James Ijames may be teaching at Columbia, but he never wants to stop making art in Philly
The Pulitzer Prize-winner considers South Philly his artistic home.
Philly theater darling James Ijames, the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright of Fat Ham, will return to local stages with a special spotlight next spring, with a slate of three plays running at three theaters.
Recognizing this scheduling synergy, the venues are partnering to offer a three-ticket pass, called “The Citywide James Ijames Pass.”
The first collaboration of its kind dedicated to a contemporary playwright, the pass covers the Philadelphia premiere of Good Bones at the Arden Theatre (Jan. 22 to March 8), The Most Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha Washington at the Wilma Theater (March 17 to April 5), and the world premiere of Ijames’ latest work, Wilderness Generation, at Philadelphia Theatre Company (April 10 to May 3).
Ijames wrote all of these plays in South Philadelphia, which he considers his artistic home. This year, he left his teaching position at Villanova University to run the playwriting program at Columbia University. While that means he’s spending most of his time in New York now — though his husband, Joel Witter, still works for the Philly school district — Ijames says Philadelphia is “still very much a place where I want to continue to make art.”
“I’ve lived in Philly more than I’ve lived anywhere in my life, so it is incredibly special to me,” said the Tony-nominated playwright, a founding member of the local playwriting collective Orbiter 3.
After growing up in North Carolina and attending Morehouse College in Atlanta, Ijames got his MFA in acting at Temple University. He performed on stages all over the city, including at the National Constitution Center, People’s Light, and all three theaters featured in the pass.
It was during the 2012 production of Angels in America at the Wilma where he wrote Miz Martha Washington, one of his earliest plays, in the dressing room. Ijames went on to serve as one of three co-artistic directors of the Wilma, which premiered the digital production of Fat Ham — his incisive and irreverent queer reimagining of Hamlet — that earned him the 2022 Pulitzer Prize.
In the sharp satire Miz Martha Washington, the titular first lady is on her deathbed, surrounded by the people she and her husband enslaved. With freedom inching closer — George Washington’s will promised them liberty upon his widow’s death — the Black characters appear in various hallucinations, putting Martha and her family on trial.
The play will come back to town amid Philadelphia’s celebrations for the 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding, apt timing for a sharp satire on the Founding Fathers’ legacy of slavery.
“I think we were all kind of hoping that the world and the politics would be a little different when we first started thinking about it,” said Ijames. “But I always say, we have to look at the history directly in the face and, from that, try to imagine something different.”
Good Bones is a more contemporary story about the development of a new stadium that stands to disrupt a city neighborhood (sound familiar?). The upper-class newcomer, haunted by those who were pushed out, gets into fiery debates over gentrification with her contractor.
The Philly premiere will be directed by Ijames’ longtime friend and collaborator Akeem Davis, who starred in the Ijames-directed production of August Wilson’s King Hedley II at the Arden earlier this year.
Arden Theatre producing artistic director Terry Nolen hopes audiences will come out to cheer on a “hometown hero.”
“Philly audiences love Philly artists, and there is so much pride for James’ success,” Nolen said in a statement.
The playwright’s newest work, Wilderness Generation, examines the relationships between cousins as Ijames, who’s close to his own cousins, wanted to spotlight that kind of family dynamic. Five cousins reunite at their grandmother’s house in the South to help her downsize; while there, they unpack a painful family history and confront the damage of their relatives’ behavior as they try to forge a future together.
Ijames wrote the work with Philadelphia Theatre Company co-artistic directors Taibi Magar and Tyler Dobrowsky in mind. Though Ijames has performed at PTC before, this world premiere marks the first time a play he wrote will grace its stage.
“I am where I am because a lot of theaters in Philadelphia took a chance on me,” said Ijames. He hopes future collaborations can highlight more “really brilliant folks” writing new plays in Philly.
“I hope a thing that happens as a result of this is a Jackie Goldfinger package one day, a Michael Hollinger package, an Erlina Ortiz package, [and] an AZ Espinoza package.”
The three-play pass costs $130, about $43 per ticket, and includes preferred seating, flexible ticket changes, parking discounts, and member benefits at each theater, as well as exclusive swag — a yellow beanie, inspired by Ijames’ personal style. Passes are available online or at the TKTS booth at the Independence Visitor Center.