Winner of the 2016 Tony Award for Best Play

Finalist for the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Drama

Winner of the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding New Broadway Play

Winner of the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Play

"THE BEST PLAY OF THE YEAR"

The New York Times, The Washington Post, New York Magazine, Chicago Tribune, The Hollywood Reporter, Time Out New York, NPR

“A middle-class family seems to be spiraling toward perilous entropy in The Humans, the blisteringly funny, bruisingly sad and altogether wonderful play by Stephen Karam … Written with a fresh-feeling blend of documentarylike naturalism and theatrical daring…Mr. Karam’s comedy-drama depicts the way we live now with a precision and compassion unmatched by any play I’ve seen in recent years.
The Humans is a major discovery, a play as empathetic as it is clear-minded, as entertaining as it is honest. For all the darkness at its core — a darkness made literal in its ghostly conclusion — a bright light shines forth from it, the blazing luminescence of collective artistic achievement.” – Charles Isherwood, The New York Times

“A kind, warm, beautifully observed and deeply moving new play, a celebration of working-class familial imperfection and affection… Few writers of Karam’s generation have achieved anything quite like The Humans, a play about the horrors of ordinary life and the love we need to counter them.” – Chris Jones, Chicago Tribune

“…beautifully wrought... Having limned The Humans with gorgeous naturalism, Karam boldly forces us into a world beyond the familiar.” – Adam Feldman, Time Out New York

Breaking with tradition, Erik Blake has brought his Pennsylvania family to celebrate Thanksgiving at his daughter’s apartment in lower Manhattan. Unfolding over a single scene, this “delirious tragicomedy” (Chicago Sun-Times) by acclaimed young playwright Stephen Karam “infuses the traditional kitchen-sink family drama with qualities of horror in his portentous and penetrating work of psychological unease” (Variety), creating an indelible family portrait.

Stephen Karam’s plays include Speech & Debate and Sons of the Prophet, a finalist for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize and the winner of the 2012 Drama Critics Circle, Outer Critics Circle, Lucille Lortel and Hull-Warriner awards for Best Play. Born and raised in Scranton, PA, he lives in New York City.