Obie Awards

The Obie Awards honor the highest calibre of off-Broadway and off-off Broadway theatre to recognize brave work, champion new material, and advance careers in theatre.

For more than sixty years, the Village Voice has put off and off-off Broadway on the map by recognizing the artistic power of downtown theatre. The Voice was a forum for heated artistic discussion, including theatre reviews, that sparked awareness and excitement for New York’s emerging theatre movement. Alongside the publication, The Voice developed the Obie Awards in 1955 to celebrate the important work being staged south of Broadway. The Obie Awards honor the boundary-pushing theatre seen in the city’s intimate performing spaces, supporting an incubator for emerging work, with an award that validates off-Broadway as a league of its own.

Upheld today, the Obie award categories were made purposefully informal to create limitless possibilities for recognizing personas and productions worthy of distinction. The loose nature of the Obies foster an award ceremony that is as spirited as the people who began the downtown theatre movement more than sixty years ago. In 2015, American Theatre Wing joined the Village Voice to co-present The Obies with the mission to celebrate the diverse artists who bring important, progressive work to every New York City stage.

Visit www.ObieAwards.com for more details.