Ifa Bayeza (born Wanda Williams) is a playwright, producer, and conceptual theater artist. She wrote the play ''The Ballad of Emmett Till'', which earned her the

Edgar Award The Edgar Allan Poe Awards, popularly called the Edgars, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America, based in New York City. Named after American writer Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849), a pioneer in the genre, the awards honor the bes ...

for Best Play in 2009. She is the sister of

Ntozake Shange Ntozake Shange ( ;
FilmReference.com. Retrieved October 27, 2018. October 18, 1948 – October 27, 2018) ...

, and directed Shange's ''A Photograph: Lovers in Motion'', which was a part of the Negro Ensemble Company's 2015 Year of the Woman Play Reading Series in New York City.

Personal life

Bayeza was born Wanda Williams, into an upper middle-class African-American family in

Trenton, New Jersey Trenton is the capital city of the U.S. state of New Jersey and the county seat of Mercer County. It was the capital of the United States from November 1 to December 24, 1784. She was raised by her parents, Paul T. Williams, a physician and fervent advocate for the underprivileged, and Eloise Williams, an educator and psychiatric social worker. Bayeza grew up in the Lawrenceville section of

Lawrence Township, Mercer County, New Jersey Lawrence Township is a township in Mercer County, New Jersey, United States. Located at the cross-roads between the Delaware Valley region to the south and the Raritan Valley region to the north, the township is an outer-ring suburb of New Yo ...

Persico, Joyce J
"Ntozake Shange and Ifa Bayeza — the erstwhile Williams siblings of Trenton — mark careers with new novel, film"
''

The Times (Trenton) ''The Times'' is a daily newspaper owned by Advance Publications that serves Trenton and the Mercer County, New Jersey area, with a strong focus on the government of New Jersey. The paper had a daily circulation of 77,405, with Sunday circulati ...

'', October 9, 2010. Accessed November 6, 2017. "'I was a very fearful child,' said Shange, who remembers first being called a racial slur at age 3 or 4.... 'I remember they threw cherry bombs at our home in Lawrenceville.'" and graduated from Lawrence High School and

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

Family

Bayeza's family has a deep history of social justice work. Her siblings are:

Ntozake Shange Ntozake Shange ( ;
FilmReference.com. Retrieved October 27, 2018. October 18, 1948 – October 27, 2018) ...

, a feminist playwright and poet; Paul Williams Jr., the first African American chief executive officer of the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York; and

Bisa Williams Bisa Williams (born 1954) is an American diplomat. She is the former Ambassador from the United States of America to the Republic of Niger in Niamey. She assumed the post on October 29, 2010. She left her post in 2013. Early life Bisa Williams w ...

(born Andrea Williams), a career foreign service officer who served as U.S. Ambassador to Niger from 2010 to 2013. All four siblings attended and graduated from Ivy League schools (Barnard, Harvard and Yale), and earned advanced degrees focusing respectively on foreign diplomacy, playwriting, poetry and law. Bayeza's parents shared an interest in the arts and encouraged her artistic education. Her family hosted prominent figures, musicians and artists in their homes in Trenton and Lawrenceville, including W.E.B. DuBois, Muhammad Ali, Dizzy Gillespie, Chico Hamilton and Sonny Till.

Career

Bayeza and Shange co-wrote ''Some Sing, Some Cry,'' a 600-page novel about seven generations of black women and their personal identities. Her works for the stage include ''Amistad Voices'', ''Club Harlem'', ''Kid Zero'', ''Homer G & the Rhapsodies'', and ''The Ballad of Emmett Till''. ''The Ballad of Emmett Till'' is about a 14-year-old boy who was tortured and killed in rural Mississippi because he whistled at a white woman. This play led to Bayeza getting an artist-in-residence fellowship from

Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...

's Rites and Reason Theater and Providence Black Repertory Theater. ''Amistad Voices'' is set in 1839, and is about 53 Africans who revolted on a Spanish slave ship, battling over the legality of slavery. Bayeza went to Ethiopia to work on a personal project, creating images of ancient religious sites along the Nile. She was the original set designer and original dramaturg for Shange's production of ''For Colored Girls'' at New Federal Theatre and The Public Theater.

Awards

* 2009

for Best Play * 2007 Eugene O'Neill Playwrights Conference fellowship * 2003 Arna Bontemps Centennial Writer's Fellowship and the Tuck School Minority Business Executive Program (MBEP) * 2010 Backstage Garland Award for Best Playwriting

Critical reception: ''The Ballad of Emmett Till''

Steve Oxman reviewed Bayeza's work on

Variety.com ''Variety'' is an American media company owned by Penske Media Corporation. The company was founded by Sime Silverman in New York City in 1905 as a weekly newspaper reporting on theater and vaudeville. In 1933 it added ''Daily Variety'', based ...

, complimenting her work and her portrayal of Emmett Till by describing it as, "extremely detailed and, while it maybe feels a touch idealized, it's also down to earth. She perfectly sets the stage for his whistle at a white woman as an act of innocence." However, Oxman wasn't a fan of journalist Jimmy Hicks, claiming that it felt like, "a dramatic cliche." In 2010, this play was performed in Los Angeles's Fountain Theatre. The original director, Ben Bradley, was suddenly murdered, and the production was picked up by Shirley Jo Finney. In Kathleen Foley's review of the play, along with praising Finney's direction, she opined that Bayeza's account made Till's fate even more harrowing, stating that, "In that she succeeds, brilliantly. Make no mistake: You will be devastated." The play was performed in San Diego's Ion Theatre in 2017. The performance was co-directed by Yolanda Franklin and Claudio Raygoza, and featured a six-character ensemble. In his review, David L. Coddon stated that, "The last half-hour of this 95-minute production is the most gut-wrenching for an audience." He continued by saying that the play ends on a hopeful note that creates optimism for a new world.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bayeza, Ifa Living people Writers from Trenton, New Jersey Lawrence High School (New Jersey) alumni People from Lawrence Township, Mercer County, New Jersey Year of birth missing (living people) African-American dramatists and playwrights American women dramatists and playwrights Edgar Award winners Harvard College alumni 21st-century African-American writers 21st-century African-American women African-American women writers 21st-century American dramatists and playwrights 21st-century American women writers