10 Best Plays Of All Time: Comedy, Drama, Tragedy And More

We all have faced at least one argument about plays. Directly speaking, the discussion we met may be about the best plays ever. If you ever have this issue, I think your vote was for William Shakespeare’s Hamlet. After all the debate and discussion, we all come and stop at that point.

The top 10 plays I added here are the famous and well-appreciated plays of all time. Maybe you will try to change the rank position, but you can’t remove any plays from the list.

The list is not based on the only mass readers, the book’s sale, or performance on Broadway. I tried to list plays history, dramatizing, and some reviews.

Best Plays Of All Time From All Genres

In modern days, we have a cinema hall, multiplex. We have lots of multitalented movie writers and directors who are giving us the test of watching. But if you got a chance to watch live drama or plays or stage shows, will you miss that change?

Plays give us a taste of live watching that movie couldn’t. In modern times, writers are also writing plays because plays are popular with our generation. I’ve made a list of the best plays of all time based on different perspectives. Here is the list below:

10. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a play by the American playwright Edward Albee. He was mostly known for his many extraordinary works such as The Zoo Story (1958), The Sandbox (1959), A Delicate Balance (1966), and Three Tall Women (1994), and as well as Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

The Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Plays take the set in the living room of a middle-aged couple, drunk and grumpy. This play was published and produced in 1962.

09. Angels in America by Tony Kushner

Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes is an English language play by the famous American playwright Tony Kushner. This play has a total of two parts. This play first premiered in May 1991 in Eureka Theatre Company, San Francisco, California.

The most pride matter for this play is it has won numerous including some big awards such as  Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the Tony Award for Best Play, and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play.

08. Long Day’s Journey into Night

Long Day’s Journey into Night is a tragedy genre of four acts written by the American writer Eugene O’Neill. This play was written between 1941–42. This play is considered a masterpiece work by the writer Eugene O’Neill also considered one of the finest American plays of the 20th century. On 2 February 1956, this plays firstly premiered in Sweden.

07. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead are a Tragicomedy genre plays written by Tom Stoppard. This play is considered the absurdist existential tragicomedy by Tom Stoppard’s playwright. He was a British playwright who was born on 3 July 1937.

He has done many literary works throughout his life, mainly he wrote for the television, radio, film, and stage. His best plays are Arcadia, The Coast of Utopia, Every Good Boy Deserves Favor, Professional Foul, The Real Thing, Travesties, and many more. The Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead are also one of his greatest works.

06. Romeo and Juliet – William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet is a timeless play written by the highly prominent writer William Shakespeare. Shakespeare wrote this tragedy in the earlier time of his life. This tragic romance plot is based on the Italian tale translated into verse as The Tragical History of Romeo and Juliet.

It is the story of two young star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately reconcile their feuding families. Still, this romance genre play has taken a large position globally.

05. A Raisin in the Sun

Lorraine Hansberry was an American playwright and writer who wrote A Raisin in the Sun. This play was debuted in 1959 on Broadway, and Lorraine Hansberry is the first African-American female author to have a play performed on Broadway.

The title of this play has taken from the poem Harlem that Langston Hughes wrote. On March 11, 1959, this play was first premiered in Ethel Barrymore Theatre.

04. Antigone

Antigone is a tragedy that was written in or before 441 BCE. This play was written by Sophocles, one of the three Greek tragedians whose play has survived.

In his short life, he wrote over 120 plays, but only 7 plays have survived; Ajax, Antigone, Women of Trachis, Oedipus Rex, Electra, Philoctetes, and Oedipus at Colonus,

03. The Importance of Being Earnest – Oscar Wilde

The Importance of Being Earnest, also known as A Trivial Comedy for Serious People worldwide, is a comedy play by Oscar Wilde. This play was first performed on 14 February 1895 at the St James’s Theatre in London.

In this farcical comedy, the protagonists maintain fictitious personae to escape burdensome social obligations. The original language of this comedy play was English.

Best Plays Of All Time The Cherry Orchard

02. The Cherry Orchard

Anton Chekhov is a Russian playwright, and The Cherry Orchard is the last popular play written by him in 1903. Znaniye is a publishing company that first published and came out as a separate edition later that year in Saint Petersburg via A.F. Marks Publishers.

On 17 January 1904, The Cherry Orchard play was opened at the Moscow Art Theatre in a production directed by Konstantin Stanislavski with Russian’s original language.

01. Hamlet – William Shakespeare

Hamlet is the most powerful and influential works of world literature by William Shakespeare, published in a quarto edition in 1603 from an unauthorized text. Hamlet has many other names, and those are The Tragedy of Hamlet and Prince of Denmark.

This popular, most extended play was written by William Shakespeare between 1599 and 1601 that contained 30,557 words. This play follows Prince Hamlet’s story and his revenge against his uncle named Claudius by setting in Denmark.

If you have watched or read all the plays on the list, write your opinion in the comment box for others. If you want to add any other plays to the list, write down about that. It’s important to read plays to feel the literature from your heart.

If you are new to reading plays, you can try Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde’s book. All those books are easily accessible. You can buy those books from your nearby bookshop, or you can collect PDF copies. Visit the theatre as much as you can.