Its heartwarming treatment of universal themes such as love and friendship has earned it unanimous acclaim—and six Tony trophies.
Just when we thought it had already peaked, South Korea’s soft power proves us wrong every single time. Everything “K” is everywhere, with everything about it deemed cool.
From K-dramas/movies to K-food, K-pop to K-beauty, the East Asian country’s rise to being a global cultural powerhouse shows no signs of slowing down just yet. Korean pop culture has also been a huge economic driver for South Korea, the world’s 12th largest economy. K-pop alone, for instance, was valued at US$8.1 billion in 2021 and is estimated to reach US$20 billion by 2031, per a report by Allied Market Research. In 2023, the South Korean music industry achieved a record-breaking sales revenue totaling a staggering 12.6 trillion won or US$9.3 billion, according to Statista.
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All this is thanks to an estimated 225 million Hallyu fans and 1,748 Hallyu fan clubs across 119 countries, according to a March 2024 report by the Korea Foundation and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
And just the other day, June 8, South Korea conquered yet another important cultural institution: the Tony Awards. It looks like with this latest milestone, K-culture is all set to win over a new set of fans.
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A triumphant night
I guess it’s now safe to say that we’re on the cusp of the rise of K-musicals, with Maybe Happy Ending (Korean: 어쩌면 해피엔딩), a heartwarming robot romance turned Broadway hit becoming one of the biggest winners of this year’s Tony’s. It bagged six awards, including best musical, best book of a musical, and best original score for longtime collaborators playwright and lyricist Park Chun-hue, also known as Hue Park, and composer Will Aronson, per The Korea Herald.
Maybe Happy Ending also won best scenic design, director Michael Arden claimed best direction of a musical, and Darren Criss (who is of Filipino descent), who plays Oliver, brought home the best leading actor in a musical trophy.
Despite being a newcomer on Broadway, debuting at the Belasco Theatre in November 2024, Maybe Happy Ending has been enjoying a successful run with major award-giving bodies. Aside from its remarkable Tony wins, it has also won trophies from the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Awards and Drama Desk Awards among others, bringing home the best musical trophy in both instances.
In his acceptance speech, Arden said that “empathy is not a weakness but it is a gift and our shared responsibility.” He ended his message by wishing everyone a happy Pride Month.
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A futuristic—yet realistic—romance
Set in a near-future Seoul, Maybe Happy Ending follows the story of Oliver and Claire, two outdated HelperBot androids discarded by their human owners. The two abandoned humanoids form a strong bond neither of them expected. Criss stars alongside Broadway newcomer Helen J. Shen who plays Claire. Maybe Happy Ending blends science fiction with emotional realism, bringing to life themes of love, friendship, connection, and hope in the face of obsolescence.
Maybe Happy Ending‘s ending at the Tonys was, indeed, a happy one despite its sluggish start. Per Variety, it opened to disappointing box office numbers initially until the one-two punch combo of word-of-mouth and unanimous rave reviews made it a commercial winner. The Washington Post described it as a “darling gem of a show with a big heart and a captivating sideways sensibility,” while The New York Times critic Jesse Green called its writing “astonishing,” which “under cover of sci-fi whimsy, it sneaks in a totally original human heartbreaker.”
Despite its Korean roots, critics say the unanimous critical—and subsequent commercial—success of Maybe Happy Ending is largely driven by its powerful and heartwarming treatment of universal themes such as love and friendship.
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A history-making production
Maybe Happy Ending has a winding, non-traditional path to Broadway, according to the New York Times. It mounted productions in South Korea (where Park was born) and Japan, as well as a pre-pandemic run at the Alliance Theater in Atlanta, before finding itself in the Big Apple in late 2025.
“The musical’s win marks the first successful transition of a small-scale Korean production from Seoul’s Daehangno theater district to a major Broadway stage, earning recognition for both its artistic excellence and commercial viability,” Choi Seung-youn, a South Korean musical critic and professor, told The Korea Herald. “It also stands as a historic milestone, as it is the first time a Korean creator has won Tony Awards in the musical categories for best book and best score.”
The show’s origins date back to 2014, when it was developed with funding from Korea’s Wooran Foundation. It premiered in Seoul in 2016 and ran for five seasons in small theaters at the South Korean capital, before its English-language adaptation made it to New York’s Belasco Theatre in November 2024. The rest, as they say, is history.
In celebration of Maybe Happy Ending’s 10th anniversary, its original Korean-language version will go back home to Seoul in October. So if you’re not going to New York City anytime soon, then maybe you can catch the play in its birthplace (and do some K-pop merch and K-beauty shopping spree on the side).
For the complete list of winners for the 2025 Tony Awards, you may visit this link.
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