The Laurels

After Novelist Carson McCullers turned her The Member of the Wedding into a play (TIME, Jan. 16), the script languished in producers' offices for three years. One producer suggested to the 33-year-old Georgian that she tear it up and try something else. Last week, its 13th on Broadway, Mrs. McCullers' drama about a sensitive twelve-year-old girl's entry into adolescence won the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award as the best of the season. The award was a scro' l which box-office men figured was worth an extra advance sale of $150,000.

As the best foreign play, the Manhattan critics chose T. S. Eliot's verse comedy,

The Cocktail Party (TIME, Jan. 30). The award for the best musical play went to The Consul, written, composed and directed by Gian-Carlo Menotti (TIME, March 27).

The day after the critics presented their scrolls, the board of the American Theater Wing passed out its annual Antoinette Perry Awards, the stage's closest approach to Hollywood's Oscars. South Pacific, produced too late to qualify for last year's honors, was named the "outstanding" musical, and individual "Tonys" went to its producers, Director Joshua Logan and four of its players: Mary Martin, Ezio Pinza, Juanita Hall and Myron McCormick. The outstanding play: The Cocktail Party.

Among the other winners: Shirley Booth and Sidney Blackmer for "distinguished" performances in Come Back, Little Sheba (TIME, Feb. 27), Actor-Manager Maurice Evans for producing the New York City Theater Company's winter season.

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