School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play review – comedy makes a near-flawless Broadway debut | Broadway

After its 2017 premiere off-Broadway, School Girls; Or, the African Mean Girls Play transferred to Los Angeles, was remounted in New York the following year, and has since been staged in over 75 theaters across the US, plus a successful run in London. It’s easy to see why – Jocelyn Bioh’s one-act comedy has a familiar structure, richly detailed characters, and an onslaught of delicious barbs. Plus it has the good sense of an 80-minute runtime.

Its splendid Broadway debut is not content with being a mere victory lap, though, in a freshly glorious production helmed by Whitney White. Having staged Bioh’s Tony-winning Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, the director knows her way around an all-women ensemble, and often counts upon a team of usual suspects to make her shows pop: Nikiya Mathis, who won a special Tony for Jaja’s hair and wig designs, and Qween Jean, whose costumes enlivened the Pulitzer-winning Liberation, ensure there’s always visual splendor onstage.

But Bioh’s play is the thing, tracing a Ghanaian all-girls school clique disperse and reassemble upon the arrival of an American transfer student in 1986. Before then, ringleader Paulina (Denée Benton) was certain she would be the school’s pick for the Miss Ghana beauty pageant, treating friends Ama, Gifty and Mercy (Lucia Aremu, Nia Otchere-Sarfo and Jordan Rice) like handmaidens and being particularly cruel to the plus-sized Nana (Erin Morton).

Enter new girl Ericka (Jasmine Amy Rogers), an instant hit at the school – charming, gorgeous and eager to please – and an instant threat to Paulina’s reign. This is where Bioh’s script becomes thornier: Ericka is far lighter skinned than Paulina, which pageant recruiter Eloise (Patina Miller) makes clear gives her a “more universal and commercial” edge. Our rooting for the queen bee’s comeuppance is complicated by the reality of colorism. And, of course, capitalism is never far off, with the headmistress (Heather Alicia Simms) tempted to look the other way since the pageant would reward the under-staffed school a hefty cash prize.

School Girls is proudly not looking to reinvent the wheel, and there’s comfort in its straight-forward machinations even as it explores its complex themes. Bioh has said that she dropped the notion that misery equals significance early in her writing career, yet her plays carry the sociocultural heft one imagines she had initially set out to showcase via unsmiling dramas.

As in Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, or the Lagos-set Nollywood Dreams, this is a comedy – full-stop – but one undergirded with deft specificity. School Girls respects its teens’ right to frivolous in-fighting, Bioh respects their particular situation’s challenges, and it’s in that combination that her plays become so salient. Bioh’s background as an actor also means she knows exactly how to craft lively dialogue and wonderfully individual characters, which White (a performer and playwright herself) is completely at home bringing to life with this knockout cast.

Miller and Simms are stage veterans with warm presences and a casual nobility perfectly suited to the adult roles. Aremu, Otchere-Sarfo and Rice create distinct (and distinctly funny) portraits of Paulina’s ostensible sidekicks, and Morton is empathy and willpower personified.

Benton commits to her characters’ long embodied diva-ness even as she loses her grip on her classmates, and brings real pathos to that downfall. Her dueling dynamic with Rogers is excellently tuned, hitting its peak during a group number the girls perform for the pageant recruiter – as they take turns on Whitney Houston’s Greatest Love of All, Rogers becomes the Eve Harrington to Benton’s Jenna Maroney. The way Benton draws out a single line, dragging the tempo down as if wrenching a spotlight onto herself, is a masterclass.

As for Rogers, what is there to say that has not been breathlessly lauded these past two years? The Boop! breakout can seemingly do no wrong, having triumphed in musicals (pop, jazz, contemporary, and soon Golden Age, when she takes on The Sound of Music in March) and now showing she can also excel at straight plays. If there were ever a misstep to be had– and that’s a massive “if” – it would still be dwarfed by her mega-watt charisma and evident grace.

Scenographer Teresa L Williams creates an attractive school cafeteria, flanked by breeze blocks and with a stunning view of stormy mountains that presage both the warmth and turbulence to come. Transitions, handled swiftly without rushing, are buoyed by Ghanaian highlife songs heard crisply through Cody Spencer’s sound design. This is a production expert at making one smile. For what is clearly one of the past decade’s most loved plays, this Broadway debut is a beautiful homecoming.