Which actress won a competitive Tony Award at the age of 88?

Cicely Tyson won a competitive Tony Award at age 88 for The Trip to Bountiful.

Tyson won the 2013 Tony for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play, portraying Carrie Watts in the Broadway revival of Horton Foote’s The Trip to Bountiful. The production marked a major stage return for Tyson after roughly three decades away from Broadway, and it became her longest Broadway run, with 187 performances.

Her victory was especially notable because it was a competitive acting award, not an honorary or lifetime-recognition prize. Tyson also won the Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle awards for the performance, completing an unusually strong season of theatrical honors.

A modern clarification is useful: Tyson is often described as the oldest Tony-winning performer because she was 88 when she won, but Lois Smith later won a competitive Tony at an older age. That later record does not change this question’s answer, which asks specifically for the actress who won at 88.