Lin-Manuel Miranda Awarded Eugene O'Neill Theater Center's Monte Cristo Award

The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center awarded Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton) the 18th Monte Cristo Award on Monday, April 30, at New York City's Edison Ballroom.

The O'Neill annually bestows its Monte Cristo Award on a prominent theater artist whose work has had an extraordinary impact on American theater, in memory of its namesake. The gala event supports the Center's commitment to developing new work and new artists for the stage.

Miranda's first professional production was at the O'Neill's National Music Theater Conference with In the Heights in 2005, and in May, the Miranda Family Fund announced their commitment to provide scholarships for artists of color to attend the O'Neill's National Theater Institute. N.T.I.'s credit-earning theater intensives — taught by industry professionals and master teachers — train actors, singers, directors, dancers, designers, playwrights, and composers to produce, write, direct, and act in their own work, as well as create their own path in the industry.

Past recipients of the Award include actors Judith Light, Meryl Streep, Michael Douglas, Nathan Lane, Christopher Plummer, James Earl Jones, Jason Robards Jr., Zoe Caldwell, Brian Dennehy, and Karl Malden; playwrights August Wilson, Wendy Wasserstein, Edward Albee, and Neil Simon; directors Harold Prince and George C. Wolfe; and Arthur and Barbara Gelb.