinette Perry
  Antoinette Perry was an actress, director and co-founder of the American Theatre Wing. The Tony Awards are her namesake....
  
  .
• Circle in the Square Phoenix Theatre, Esther Hawley

1959

• John Gielgud
  John Gielgud
  Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...
  
   for contribution to theatre for his extraordinary insight into the writings of Shakespeare as demonstrated in his one-man play, Ages of Man.
• Howard Lindsay
  Howard Lindsay
  Howard Lindsay was an American theatrical producer, playwright, librettist, director and actor. He is best known for his writing work as part of the collaboration of Lindsay and Crouse, and for his performance, with his wife Dorothy Stickney, in the long-running play Life with...
  
   and Russell Crouse for a collaboration that lasted longer than Gilbert and Sullivan.
• Cast of La Plume de Ma Tante
  La Plume de Ma Tante
  is a musical written, devised, and directed by Robert Dhery, with music by Gérard Calvi, and English lyrics written by Ross Parker. It was nominated for the Best Musical, but lost to Redhead...
  
  (Pamela Austin, Colette Brosset
  Colette Brosset
  Colette Marie Claudette Brosset was a French actress, writer and choreographer.She was once married to actor Robert Dhéry, with whom she appeared onstage in La Plume de Ma Tante....
  
  , Roger Caccia, Yvonne Constant
  Yvonne Constant
  Yvonne Constant began her career as a ballet dancer but later she made the transition to a musical comedy performer. Poulenc wrote the beautiful French art song Les Chemins de l'Amour for her.-Stage productions:...
  
  , Genevieve Coulombel, Robert Dhery, Michael Kent
  Michael Kent
  Michael Kent was one of two founders of the Computer Group which used a statistics based sports betting to predict the outcome of college football. The group reportedly made millions each season.Kent was the computer genius who invented the statistical models...
  
  , Jean Lefevre, Jacques Legras, Michael Modo, Pierre Olaf, Nicole Parent, Ross Parker, Henri Pennec), for contribution to the theatre.

1960s

1960

• John D. Rockefeller III for vision and leadership in creating the Lincoln Center, a landmark of theatre encompassing the performing arts.
• James Thurber
  James Thurber
  James Grover Thurber was an American author, cartoonist and celebrated wit. Thurber was best known for his cartoons and short stories published in The New Yorker magazine.-Life:...
  
   and Burgess Meredith
  Burgess Meredith
  Oliver Burgess Meredith , known professionally as Burgess Meredith, was an American actor in theatre, film, and television, who also worked as a director...
  
   A Thurber Carnival

1961

• David Merrick
  David Merrick
  David Merrick was a prolific Tony Award-winning American theatrical producer.-Life and career:Born David Lee Margulois to Jewish parents in St. Louis, Missouri, Merrick graduated from Washington University, then studied law at the Jesuit-run Saint Louis University School of Law...
  
   In recognition of a fabulous production record over the last seven years.
• The Theatre Guild For organizing the first repertory to go abroad for the State Department.

1962

• Brooks Atkinson
  Brooks Atkinson
  Justin Brooks Atkinson was an American theatre critic. He worked for The New York Times from 1925 to 1960...
  
   Retired drama critic of the New York Times
• Franco Zeffirelli
  Franco Zeffirelli
  Franco Zeffirelli KBE is an Italian director and producer of films and television. He is also a director and designer of operas and a former senator for the Italian center-right Forza Italia party....
  
   For designs and direction of the Old Vic's Romeo and Juliet.
• Richard Rodgers
  Richard Rodgers
  Richard Charles Rodgers was an American composer of music for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television. He is best known for his songwriting partnerships with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II...
  
   For all he has done for young people in the theatre and for taking the men of the orchestra out of the pit and putting them on stage in No Strings.

1963

• W. McNeil Lowry On behalf of the Ford Foundation for his and their distinguished support of the American Theatre.
• Irving Berlin
  Irving Berlin
  Irving Berlin was an American composer and lyricist of Jewish heritage, widely considered one of the greatest songwriters in American history.His first hit song, "Alexander's Ragtime Band", became world famous...
  
   For his distinguished contribution to the musical theatre for these many years
• Alan Bennett
  Alan Bennett
  Alan Bennett is a British playwright, screenwriter, actor and author. Born in Leeds, he attended Oxford University where he studied history and performed with The Oxford Revue. He stayed to teach and research mediaeval history at the university for several years...
  
  , Peter Cook
  Peter Cook
  Peter Edward Cook was an English satirist, writer and comedian. An extremely influential figure in modern British comedy, he is regarded as the leading light of the British satire boom of the 1960s. He has been described by Stephen Fry as "the funniest man who ever drew breath," although Cook's...
  
  , Jonathan Miller
  Jonathan Miller
  Sir Jonathan Wolfe Miller CBE is a British theatre and opera director, author, physician, television presenter, humorist and sculptor. Trained as a physician in the late 1950s, he first came to prominence in the 1960s with his role in the comedy revue Beyond the Fringe with fellow writers and...
  
   and Dudley Moore
  Dudley Moore
  Dudley Stuart John Moore, CBE was an English actor, comedian, composer and musician.Moore first came to prominence as one of the four writer-performers in the ground-breaking comedy revue Beyond the Fringe in the early 1960s, and then became famous as half of the highly popular television...
  
  , For Beyond the Fringe, for their brilliance which has shattered all the old concepts of comedy.

1964:

• Eva Le Gallienne
  Eva Le Gallienne
  Eva Le Gallienne was a well-known actress, producer, and director, during the first half of the 20th century.-Early life and early career:...
  
   Celebrating her 50th year as an actress, honored for her work with the National Repertory Theatre.

1965:

• Gilbert Miller
  Gilbert Miller
  Gilbert Heron Miller was an American theatrical producer.Born in New York City, he was the son of English-born theatrical producer Henry Miller and Bijou Heron, a former child actress. Raised and educated in Europe, he returned home to follow in his father's footsteps and became a highly...
  
   For having produced 88 plays and musicals and for his perseverance which has helped to keep New York and theatre alive
• Oliver Smith
  Oliver Smith (designer)
  Oliver Smith was an American scenic designer.Born in Waupun, Wisconsin, Smith attended Penn State, after which he moved to New York City and began to form friendships that blossomed into working relationships with such talents as Leonard Bernstein, Jerome Robbins, Carson McCullers, and Agnes de...
  
  

1966

• Helen Menken
  Helen Menken
  Helen Menken was an American actress, born Helen Meinken to a German-French father, Frederick Meinken, and an Irish-born mother, Mary Madden....
  
   For a lifetime of devotion and dedicated service to the Broadway theatre.

1967: no award

1968

• Audrey Hepburn
  Audrey Hepburn
  Audrey Hepburn was a British actress and humanitarian. Although modest about her acting ability, Hepburn remains one of the world's most famous actresses of all time, remembered as a film and fashion icon of the twentieth century...
  
  
• Carol Channing
  Carol Channing
  Carol Elaine Channing is an American singer, actress, and comedienne. She is the recipient of three Tony Awards , a Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination...
  
  
• Pearl Bailey
  Pearl Bailey
  Pearl Mae Bailey was an American actress and singer. After appearing in vaudeville, she made her Broadway debut in St. Louis Woman in 1946. She won a Tony Award for the title role in the all-black production of Hello, Dolly! in 1968...
  
  
• David Merrick
  David Merrick
  David Merrick was a prolific Tony Award-winning American theatrical producer.-Life and career:Born David Lee Margulois to Jewish parents in St. Louis, Missouri, Merrick graduated from Washington University, then studied law at the Jesuit-run Saint Louis University School of Law...
  
  
• Maurice Chevalier
  Maurice Chevalier
  Maurice Auguste Chevalier was a French actor, singer, entertainer and a noted Sprechgesang performer. He is perhaps best known for his signature songs, including Louise, Mimi, Valentine, and Thank Heaven for Little Girls and for his films including The Love Parade and The Big Pond...
  
  
• APA-Phoenix Theatre
• Marlene Dietrich
  Marlene Dietrich
  Marlene Dietrich was a German-American actress and singer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself, professionally and characteristically. In the Berlin of the 1920s, she acted on the stage and in silent films...
  
  

1969

• The National Theatre Company of Great Britain
• The Negro Ensemble Company
  Negro Ensemble Company
  The Negro Ensemble Company is a New York City-based theater company. Established in 1967 by playwright Douglas Turner Ward, producer/actor Robert Hooks, and theater manager Gerald S...
  
  
• Rex Harrison
  Rex Harrison
  Sir Reginald Carey “Rex” Harrison was an English actor of stage and screen. Harrison won an Academy Award and two Tony Awards.-Youth and stage career:...
  
  
• Leonard Bernstein
  Leonard Bernstein
  Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
  
  
• Carol Burnett
  Carol Burnett
  Carol Creighton Burnett is an American actress, comedian, singer, dancer and writer. Burnett started her career in New York. After becoming a hit on Broadway, she made her television debut...
  
  

1970s

1970

• Noel Coward
  Noël Coward
  Sir Noël Peirce Coward was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and what Time magazine called "a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".Born in Teddington, a suburb of London, Coward attended a dance academy...
  
   – for multiple and immortal contributions to the theatre
• Alfred Lunt
  Alfred Lunt
  Alfred Lunt was an American stage director and actor, often identified for a long-time professional partnership with his wife, actress Lynn Fontanne...
  
   and Lynn Fontanne
  Lynn Fontanne
  Lynn Fontanne was a British actress and major stage star in the United States for over 40 years. She teamed with her husband Alfred Lunt.She lived in the United States for more than 60 years but never relinquished her British citizenship. Lunt and Fontanne shared a special Tony Award in 1970...
  
  
• New York Shakespeare Festival
  New York Shakespeare Festival
  New York Shakespeare Festival is the previous name of the New York City theatrical producing organization now known as the Public Theater. The Festival produced shows at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park, as part of its free Shakespeare in the Park series, at the Public Theatre near Astor Place...
  
   – for pioneering efforts on behalf of new plays
• Barbra Streisand
  Barbra Streisand
  Barbra Joan Streisand is an American singer, actress, film producer and director. She has won two Academy Awards, eight Grammy Awards, four Emmy Awards, a Special Tony Award, an American Film Institute award, a Peabody Award, and is one of the few entertainers who have won an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy,...
  
  

1971

• Elliot Norton drama critic, for distinguished theatrical commentary.
• Ingram Ash president of Blaine-Thompson Advertising, for decades of devoted service to the theatre.
• Playbill
  Playbill
  Playbill is a monthly U.S. magazine for theatregoers. Although there is a subscription issue available for home delivery, most Playbills are printed for particular shows to be distributed at the door...
  
   for chronicling Broadway through the years.
• Roger L. Stevens
  Roger L. Stevens
  Roger Lacey Stevens was an American theatrical producer, arts administrator, and a real estate executive. He is the founding Chairman of both the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts , and National Endowment for the Arts .Born in Detroit, Michigan, Stevens was educated at The Choate School in...
  
  

1972

• The Theatre Guild
  Theatre Guild
  The Theatre Guild is a theatrical society founded in New York City in 1918 by Lawrence Langner, Philip Moeller, Helen Westley and Theresa Helburn. Langner's wife, Armina Marshall, then served as a co-director. It evolved out of the work of the Washington Square Players.Its original purpose was to...
  
  -American Theatre Society for its many years of service to audiences for touring shows.
• Fiddler on the Roof
  Fiddler on the Roof
  Fiddler on the Roof is a musical with music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick, and book by Joseph Stein, set in Tsarist Russia in 1905. It is based on Tevye and his Daughters by Sholem Aleichem...
  
  on becoming the longest-running musical in Broadway history. Presented to Harold Prince.
• Ethel Merman
  Ethel Merman
  Ethel Merman was an American actress and singer. Known primarily for her powerful voice and roles in musical theatre, she has been called "the undisputed First Lady of the musical comedy stage." Among the many standards introduced by Merman in Broadway musicals are "I Got Rhythm", "Everything's...
  
  
• Richard Rodgers
  Richard Rodgers
  Richard Charles Rodgers was an American composer of music for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television. He is best known for his songwriting partnerships with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II...
  
  

1973

• John Lindsay
  John Lindsay
  John Vliet Lindsay was an American politician, lawyer and broadcaster who was a U.S. Congressman, Mayor of New York City, candidate for U.S...
  
   Mayor of New York
• The Actor's Fund of America
• Shubert Organization

1974

• Liza Minnelli
  Liza Minnelli
  Liza May Minnelli is an American actress and singer. She is the daughter of singer and actress Judy Garland and film director Vincente Minnelli....
  
   For adding lustre to the Broadway season
• Bette Midler
  Bette Midler
  Bette Midler is an American singer, actress, and comedian, also known by her informal stage name, The Divine Miss M. She became famous as a cabaret and concert headliner, and went on to star in successful and acclaimed films such as The Rose, Ruthless People, Beaches, and For The Boys...
  
   For adding lustre to the Broadway season
• Peter Cook
  Peter Cook
  Peter Edward Cook was an English satirist, writer and comedian. An extremely influential figure in modern British comedy, he is regarded as the leading light of the British satire boom of the 1960s. He has been described by Stephen Fry as "the funniest man who ever drew breath," although Cook's...
  
   and Dudley Moore
  Dudley Moore
  Dudley Stuart John Moore, CBE was an English actor, comedian, composer and musician.Moore first came to prominence as one of the four writer-performers in the ground-breaking comedy revue Beyond the Fringe in the early 1960s, and then became famous as half of the highly popular television...
  
   Co-stars and authors of Good Evening
• A Moon for the Misbegotten
  A Moon for the Misbegotten
  A Moon for the Misbegotten is a play by Eugene O'Neill. The play can be thought of as a sequel to the autobiographical Long Day's Journey into Night...
  
  An outstanding dramatic revival of an American classic. Produced by Lester Osterman, Elliott Martin and Richard Hurner
• Candide
  Candide
  Candide, ou l'Optimisme is a French satire first published in 1759 by Voltaire, a philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment. The novella has been widely translated, with English versions titled Candide: or, All for the Best ; Candide: or, The Optimist ; and Candide: or, Optimism...
  
  An outstanding contribution to the artistic development of the musical theatre. Produced by Chelsea Theatre Group, Harold Prince and Ruth Mitchell
• Actor's Equity Association

1974 (cont.)

• The Theatre Development Fund
• John F. Wharton
  John F. Wharton
  John Franklin Wharton was a prominent American lawyer and founding partner of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP. Wharton's work was steeped in the classic era of Broadway theatre; he was an aficionado of the stage from his youth, and his practice as a lawyer developed around a series of...
  
   Veteran theatrical attorney (Theatre Award '74)
• Harold Friedlander The industry's foremost printing expert (Theatre Award '74)

1975

• Al Hirschfeld
  Al Hirschfeld
  Albert "Al" Hirschfeld was an American caricaturist best known for his simple black and white portraits of celebrities and Broadway stars.-Personal life:Born in St...
  
   For 50 years of theatrical cartoons (Theatre Award '75)

1976

• George Abbott
  George Abbott
  George Francis Abbott was an American theater producer and director, playwright, screenwriter, and film director and producer whose career spanned more than nine decades.-Early years:...
  
   - Lawrence Langner Award
• Mathilde Pincus For outstanding service to the Broadway musical theatre
• Thomas H. Fitzgerald To the gifted lighting technician of countless Broadway shows and many Tony telecasts. (Posthumous)
• Circle in the Square For twenty-five continuous years of quality productions
• Richard Burton
  Richard Burton
  Richard Burton, CBE was a Welsh actor. He was nominated seven times for an Academy Award, six of which were for Best Actor in a Leading Role , and was a recipient of BAFTA, Golden Globe and Tony Awards for Best Actor. Although never trained as an actor, Burton was, at one time, the highest-paid...
  
  

1977

• Cheryl Crawford - Lawrence Langner Award
• Lily Tomlin
  Lily Tomlin
  Mary Jean "Lily" Tomlin is an American actress, comedienne, writer, and producer. Tomlin has been a major force in American comedy since the late 1960's when she began a career as a stand up comedian and became a featured performer on television's Laugh-in...
  
  
• Barry Manilow
  Barry Manilow
  Barry Manilow is an American singer-songwriter, musician, arranger, producer, conductor, and performer, best known for such recordings as "Could It Be Magic", "Mandy", "Can't Smile Without You", and "Copacabana ."...
  
  
• Diana Ross
  Diana Ross
  Diana Ernestine Earle Ross is an American singer, record producer, and actress. Ross was lead singer of the Motown group The Supremes during the 1960s. After leaving the group in 1970, Ross began a solo career that included successful ventures into film and Broadway...
  
  
• National Theatre of the Deaf
  National Theatre of the Deaf
  The National Theatre of the Deaf is a touring theatre company in the United States. It was founded in 1967. Productions combine the use of American Sign Language with the spoken word. The theatre has won several awards, including the Tony Award for Theatrical Excellence...
  
  
• Equity Liberty Theatre

1978

• Irving Berlin
  Irving Berlin
  Irving Berlin was an American composer and lyricist of Jewish heritage, widely considered one of the greatest songwriters in American history.His first hit song, "Alexander's Ragtime Band", became world famous...
  
   - Lawrence Langner Memorial Award for Distinguished Lifetime Achievement in the American Theatre
• Charles Moss
  Charles Moss
  Charles Moss was an Anglican clergyman who served as Bishop of St David's from 1766 to 1774 and Bishop of Bath and Wells from 1774 to 1802.-Biography:...
  
   and Stan Dragoti
  Stan Dragoti
  Stan Dragoti is an Albanian American film director, whose work includes the comedies Mr. Mom and Love at First Bite....
  
   To the creators (of Wells, Rich, Greene, Inc.) of the I Love New York Broadway Show Tours and its sponsor, the New York State Department of Commerce. (Theatre Award '78)

1979

• Richard Rodgers
  Richard Rodgers
  Richard Charles Rodgers was an American composer of music for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television. He is best known for his songwriting partnerships with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II...
  
   - Lawrence Langner Memorial Award for Distinguished Lifetime Achievement in the American Theatre
• Henry Fonda
  Henry Fonda
  Henry Jaynes Fonda was an American film and stage actor.Fonda made his mark early as a Broadway actor. He also appeared in 1938 in plays performed in White Plains, New York, with Joan Tompkins...
  
  
• Walter F. Diehl International President of Theatrical Stage Employees and Moving Picture Operators, has been an active force in advancing the well-being of the Broadway theatre and of theatre nationally
• Eugene O'Neill Memorial Theater Center
  Eugene O'Neill Theater Center
  The Eugene O'Neill Memorial Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut is a 501 not-for-profit theater company founded in 1964 by George C. White. The O'Neill is the recipient of the . The O'Neill is home to the National Theater Institute , and several major theater conferences including the...
  
  , Waterford, Connecticut

1980s

1980

• Helen Hayes
  Helen Hayes
  Helen Hayes Brown was an American actress whose career spanned almost 70 years. She eventually garnered the nickname "First Lady of the American Theatre" and was one of twelve people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award...
  
   - Lawrence Langner Memorial Award for Distinguished Lifetime Achievement in the American Theatre
• Mary Tyler Moore
  Mary Tyler Moore
  Mary Tyler Moore is an American actress, primarily known for her roles in television sitcoms. Moore is best known for The Mary Tyler Moore Show , in which she starred as Mary Richards, a 30-something single woman who worked as a local news producer in Minneapolis, and for her earlier role as...
  
   Whose Life Is It Anyway?
• Richard Fitzgerald
  Richard Fitzgerald
  Richard Fitzgerald VC was an Irish recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces.-Details:He was approximately 25 years old, and a Gunner in the Bengal Horse Artillery, Bengal...
  
   honored for his installing the infrared system in Broadway theatres, thus bringing the compassion and dedication of making theatergoing for those with impaired hearing, rewarding, and enjoyable (Theatre Award '80)
• Hobe Morrison theater editor of Variety
  Variety (magazine)
  Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
  
   (Theatre Award '80)

1981

• Lena Horne
  Lena Horne
  Lena Mary Calhoun Horne was an American singer, actress, civil rights activist and dancer.Horne joined the chorus of the Cotton Club at the age of sixteen and became a nightclub performer before moving to Hollywood, where she had small parts in numerous movies, and more substantial parts in the...
  
   Lena Horne: The Lady and her Music

1982

• The Actors' Fund of America
• Warner Communications
  Warner Communications
  Warner Communications or Warner Communications, Inc. was established in 1971 when Kinney National Company spun off its non-entertainment assets, due to a financial scandal over its parking operations and changed its name....
  
   (Theatre Award '82)
• Radio City Music Hall
  Radio City Music Hall
  Radio City Music Hall is an entertainment venue located in New York City's Rockefeller Center. Its nickname is the Showplace of the Nation, and it was for a time the leading tourist destination in the city...
  
   (Theatre Award '82)

1983:no award

1984

• La Tragedie de Carmen For outstanding achievement in musical theatre
• Peter Feller A master craftsman who has devoted forty years to theatre stagecraft and magic
• A Chorus Line
  A Chorus Line
  A Chorus Line is a 1975 musical about Broadway dancers auditioning for spots on a chorus line. The book was authored by James Kirkwood, Jr. and Nicholas Dante, lyrics were written by Edward Kleban, and music was composed by Marvin Hamlisch....
  
  Gold Tony Award, in honor of becoming Broadway's longest-running musical

1985

• Yul Brynner
  Yul Brynner
  Yul Brynner was a Russian-born actor of stage and film. He was best known for his portrayal of Mongkut, king of Siam, in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical The King and I, for which he won an Academy Award for Best Actor for the film version; he also played the role more than 4,500 times on...
  
   Honoring his 4,525 performances in The King and I
• New York State Council on the Arts
  New York State Council on the Arts
  The New York State Council on the Arts is an arts council serving the U.S. state of New York. It was established in 1960 through a bill introduced in the New York State Legislature by New York State Senator MacNeil Mitchell , with backing from Governor Nelson Rockefeller, and began its work in 1961...
  
  

1986:no award

1987

• Jackie Mason
  Jackie Mason
  Jackie Mason is an American stand-up comedian and movie actor.-Early life:Born Yacov Moshe Maza in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, he grew up on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York City....
  
   for The World According to Me
• George Abbott
  George Abbott
  George Francis Abbott was an American theater producer and director, playwright, screenwriter, and film director and producer whose career spanned more than nine decades.-Early years:...
  
   on the occasion of his 100th birthday

1988

• Brooklyn Academy of Music
  Brooklyn Academy of Music
  Brooklyn Academy of Music is a major performing arts venue in Brooklyn, a borough of New York City, United States, known as a center for progressive and avant garde performance....
  
  

1989: no award

1990s

Source:Internet Broadway DatabaseBroadwayWorld Tony Database

1990

• none

1991

• none

1992

• none

1993

• Oklahoma!
  Oklahoma!
  Oklahoma! is the first musical written by composer Richard Rodgers and librettist Oscar Hammerstein II. The musical is based on Lynn Riggs' 1931 play, Green Grow the Lilacs. Set in Oklahoma Territory outside the town of Claremore in 1906, it tells the story of cowboy Curly McLain and his romance...
  
  50th anniversary in 1993

1994

• Jessica Tandy
  Jessica Tandy
  Jessie Alice "Jessica" Tandy was an English-American stage and film actress.She first appeared on the London stage in 1926 at the age of 16, playing, among others, Katherine opposite Laurence Olivier's Henry V, and Cordelia opposite John Gielgud's King Lear. She also worked in British films...
  
   and Hume Cronyn
  Hume Cronyn
  Hume Blake Cronyn, OC was a Canadian actor of stage and screen, who enjoyed a long career, often appearing professionally alongside his second wife, Jessica Tandy.-Early life:...
  
  , the first recipients of the special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement

1995

• Carol Channing
  Carol Channing
  Carol Elaine Channing is an American singer, actress, and comedienne. She is the recipient of three Tony Awards , a Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination...
  
   Lifetime Achievement
• Harvey Sabinson, (retiring as executive director of the League of American Theaters and Producers after 50 years in the theater) Lifetime Achievement
• National Endowment for the Arts, accepted by Jane Alexander
  Jane Alexander
  Jane Alexander is an American actress, author, and former director of the National Endowment for the Arts. Although perhaps best known for playing the female lead in The Great White Hope on both stage and screen, Alexander has played a wide array of roles in both theater and film and has committed...
  
   (Tony Honor)

1996: none

1997

• Bernard B. Jacobs (president of the Shubert Organization) Lifetime Achievement

1998

• Edward E. Colton Lifetime Achievement
• Ben Edwards Lifetime Achievement

1999

• Isabelle Stevenson Lifetime Achievement
• Uta Hagen
  Uta Hagen
  Uta Thyra Hagen was a German-born American actress and drama teacher. She originated the role of Martha in the 1963 Broadway premiere of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee...
  
   Lifetime Achievement
• Arthur Miller
  Arthur Miller
  Arthur Asher Miller was an American playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in American theatre, writing dramas that include plays such as All My Sons , Death of a Salesman , The Crucible , and A View from the Bridge .Miller was often in the public eye,...
  
   Lifetime Achievement

2000s

2000

• Dame Edna: The Royal Tour – Live Theatrical Presentation
• T. Edward Hambleton – Lifetime Achievement

2001

• Paul Gemignani
  Paul Gemignani
  Paul Gemignani is an award-winning American musical director with a career on Broadway and West End theatre spanning over thirty years.-Life and career:...
  
   – Lifetime Achievement

2002

• Robert Whitehead - Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre
• Julie Harris
  Julie Harris
  Julia Ann "Julie" Harris is an American stage, screen, and television actress. She has won five Tony Awards, three Emmy Awards and a Grammy Award, and was nominated for an Academy Award. In 1994, she was awarded the National Medal of Arts. She is a member of the American Theatre Hall of Fame...
  
   - Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre

2003

• Cy Feuer
  Cy Feuer
  Cy Feuer was an American theatre producer, director, composer, and musician.Born Seymour Arnold Feuerman in Brooklyn, New York,he studied trumpet privately with Max Schlossberg, he became a professional trumpeter at the age of fifteen, working at clubs on weekends to help support his family while...
  
   – Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre
• Russell Simmons
  Russell Simmons
  -External links:** * * * * * * from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum* *...
  
  ' Def Poetry Jam on Broadway – Special Theatrical Event (Competitive)

2004

• James M. Nederlander – Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre

2005

• Edward Albee
  Edward Albee
  Edward Franklin Albee III is an American playwright who is best known for The Zoo Story , The Sandbox , Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? , and a rewrite of the screenplay for the unsuccessful musical version of Capote's Breakfast at Tiffany's . His works are considered well-crafted, often...
  
   – Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre

2006

• Sarah Jones, Bridge and Tunnel
• Harold Prince – Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre

2007: no award

2008

• Stephen Sondheim
  Stephen Sondheim
  Stephen Joshua Sondheim is an American composer and lyricist for stage and film. He is the winner of an Academy Award, multiple Tony Awards including the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre, multiple Grammy Awards, a Pulitzer Prize and the Laurence Olivier Award...
  
   – Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre
• Robert Russell Bennett
  Robert Russell Bennett
  Robert Russell Bennett was an American composer and arranger, best known for his orchestration of many well-known Broadway and Hollywood musicals by other composers such as Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, and Richard Rodgers. In 1957 and 2008, Bennett received Tony Awards...
  
   – in recognition of his contribution to the field of orchestrations

2009

• Jerry Herman
  Jerry Herman
  Jerry Herman is an American composer and lyricist, known for his work in Broadway musical theater. He composed the scores for the hit Broadway musicals Hello, Dolly!, Mame, and La Cage aux Folles. He has been nominated for the Tony Award five times, and won twice, for Hello, Dolly! and La Cage...
  
   – Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre

2010

• Marian Seldes
  Marian Seldes
  Marian Hall Seldes is an American stage, film, radio, and television actress whose career has spanned six decades and who was elected to the American Theatre Hall of Fame.-Life and career:...
  
   – Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre
• Alan Ayckbourn
  Alan Ayckbourn
  Sir Alan Ayckbourn CBE is a prolific English playwright. He has written and produced seventy-three full-length plays in Scarborough and London and was, between 1972 and 2009, the artistic director of the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, where all but four of his plays have received their...
  
  – Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre

External links

• Official Site Tony Awards