For many Black women, the hair salon is a cultural safe space, where stories and secrets help build an intimate community. That’s the setting of the 90-minute Tony Award-winning play “Jaja’s African Hair Braiding” — named for the fictional Harlem salon owned by West African immigrant Jaja.
The play is now up at SpeakEasy Stage in Boston through the end of May. It takes place over one scorching day, in which the hair braiders — all African immigrants — blend humor, cultural Easter eggs, current-day issues like immigration policy and how complicated camaraderie can be.
Summer L. Williams, who’s directing the production, said the complexities that make up the play are why she was so drawn to the script from Jocelyn Bioh.
“Jocelyn, she knows how to write a play — just a beautiful, tight, thoughtful, impactful, activating piece of art,” Williams said. “And then I get to be in a room full of all of these gorgeous, incredible Black and brown women who are then lifting and really telling the story with their heart and soul? It’s just like: Yes, sign me up all day.”
The cast is entirely of people of color, and putting together their diversity of experiences and characters is at the heart of consultant Kira Troilo’s diversity, equity and inclusion work on the production.
“Even a room full of Black women is a diverse room,” Troilo said. “Some of us our mothers, some of us are cisgender, we’re all different levels of abilities and backgrounds and all these beautiful things that make us different. We do have also one man in the play. We also have a design team that’s mostly white. The thing that I love about the work is that it’s really focused around what do we need to achieve inclusion, which is people feeling supported and respected and empowered in the space.”
One of those actors working within Williams’ vision and Troilo’s mission is Hampton Richards, who makes her SpeakEasy Stage debut as Jennifer. Jennifer’s a customer living through the entire day at the salon as her character gets micro-braids — an experience she understands firsthand.
“I have micro-braids currently on my head, and those took 10 hours in the chair,” Richards said. “I am no stranger to long hours in a chair, but this was the longest time I think I’ve ever spent in the chair.”
Communicating the intensity of the labor to the audience is essential to the experience of the play. So is tying the issues of 2019 — when the action takes place — to the current state of affairs in 2025, particularly when it comes to undocumented people and immigration policy.
“It’s important for us to understand that the trajectory of that world and our world — they’re tethered, they’re connected,” said Williams, the director. “I don’t want us to lose sight of that. I want our production to hold you in a space of, this is then, this is now, and it could be our future, unless we make some different choices.”
And although the themes are, at times, heavy, the play looks to uplift its audience. Richards said she hopes theater-goers leave with a sense of joy after seeing the show.
“It’s such a bittersweet play, especially getting toward the end, but I just really want them to walk away feeling good and feeling joyous about getting their hair done. It can be such a labor of time and money — but also of love,” Richards said.
“Jaja’s African Hair Braiding” is up at Boston’s SpeakEasy Stage until May 31. For more information, click here.
UPDATE: Since the recording of this roundtable, Kira Troilo and Art & Soul Consulting are no longer working with SpeakEasy Stage.
Guests
- Summer L. Williams, award-winning director and Co-Founder/Associate Artistic Director of Company One Theatre in Boston and director of Speakeasy Stage’s production of “Jaja’s African Hair Braiding.”
- Hampton Richards, an Atlanta-born actor and movement artist and a 2024 graduate of Boston University who plays Jennifer in “Jaja’s African Hair Braiding.”
- Kira Troilo, founder and owner of Art & Soul Consulting, a diversity, equity and inclusion firm that worked on “Jaja’s African Hair Braiding,” and author of the ebook, “Black Hair on Stage: A Practical Guide to Textured Hair.”
