Actors hope Boston production of "Jaja's African Hair Braiding" will bring people together

CBS News

19-05-2025

A new production of the Tony Award-winning play, "Jaja's African Hair Braiding," a group of West African immigrants are creating community with mini masterpieces in Boston.
The play takes place over one day, inside a braiding salon in Harlem. The new SpeakEasy Stage production highlights the challenges of the immigrant experience, black culture, and the art of braiding.
Actor Marhadoo Effeh tells us, "I always count hair braiding as a labor of love. And that's really something that I'm excited to get to share."
Hair designer Nadja Vanterpool, who helped create the designs you see on stage, says, "I had to teach the actors how to become stylists, like basically overnight…. It's part of our culture. It's part of who we are."
"There's deep community in the salon, there's sisterhood in the salon, and there's also deep support in terms of like, we understand the work that is involved in that transformation, and therefore, there's a celebration that happens in that," explains director Summer L. Williams.
"These women are from all different parts of West Africa and they find community and family, chosen family in each other in this play," says Effeh. "I think the community that is created with the customers as well as the sense of trust and safety and joy in the celebration of black beauty."
Everyone can relate to the play
While that joy is on full display, there is also the undercurrent of uncertainty in that community, with Effeh explaining, "There's a sense of heaviness that exists and maybe anxiety that exists for each character."
Actor Kwezi Shongwe tells us, "Jaja's is really like sparking a lot of thoughts for people on like the state of the world, state of the country. And also it's making people think like, 'What can I do?'"
While the play takes place in a braiding salon, the story is a universal one.
Shongwe says, "I think Jaja's gives people an opportunity to be like, okay, we are like, we're all people. We have hardships of our own. Yes, they're very different, but I'm still able to relate to you."
"I think it's less about the fact that they're hair braiders and more about the fact that they're people who have dreams and wants and desires and goals for themselves. And there are also tensions amongst close friends and family members that could happen anywhere," Effeh adds.
"I think you are hungry for what's going to happen with all these folks that we just fell in love with," says Williams. "And my hope is that there's something that sort of transpires with that love and moves us towards action so that some of the things, the events of the play, the realities of the play, may not have to be the realities for our neighbors."
You can catch SpeakEasy Stage's production of "Jaja's African Hair Braiding" at the Calderwood Pavilion in the South End through Saturday, May 31st.