Established in 1936 by members of the Dramatists Guild and the Society for Authors' Representatives, Dramatists Play Service, Inc. (a.k.a. DPS and The Play Service) is a theatrical publishing and licensing house. DPS publishes English-language acting editions of plays

Play (theatre)

A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...

 and handles the licensing for professional and nonprofessional English-language productions of these plays in the United States, Canada, and throughout the world.

DPS is based in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, with foreign affiliates in London, Australia, and South Africa that serve DPS' interests in their respective regions. The DPS catalogue consists of over 3,300 titles from over 1,300 authors. DPS is especially known for its extensive list of Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning plays. DPS authors include Eugene O'Neill

Eugene O'Neill

Eugene Gladstone O'Neill was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in Literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into American drama techniques of realism earlier associated with Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, and Swedish...

, George S. Kaufman

George S. Kaufman

George Simon Kaufman was an American playwright, theatre director and producer, humorist, and drama critic. In addition to comedies and political satire, he wrote several musicals, notably for the Marx Brothers...

, Tennessee Williams

Tennessee Williams

Thomas Lanier "Tennessee" Williams III was an American writer who worked principally as a playwright in the American theater. He also wrote short stories, novels, poetry, essays, screenplays and a volume of memoirs...

, Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller

Arthur Asher Miller was an American playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in American theatre, writing dramas that include plays such as All My Sons , Death of a Salesman , The Crucible , and A View from the Bridge .Miller was often in the public eye,...

, Horton Foote

Horton Foote

Albert Horton Foote, Jr. was an American playwright and screenwriter, perhaps best known for his Academy Award-winning screenplays for the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird and the 1983 film Tender Mercies, and his notable live television dramas during the Golden Age of Television...

, Edward Albee

Edward Albee

Edward Franklin Albee III is an American playwright who is best known for The Zoo Story , The Sandbox , Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? , and a rewrite of the screenplay for the unsuccessful musical version of Capote's Breakfast at Tiffany's . His works are considered well-crafted, often...

, Sam Shepard

Sam Shepard

Sam Shepard is an American playwright, actor, and television and film director. He is the author of several books of short stories, essays, and memoirs, and received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1979 for his play Buried Child...

, Lanford Wilson

Lanford Wilson

Lanford Wilson was an American playwright who helped to advance the Off-Off-Broadway theater movement. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1980, was elected in 2001 to the Theater Hall of Fame, and in 2004 was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters...

, Terrence McNally

Terrence McNally

Terrence McNally is an American playwright who has received four Tony Awards, an Emmy, two Guggenheim Fellowships, a Rockefeller Grant, the Lucille Lortel Award, the Hull-Warriner Award, and a citation from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He has been a member of the Council of the...

, Beth Henley

Beth Henley

Elizabeth Becker "Beth" Henley is an American dramatist and actress. She writes primarily about women's issues and family in the Southern United States. She is also a screenwriter who has written many film adaptations of her plays...

, Alfred Uhry

Alfred Uhry

Alfred Fox Uhry is an American playwright, screenwriter, and member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers. He is one of very few writers to receive an Academy Award, Tony Award and the Pulitzer Prize for dramatic writing....

, Wendy Wasserstein

Wendy Wasserstein

Wendy Wasserstein was an American playwright and an Andrew Dickson White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University...

, Christopher Durang

Christopher Durang

Christopher Ferdinand Durang is an American playwright known for works of outrageous and often absurd comedy. His work was especially popular in the 1980s.- Life :...

, Paula Vogel

Paula Vogel

Paula Vogel is an American playwright and university professor. She received the 1998 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for her play, How I Learned to Drive.-Early years:...

, Donald Margulies

Donald Margulies

Donald Margulies is an American playwright and a professor of English and Theater Studies at Yale University...

, Richard Greenberg

Richard Greenberg

Richard Greenberg is an American playwright. He is the author of over 25 plays including eight South Coast Repertory world premieres: Our Mother's Brief Affair, The Injured Party, The Violet Hour, Everett Beekin, Hurrah at Last, Three Days of Rain Richard Greenberg (1958–present) is an American...

, John Patrick Shanley

John Patrick Shanley

John Patrick Shanley is an American playwright, screenwriter, and director. He also contributed articles on the performing arts to The New York Times among other publications.-Life and career:...

, Doug Wright

Doug Wright

Doug Wright is an American playwright, librettist, and screenwriter. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2004 for his play, I Am My Own Wife.-Early years:Wright was born in Dallas, Texas...

, Tracy Letts

Tracy Letts

Tracy Letts is an American playwright and actor who received the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play August: Osage County.-Biography:...

, and Frederick Knott

Frederick Knott

Frederick Major Paull Knott was an English playwright, best known for writing the London-based stage thriller Dial M for Murder, which was later filmed in Hollywood by Alfred Hitchcock....

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