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Martyna Majok ( ) is a Polish-born American playwright who received the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for her play Cost of Living. She emigrated to the United States as a child and grew up in New Jersey. Majok studied playwriting at the Yale School of Drama and Juilliard School. Her plays are often politically engaged, feature dark humor, and experiment with structure and time.
Her breakthrough came with the play Ironbound (2014). As her work gained wider acclaim and recognition, Majok, who has a diverse writing style, debuted Cost of Living (2016), Queens (2018), and Sanctuary City (2021). She adapted The Great Gatsby for the musical "Gatsby: An American Myth," with Florence Welch and Thomas Bartlett writing music.
Martyna lives in Manhattan with her partner, actor Bobby Conte.
Talking about her working method, she emphasized: "Workshops, whether in the 'traditional' playwright-of-a-play method or in a room with artists and no script, are my favorite part of making theatre." Discussing her inspirations, Majok pointed out her mother, and also said:
Her breakthrough play, Ironbound (2014), depicts the illusion of the American Dream and fighting for a place in the world through the eyes of a hard-working, barely-getting-by immigrant woman, living in the industrial wastelands of New Jersey. It is based on experiences from the author's mother. The play was praised by critics, won several awards including the 2016 Helen Hayes Awards's Charles McArthur Award for Outstanding Original New Play or Musical, and was featured in the top-ten of the 2014 Kilroys' List. Ironbound opened Off-Broadway in 2016 at the WP Theater/Rattlestick.
Cost of Living (2016), the winner of 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, explores the interactions of abled and disabled individuals. Majok takes a broader look at class division, financially precarious characters, and the delicate emotional balance of need and care. It played Off-Broadway in a Manhattan Theatre Club production at City Center in June and July 2017. Jesse Green of The New York Times wrote: "in the play, two characters chafe against the way that a wheelchair, like color or language, can be a marker of disfavored status within the larger, normative society... it would be a mistake to see Cost of Living as an identity play about people with disabilities. Rather, it’s a play about disabilities with people. In both of its stories, which eventually collide, the biggest handicaps are the universal ones: fear and disconnection." This piece also won Outstanding Play at the Lucille Lortel Awards, got nomination for Outer Critics Circle Award's Outstanding New Off-Broadway Play, and was featured in the top-ten of the 2016 Kilroys' List, among other accolades.
Cost of Living has been produced around the world including in New York, Los Angeles, London, Toronto, Poland, Israel, and Cyprus.
In 2018, Queens ( queens) premiered Off-Broadway at the Lincoln Center's LCT3/Claire Tow Theater. The play encompasses 16 years during which documented and undocumented women of two generations and different origin live together, in a basement apartment in Queens, New York, trying to support each other in their struggle with everyday life. The choices they have made come back to confront them. Queens is being developed into an original series for HBO; Majok is penning the adaptation and is set to executive produce.
In Sanctuary City (2020), she looks at a pair of teenage immigrants, one recently naturalized and the other undocumented, who hatch a plan to keep the latter in the U.S. The action takes place in Newark during the early 2000s when the DREAM Act was proposed and young immigrants hoped it might be a resolution to their uncertain status. "DREAMers, friends, and lovers negotiate the promise of safety and the weight of responsibility in America." Majok's story asks what we’re willing to sacrifice for someone we love, she said: “some of the things I'm exploring are the extent to which we help when we can, how much we are willing to care for and sacrifice for another person, and the cost of that, for both sides, particularly when coming from a world of limited means and guarantees.” Sanctuary City, produced by New York Theatre Workshop, had a world premiere Off-Broadway at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in March 2020, but was suspended after a few days due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It received an Edgerton Foundation New Play Award.
Majok's works has been presented and developed with many other theater companies, including La Jolla Playhouse, Round House, Kennedy Center, Geffen Playhouse, Fountain Theatre, and Steppenwolf Theatre. International productions include London, Toronto, Sydney, Poland, Israel, and Cyprus.
Among her other accolades and fellowships, she received Hermitage Greenfield Prize Jury in Drama in 2018 (as first female recipient of this commission), New York Theatre Workshop's 2050 Fellowship, and Puffin Foundation grant. She is alumna of 2014–16 WP Theater Lab, Ensemble Studio Theater's Youngblood, and Ars Nova’s Uncharted programs.
She has taught playwriting at Williams College, Wesleyan University, and SUNY Purchase College; in education projects such as Primary Stages ESPA, and NJ Rep; and as an assistant to Paula Vogel at Yale University. Publications: Dramatists Play Service, Samuel French, TCG, Playscripts, and Smith & Kraus.
The play premiered at the Steppenwolf Theatre, Chicago in July 2014. In the fall of 2015, it was shown at the Round House Theatre in Bethesda, Maryland as a part of the Women's Voices Theatre Festival, where on opening night 300 people gave a standing ovation. Ironbound went on to an Off-Broadway run at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater in 2016, in a co-production with WP Theater. It started previews March 3, opened March 16, and closed April 24. The play featured direction by Daniella Topol, sets and lighting by Justin Townsend, costumes by Kaye Voyce, and sound by Jane Shaw. The cast included Marin Ireland as Darja, Shiloh Fernandez as Vic, and Morgan Spector as Tommy. The drama was also staged at the Geffen Playhouse, and National Theatre of Warsaw, amongst other theatres in America and abroad.
Nelson Pressley of The Washington Post called Ironbound a "knockout" and stated: "you seldom see plays that are both harsh and wonderful." BroadwayWorld's Jennifer Perry emphasized: "Majok proves exceptional at writing (a) richly-drawn character(s).", and it was The New York Times critic's pick. In 2013, the play script won the Smith Prize for Political Theater, a joint commission/award supported and administered by the National New Play Network, and it has also won the Aurora Theatre's Global Age Project Prize, the David Calicchio Emerging American Playwright Prize, and the Charles McArthur Award for Outstanding Original New Play or Musical at the 2016 Helen Hayes Awards.
Cost of Living received its West Coast premiere at the Fountain Theatre in November 2018, British premiere in January and Polish premiere in March 2019.
The play won Outstanding New Play at the 2018 Lucille Lortel Awards (tied with Jocelyn Bioh's School Girls: Or, The African Mean Girls Play), Edgerton New Play Prize, The Kennedy Center's Jean Kennedy Smith Award, and the Women's Invitational Prize, among others. It was nominated for the 2018 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding New Off-Broadway Play. Both performances were directed by Jo Bonney, who was nominated for Outstanding Director of a Play at the Outer Critics Circle Awards. They also both featured actors with disabilities – Katy Sullivan as Ani, who was nominated for a Lucille Lortel award and Outer Critics Circle Award for her performance, and Gregg Mozgala who portrayed John. Mozgala was nominated for a Drama Desk Award and Outer Critics Circle Award and won a Lucille Lortel award for his performance.
This time Jesse Green of The New York Times called Majok's play a "knockout". Queens received West Coast premiere at the La Jolla Playhouse in July 2018, in a new two-act version. The play is being developed into a series for HBO.
A further revised version of Queens will begin previews Off-Broadway at Manhattan Theatre Club on October 15, 2025, with an opening set for November 5. Now directed by Trip Cullman, the production stars Anna Chlumsky, Julia Lester and Marin Ireland, alongside Sharlene Cruz, Brooke Bloom, and Syglowski, Malouf, and Villamil reprising their roles.
The project received an Edgerton Foundation New Play Award, and was supported by a Laurents/Hatcher Foundation Theater Development Grant and in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
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