Victory Gardens Theater, founded in 1974, is dedicated to contemporary American playwrights and their work. Considered one of the seminal institutions in the Chicago Theater Movement of the 1970's, Victory Gardens won the Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre in 2001. The theater's primary commitment is to the development, production and support of new American plays and has produced 170 world premieres among its 295 mainstage productions. Victory Gardens is the oldest and largest not-for-profit, professional theater in Chicago devoted to new work.