TV Exclusive: Marshall W. Mason on Receiving Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre

Marshall W. Mason was the recipient of the 2016 Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre - below, check out what he had to say after he accepted the award!

Marshall W. Mason was the Founding Artistic Director of the Circle Repertory Company, acclaimed by the New York Times in 1975 as "the chief provider of new American plays." His 44-year collaboration with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lanford Wilson has been certified by Playbill as the longest collaboration between a writer and director in the history of the American Theater.

In 1999, he was awarded a special millennium "Mr. Abbott" Award as one of the most innovative and influential directors of the twentieth century, and last year he was elected to the Theater Hall of Fame.

On Broadway, Mason directed 12 plays that earned him five Tony nominations for Best Director: Knock Knock by Jules Feiffer, Talley's Folly (New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Play and the Pulitzer Prize), Fifth of July and Angels Fall by Lanford Wilson, and As Is by William M. Hoffman (Drama Desk Award for Best Play). Four productions received TONY AWARDS with 24 nominations. Mason has been honored with the Theater World Award for his discovery and nourishment of new talent, including William Hurt, Kathy Bates, Christopher Reeve, Jeff Daniels and many others. He received the Margo Jones Award for his cultivation of new writers, and both the Inge Festival and the Last Frontier Awards for lifetime achievement. He has won the Irwin Piscator Award, three Drama League Awards and four AriZoni Awards. For two years, he was chief drama critic for New Times in Phoenix and received the Arizona Press Club Award. He is the author of Creating Life on Stage: A Director's Approach to Working with Actors (Heinemann Press, 2006) and The Transcendent Years of Circle Rep.