Biography
(aka Jiréh Breon Holder) (Playwright) made his professional debut with Too Heavy for Your Pocket (Laurents/ Hatcher Award, Alliance/Kendeda Award and Edgerton Foundation Award). He has written for television on NBC’s “New Amsterdam.” Other plays include In the Southern Breeze, 50:13, Shutter Sisters and The Dancing Granny. Ra was educated at Memphis Central High School, Morehouse College, Spelman College and Emory University, and earned an MFA in playwriting from the Yale School of Drama. He lives in Hollywood with his fiancé and their dog, Harriet. www.MansaRa.info Twitter: @mansa_ra3x, Instagram: @mansa.ra3x
MFA from Yale School of Drama's playwriting program. His sharp and often political plays frequently include wild visual metaphors and address the magic of everyday life in the South. From 2012-2013, he served as the Kenny Leon Fellow at the Tony Award-winning Alliance Theatre where he worked alongside Susan V. Booth, Lynne Meadow, Pearl Cleage, Alfred Uhry, and Stephen King. He graduated from Morehouse College where he served as the artistic director of Spelman College Playwrights’ Workshop. His plays have received productions or readings at the Yale School of Drama, Yale Cabaret, the Alliance Theatre, Roundabout Theatre Company, Manhattan Theatre Club, the Old Globe Theatre, Theater Emory and the Spelman College Department of Drama and Dance. He is the 2016 Winner of the Kendeda Prize from the Alliance Theater for his play Too Heavy for Your Pocket. He is under commission with Roundabout Theatre Company, Manhattan Theatre Club and the Alliance Theatre.
