Jocelyn Bioh’s play “School Girls; or, the African Mean Girls Play,” currently running on Broadway, uses the backdrop of a 1986 Miss Ghana beauty pageant to examine issues of colorism, beauty standards, and social hierarchy. Set at the Aburi Girls’ Boarding School in Ghana, the play follows a group of teenage girls competing for the chance to advance to the Miss Universe pageant, a cultural phenomenon that Bioh says once held significant power as a pathway to fame and opportunity.

The narrative centers on Paulina, the school’s reigning queen bee and leading contestant who views winning as a means of escaping poverty. Her position is challenged by Ericka, a lighter-skinned, biracial American-raised newcomer whose arrival sparks tensions that highlight the privileging of lighter skin within Black communities. Through these characters, Bioh explores how colorism—discrimination based on skin tone—affects perceptions of beauty and worth.

Bioh, a Ghanaian American playwright and actress, began working on the play in 2014 to address personal experiences with discrimination, drawing partly on her family’s history and her own boarding school education. Her mother attended the real Aburi Girls’ Boarding School, while Bioh herself was a student at a socioeconomically focused boarding school in Pennsylvania. She aimed to expose implicit biases surrounding colorism, prompting audiences to question the origins and impacts of established beauty standards.

The play was also inspired by a 2011 controversy in the Miss Ghana pageant, where Yayra Erica Nego, a multiracial woman born in the United States, won the crown, sparking debate over eligibility and fairness since other contestants were Ghana-born with darker complexions. This real-world event underscores ongoing tensions around identity and representation in cultural institutions.

Research supports the play’s themes, with studies indicating that lighter-skinned African Americans tend to have higher incomes and educational attainment, while those with darker skin face more racial discrimination. Black girls themselves report that colorism contributes to vulnerabilities, including exposure to violence.

While “School Girls” addresses these serious topics, it does so with wit, humor and a nuanced portrayal of its characters. Ericka initially appears as the most sympathetic and talented contestant, but as the story unfolds, Paulina’s struggles reveal deeper societal pressures and paint a more complex picture of colorism’s effects. Bioh deliberately avoids a neat resolution, choosing instead an ending that reflects the harsh realities the characters confront as they transition into adulthood.

Through her play, Bioh hopes to prompt audiences to rethink entrenched notions of beauty and to consider how they might challenge discriminatory standards. She warns that without such reflection, future generations may continue to accept narrow definitions of worth tied to color and appearance, perpetuating cycles of exclusion and inequality.