This dazzling world premiere from Jocelyn Bioh welcomes you into Jaja’s bustling hair braiding salon in Harlem where every day, a lively and eclectic group of West African immigrant hair braiders are creating masterpieces on the heads of neighborhood women. During one sweltering summer day, love will blossom, dreams will flourish and secrets will be revealed. The uncertainty of their circumstances simmers below the surface of their lives and when it boils over, it forces this tight-knit community to confront what it means to be an outsider on the edge of the place they call home.
The playwright does at the end of this wickedly entertaining evening give in to the urge to highlight her characters’ plights a bit too baldly (sorry). Other than that, though, she and White so skillfully orchestrate her workplace comedy that you’re put in mind of the beauty parlor in “Steel Magnolias,” or, more potently, of a master such as August Wilson portraying the cabbies dispatched from a Pittsburgh storefront in “Jitney.”
Jaja’s can sometimes veer a little formulaic or presentational: In the single-scene appearance of Jaja herself, Kakoma spends most of her time standing directly downstage center (in, not to spoil anything, an absolute battleship of a wedding gown), facing out and delivering a rousing monologue about her right to call America “my country.” It rings clear and true, though I wonder how the same speech would have felt had White oriented Jaja as much toward her fellow characters as toward us, or what its effect might have been in a theater space without such a flat, front-on relationship with the audience. But this isn’t subtle stuff, and it’s not meant to be. Instead, it’s bright, generous, and forceful, and those currents carry the day. As Miriam says, perhaps speaking partly for her playwright, “No more time for quiet. I want to be loud, yeah? … Yeah. Very loud.”
2023 | Broadway |
Manhattan Theatre Club Original Broadway Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Featured Performance in a Play | Brittany Adebumola |
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Play | Jocelyn Bioh |
2024 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Wig and Hair | Nikiya Mathis |
2024 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance | Zenzi Williams |
2024 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Direction of a Play | Whitney White |
2024 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Production of a Play | Jaja’s African Hair Braiding |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Costume Design (Broadway or Off-Broadway) | Dede Ayite |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding New Broadway Play | Jocelyn Bioh |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Costume Design of a Play | Dede Ayite |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Direction of a Play | Whitney White |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Play | Jocelyn Bioh |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Scenic Design of a Play | David Zinn |
2024 | Tony Awards | Best Sound Design of a Play | Justin Ellington |
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