A hair salon can be a place of hot topics, personal drama, and a clamor of opinions. However, for West African immigrant women in Harlem, an African braiding shop holds the dreams of a prosperous American future. With a trace of dismay, the shop’s women reflect on their unsure futures as immigrants in President Donald Trump’s America.
Playwright Jocelyn Bioh charmed the Boston Center for the Arts audience through May 31 with the five-time, Tony-nominated stage play “Jaja’s African Hair Braiding.” A salon owner’s daughter and a hair braider open a New York City African braiding shop to partially-painted walls of yellow, a failing air conditioner amid summer heat, and the uncertainty that the current political climate holds for immigrants. After its standout Broadway premiere in 2023, Boston’s SpeakEasy Stage company showcases commentary on humanity through the “Best Play” nominated piece.
Director Summer L. Williams carries Bioh’s passionate sentiment through revealing one-on-one’s and provocative encounters between characters. The emphasis on a chin-up endurance is exemplified through the challenges presented by the various characters’ immigration statuses, while underscoring the evergreen relevance of the current political climate around immigration.
Despite these challenges, the characters are not reserved in their joy, as they shift hips to the familiar Afrobeat messenger Burna Boy, and act out scenes from Nollywood films. These actions are a must when navigating finicky clients like Vanessa, played by Ashley Aldarondo, whose comical service requests suggest a prevalence of uneasy encounters between shop staff and their American patrons.
“I am a big fan of Jocelyn Bioh. I love that, as a writer, she creates people you want to spend time and share space with.” said Williams, in an interview with SpeakEasy Stage.
Like Williams notes, the characters in Jaja’s African Hair Braiding exemplify Bioh’s skill for staging sincere connections and humanity.This portrayal is exemplified by the feel-good camaraderie between bonded West African women, in combination with unavoidable controversies that can swell in any close-knit work group
“A salon is a sacred place. Many secrets are revealed there–such as how a person comes to look a certain way,” said Williams. ”You really can’t hide in a salon–you are uniquely vulnerable while in that space.”
Hair braiders Bea (Crystin Gilmore), Aminata (Kwezi Shongwe), Miriam (MarHadoo Effeh), and Ndidi (Catia) —although existing in tumult, entertain their audience with engaging tools like riotous humor, competition, and communal gossip. Among the shop’s dysfunctional family-like dynamics are self-asserting, yet somewhat endearing solicitors, and Aminata’s no-good ex played by Joshua Olumide. His characters, James, Sock Man, Jewelry Man, and DVD Man, flood the braiding space with trivial bargains, romantic advances, and broken promises.
These flagrant shop encounters exemplify how each character contrasts and balances each other—like Jaja’s most senior employee, Bea, who struggles to understand Aminata’s taste and tolerance for her serial cheater ex.
“Well pardon me that I don’t like to sit around and get taken advantage of for fun! Are you that desperate for a man?” Bea poses to Aminata during one scene.
Like the neighborhood sales opportunists, Jaja’s staff, and Jaja herself, keep contingency plans for a successful American livelihood. Like scholarly “DREAMer” Marie (Dru Sky Berrian), daughter of shop owner Jaja (MaConnia Chesser), feels unsteady leveraging a fragile loophole for higher education, while her mother’s immigration status remains under high scrutiny by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Hurdles like immigration status loom over Bioh’s characters, who were based on the playwright’s own personal observations and cultural experiences in Harlem’s African braiding salons since the age of four. The first-generation Ghanaian playwright gathered these women’s stories for display as her theater performances merged into playwriting.
“I’m pulling from me and all of the women I’ve ever known in those spaces and all of those experiences. That’s why I always describe the play as a love letter to these women and a love letter to Harlem,” Bioh told The Boston Globe.
Jaja’s African Hair Braiding’s timely messaging inspired Paul Daigneault, SpeakEasy Stage’s Artistic Director, to conclude the SpeakEasy’s 34th season with a showcase that solidified the importance of its immigration themes. During a time when migrant anxiety is high for round two of Trump’s “zero-tolerance” immigration policy and condemnation of noncitizens, a story about humanity through the lives of migrants is refreshing.
