SETPIECE Independent critical review Skip to content Issue 07 / 26

Award record

1969-1970 award record

Categories
12
Honoured
46
Nominated
—
New this season
5

46 awards were given across 12 categories. Shortlists were not published in this period, so everyone named here was honoured — none of them is a runner-up. The entries come from the announcements issued at the time, the only public record of this season. 5 categories appear for the first time this season: Best American Play, Best Musical, Best Play, Outstanding Costume Design, Outstanding Performances.

A darkened theatre auditorium seen from the side: an ornate proscenium arch with lit wall sconces, a drawn curtain glowing at the stage opening, and rows of empty seats in the foreground.
A proscenium house of the kind the early awards were judged in. Photographs on these record pages illustrate the period; they do not depict the productions listed.

Best American Play

Winner

  • he Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds Paul Zindel

Best Musical

Winner

  • Company George Furth, Stephen Sondheim

Best Play

Winner

  • Borstal Boy Frank MacMahon

Most Promising Playwrights

These entries did not carry a heading of their own in the surviving announcement. They are placed here from their position in the original, so the heading above is the most likely one rather than a recorded one.

Honoured

  • C.C. Courtney, Peter Link Salvation
  • Gary William Friedman, Will Holt The Me Nobody Knows
  • Nancy Ford, Gretch Cryer The Last Sweet Days of Isaac
  • Paul Zindel The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds
  • Stanley Eveling Dear Janet Rosenberg, Dear Mr. Kooning
  • Susan Yankowitz Terminal

Outstanding Book

Winner

  • George Furth Company

Outstanding Choreography

Winner

  • Ron Field Applause

Outstanding Costume Design

These entries did not carry a heading of their own in the surviving announcement. They are placed here from their position in the original, so the heading above is the most likely one rather than a recorded one.

Honoured

  • Freddy Wittop A Patriot for Me
  • Theoni V. Aldredge Peer Gynt
  • Willa Kim Promenade / Operation Sidewinder

Outstanding Directors

These entries did not carry a heading of their own in the surviving announcement. They are placed here from their position in the original, so the heading above is the most likely one rather than a recorded one.

Honoured

  • Alan Arkin The White House Murder Case
  • Harold Prince Company
  • Jerzy Grotowski The Apocalypse
  • Joseph Hardy Child's Play
  • Ron Field Applause

Outstanding Lyrics

These entries did not carry a heading of their own in the surviving announcement. They are placed here from their position in the original, so the heading above is the most likely one rather than a recorded one.

Honoured

  • Bertolt Brecht Mahagonny
  • Stephen Sondheim Company

Outstanding Music

These entries did not carry a heading of their own in the surviving announcement. They are placed here from their position in the original, so the heading above is the most likely one rather than a recorded one.

Honoured

  • Kurt Weill Mahagonny
  • Stephen Sondheim Company

Outstanding Performances

These entries did not carry a heading of their own in the surviving announcement. They are placed here from their position in the original, so the heading above is the most likely one rather than a recorded one.

Honoured

  • Austin Pendleton The Last Sweet Days of Isaac
  • Brian Bedford Private Lives
  • Christopher Walken Lemon Sky
  • Cleavon Little Purlie
  • Colleen Dewhurst Hello and Goodbye
  • Ethel Merman Hello, Dolly!
  • Frank Grimes Borstal Boy
  • Fritz Weaver Child's Play
  • James Stewart Harvey
  • Lauren Bacall Applause
  • Lewis J. Stadlen Minnie's Boys
  • Melba Moore Purlie
  • Niall Tobin Borstal Boy
  • Ron Leibman Transfers
  • Ryszard Cieslak The Constant Prince
  • Sada Thompson The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds
  • Sandy Duncan The Boy Friend
  • Stacy Keach Indians
  • Stephen Elliott A Whistle in the Dark
  • Zoe Caldwell Colette

Outstanding Set Design

These entries did not carry a heading of their own in the surviving announcement. They are placed here from their position in the original, so the heading above is the most likely one rather than a recorded one.

Honoured

  • Boris Aronson Company
  • Fred Voelpe The Memory Bank
  • Jo Mielziner Child's Play

Who else on this page appears elsewhere in the record

12 of the 44 names on this page appear in at least one other season held here. Reading a person as a run rather than a single entry is the point of an index like this one. A designer's work shows up under two or three different category names as the headings were renamed.

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