Off-Broadway's Atlantic Theater Company won the 1998 Jujamcyn Theaters Award and the $50,000 that goes with the citation, it was announced Nov. 12.

The award from commercial Jujamcyn producer Rocco Landesman and chairman James H. Binger annually honors "a resident theatre that has made an outstanding contribution to the development of creative talent."

The Atlantic Theater Company, which stages new works and classics, was founded in 1985 by David Mamet and William H. Macy. Its recent productions include The Beauty Queen of Leenane, Mojo and Wolf Lullaby.

The Jujamcyn Award will be presented to the Atlantic and its artistic director Neil Pepe and managing director Hilary Hinckle Nov. 23 at Tavern on the Green in Manhattan.

This is the 15th Jujamcyn Award since 1984. Past winners include the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center, American Repertory Theatre, Long Wharf Theatre, the Mark Taper Forum, Second Stage, the Foundation of the Dramatists Guild Young Playwrights Festival, the Guthrie Theater, New York Shakespeare Festival, Yale School of Drama/Yale Repertory Theatre, the Alliance for New American Musicals, the Market Theatre in South Africa, New York Stage and Film Company, American Conservatory Theatre and City Center Encores! Jujamcyn owns and operates five Broadway theatres: the St. James, the Martin Beck, the Virginia, the Walter Kerr and the Eugene O'Neill. The company presents a Broadway touring series at the Mechanic Theatre in Baltimore, the Orpheum and State Theatres in Minneapolis, the Orpheum in Omaha, and the Civic Auditorium in Portland, OR. As a producer, the company's current Broadway shows are The Beauty Queen of Leenane, Smokey Joe's Cafe and The Sound of Music.

-- By Kenneth Jones