But he couldn't quit Philly.
"There was something about what was happening here, the theater that was being made, the theater I was seeing," he says.
For 20 years, Ijames was a Philadelphia stage mainstay, as an actor, writer and director.
Last year, once three local theaters realized they were all planning productions of his plays, the "James Ijames Citywide Pass" with discounts, discounted parking, and swag was born.
"You know a Philly Pulitzer Prize Playwright is a huge source of pride," says Arden Theatre Company Producing Artistic Director Terry Nolen.
First up, opening Thursday, January 22 at the Arden is "Good Bones," about a down-on-its-luck Philly neighborhood at odds over demolition plans for a new stadium.
"When you move into a community, what is your responsibility to that community as it exists when you move in?" asks Ijames.
"There's more than shades of the Sixers arena situation. I think that's actually foundational to the creation of the plot," says "Good Bones" director Akeem Davis, a very close friend of Ijames.
In March, the Wilma Theater will put on "The Most Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha."
"It's a fever dream that Martha Washington has where she thinks that the enslaved people of Mount Vernon are trying to kill her," says Ijames.
It is true that Martha Washington did free her slaves before her death, convinced they were out to get her.
It sounds heavy, asking what does it do to you to own other people, but it's a comedy.
It's a signature move of James Ijames to use humor to make you think and re-think.
"If I feel that something is going to be volatile, I try to present it to the audience in such a way that they laugh first and then they hear it," he says.
And in April, his newest play, "Wilderness Generation," will hold its world premiere at the Philadelphia Theater Company.
It's about how a grandmother deals with her estranged children by tricking her grandchildren into coming together.
Ijames now heads the theater program at Columbia University in New York City.
But Philadelphia is still home, a place he still can't quit, as he writes and dreams what's next.
For more information:
James iJames Citywide Pass
Tickets for "Good Bones" at the Arden Theatre Company
Tickets to "The Most Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha" at the Wilma Theater
Tickets to "Wilderness Generation" at the Philadelphia Theater Company