In "Jamaica Farewell", the story of one women's journey to the United States from her native Jamaica, actress/playwright Debra Ehrhardt tells the true and unbelievable story of accomplishing her dream to come to America against all odds.  It's story as a much about the journey as the destination.

Ehrhardt is an honest, funny, and detailed-oriented storyteller. The intimate moments specific to her own life are easily relatable to anyone who has come to America from elsewhere.  (The energy of the audience, more than half of which was certainly from Jamaica, was palpable.) The play is a very authentic rendition of the struggle, coupled with a burning desire, to change your life and come to another country.

Throughout the play, Ehrhardt transforms into dozens of characters representing those people who crossed her path. She believably and energetically portrays the life and times of Jamaica in the 70s and 80s, from her religiously indoctrinated mother to the Bob Marley-like cab driver who saved her life from her version of Satan, a drunken beast of a man with two teeth who attempted to rape her. The piece is filled with predictable stereotypes, but they serve the audience well, transporting us to the island, which at the time of Ehrhardt's story was going through political unrest and a socialist revolution. What worked extremely well for the piece is the well-placed humor scattered throughout.

The sheer amount of content that Ehrhardt delivers in 90 minutes is impressive. Director Joel Zwick has done a great job guiding Ehrhardt in transitions through multiple characters, a number of decades, and the often bizarre and scary situations Ehrhardt found herself in. One can easily get lost in thinking, ‘did this really happen to her?' -- but then again, truth is stranger than fiction.

In the playbill Ehrhardt writes that Jamaica’s motto “Out of many, one people” accurately represents the universal human experience she tries to convey, despite the cultural and geographic specifics of her story. Sitting in New York City, experiencing this story amongst the myriad of different cultures and backgrounds concentrated in this city, this universality is certainly shared amongst all.