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Arts-culture/review/theatre
Date Posted:
7-20-04


Ira Jeffries
by:Maya Williams

Ira Jeffries
Wow Theater presented g riot a festival featuring work by women of color and trans gendered people. Three short plays written by Ira Jeffries were performed. Delilah Brown: revolutionary, Martha Redding and the bag lady and ole Becky. Each short play dealt with struggles that these women encountered in their lives and the lessons that they have learned from their experiences.
“My plays deal with issues of concern to the lesbian and gay community as well as the community at large I do not discriminate when I write” Ira Jeffries said. Ms Jeffries is an accomplished playwright/producer and retired journalist. She has been a member of the Wow Café Theater since 1992,she has written over 17 plays. Ms Jeffries is a graduate of the City College of Arts in Communications.
Her plays have been produced on and off-Broadway and in Harlem based Community Theaters. She received the audience theater award for excellence in play writing for her first play “Odessa”.
Becoming a play Wright producer and director was not very easy for Jeffries; “My “mom was always supportive of me,” and says Jeffries I did not have a close relationship with my father. Or many other family members”. Her mother was whom she turned to when she felt discouraged.
When her mother fell ill, Jeffries made the decision to leave school to help care for her mom. When her mom passed, Jeffries returned to school.
“I returned to school at the age of 44 after my mom past, and I had just received an internship with the Amsterdam News, but I was never hired as a journalist.” Despite this Jeffries didn’t allow it to stop her dreams of becoming an accomplished writer. She left Amsterdam News and went to pursue her goals.
In 1992 Jeffries founded Kaleidoscope her own theater production company to deal with issues relevant to the gay and lesbian community. “Being a playwright was not a choice but a necessity for a space in which to have my plays performed”, Ms Jeffries said. Her goal was to present quality theater and she believes she has accomplished just that.

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