World Premiere of Jocelyn Bioh's Jaja's African Hair Braiding to Play Broadway in 2023

Manhattan Theatre Club has announced the first Broadway production of its 2023-2024 season. The world premiere of Jocelyn Bioh's Jaja’s African Hair Braiding will bow at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre in the fall of 2023. Whitney White will direct the new play with exact dates and casting to be announced later.

The play is set in 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 blossoms, dreams flourish and secrets are 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. 

Bioh is a an award-winning Ghanaian-American writer and performer. She is known for writing Merry Wives, Nollywood Dreams, Goddess, School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play. Her screen credits include writing for Russian Doll, She's Gotta Have and the upcoming Tiny Beautiful Things. She is writing the screen adaptation of the Tony-winning Once On This Island for Disney+. 

White is an Obie Award-winning director, writer and performer. Her recent work includes directing Soft, On Sugarland, Semblance, Our Dear Dead Drug Lord and What to Send Up When It Goes Down.