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Video: The Company of JAJA'S AFRICAN HAIR BRAIDING Meets the Press!
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May 17, 2024
Rehearsals are now underway for the world premiere of Jaja's African Hair Braiding, written by Jocelyn Bioh (School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play) and directed by Whitney White (Our Dear Dead Drug Lord).
View Video Transcript
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Hello, I'm Richard Ridge for Broadway
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Up next for Manhattan Theatre Club on Broadway is the world premiere of Jocelyn B.O's
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Jajas African Hair Braiding. It's directed by Whitney White, and we drop by the rehearsal room to meet the company
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I mean, these are like some of the most incredible actresses we have working in the business right now
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The fact that all 10 of them were able to come together and be in a show is just astounding
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No, it's incredible. They are lifting my work in a way that I never even imagined
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How excited are you to be bringing this gorgeous play to Broadway? Oh, this is personal for me
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This is my childhood. This is my womanhood. There's so many stories and experiences I've had getting my hair braided
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It's, you know, it's ritual, it's communal. There's so many things about the experience of being beautified by these women
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that I feel so proud to have experienced. experienced in my life and I just felt that it is the project that needs its place in our
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canon, in our Broadway community, so that people can learn more about the rich world of
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an African hair rating salon. Well, you're about to make your Broadway debuts
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How like so... Okay we back I was gonna ask you how excited you are I mean that excited This has been my dream for so long
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I've worked so, so hard, and it's just an affirmation that dreams do come true
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And it's a beautiful, beautiful room to make our Broadway debut in
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This morning, I was walking here and I was getting my Starbucks order
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and I passed a small black box theater that I did my first ever play
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And I was like, wow, wow. Look at the full-circleness of this moment right now
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So I'm just feeling really grateful and excited and trusting the process and the people involved
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So, yeah. I mean, to be working with this incredible cast and Jocelyn Bio and Whitney White and LaShawns, Taraji
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I mean, I know. It's fantastic. It's great. It's a beautiful room
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Yeah. Just so long. loving, so vivacious. Like, yeah, it's full. It's been fun
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It's actually been very fun. You know, I think we work so well together
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We have such a shared experience and wants and desire to make really beautiful
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kind of life-changing art. And I think we're going to be able to do that with such a unique experience
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like bringing people into a hair shop in Harlem but on Broadway Yes It been full of laughter full of dancing and just full of the work So it been a dream for me to kind of see it all slowly come together
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from page to stage. I think, especially in New York, we can get kind of accustomed to going about our day
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at a very swift, sort of monotonous pace. And I hope that when folks come to see this show
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that they really sit with what is someone's true experience, you know
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and just take the time. to digest that? I think for me, as an African woman, as an immigrant, as somebody who lives in Harlem, USA
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as someone who adores my mother and my aunts and all the women who raised me, I really hope
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that people step away, respecting, and wanting to celebrate those stories and wanting to celebrate
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Harlem, the history of it, the contribution of these immigrants to New York City
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So yeah, just really coming away with a more complex and full appreciation for those lives and voices
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I think hair-braiding salons on the outside don't really look like much, but then there's just so much, there's so much going on on the inside
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And there are so many beautiful stories and beautiful women and beautiful artists that occupy that space
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And they transforming people lives each and every day My life was transformed last night when I was able to get my hair braided at the last minute for this So yeah it just a magical place
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It's true. They're like, they're full spaces. I hope people walk away and realize that they are more than just places of business, right
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That there are places where people go to feel found, where they go to find home, and where communities are built
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and where people get to transform and feel like themselves fully. And so
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I think that story is told in really an intricate way on stage
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but it happens every day in this city around us, and so people can just be open to that reality
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A lot of the time in theater we talk about universal stories, right? This is one of those plays that incorporates a universal story
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However, the inhabitants and their manner in which they live, I don't think has been illuminated on the American stage yet
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And to be able to do it on broad, during MTC's 50th anniversary, directed by Whitney White
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That's right. It's just, I mean, with this phenomenal cat, the whole space is just energized
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We're ready to go. We're ready to tell this story, and we hope that the people come and witness it
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and go back out into the world, inspired, and thinking about others and the world more deeply
#Acting & Theater
#Broadway & Musical Theater
#Hair Care