In a move more befitting the tortoise than the hare, "Rabbit Hole," a play about the loss of a child written by David Lindsay-Abaire, won this year's Pulitzer Prize race for best play after the board overruled the Nominating Jury, which had put forth three other finalists.

The snubbed "Orpheus X" by Rinde Eckert, "Bulrusher" by Eisa Davis, and "Elliot, a Soldier’s Fugue" by Quiara Alegría Hudes were chosen by a panel of five, including New York Times theater critic Ben Brantley and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Paula Vogel. They were rejected in favor of what many theater critics considered a mainstream commercial play admired mostly for the performance of a red-hot former star of "Sex and the City." "Rabbit Hole" did win Cynthia Nixon a Tony last June as best actress for her raw portrayal of grief, but it lost the Tony for best play to "The History Boys" (a British work not eligible for the U.S. Pulitzer). This new honor comes with an added bonus: $10,000 in Yankee greenbacks as prize booty.

To see the full list of other Pultizer champs, too CLICK HERE, then click on the date "2007" in the timeline at the top of the page.

Photo: In "Rabbit Hole," Nixon starred opposite Tyne Daly, who lost the Tony race for best featured actress to Frances de la Tour of "The History Boys." In his review of their play, New York Times critic Ben Brantley wrote, "'Rabbit Hole' dispenses with the flashy metaphors . . . . The resulting work belongs squarely to the school of what were once called kitchen-sink dramas. But the sink, in this instance, has been polished to a high, reflective sheen." (Biltmore Theatre)