First create a mapper :

import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.ObjectMapper;// in play 2.3
ObjectMapper mapper = new ObjectMapper();

As Array:

MyClass[] myObjects = mapper.readValue(json, MyClass[].class);

As List:

List<MyClass> myObjects = mapper.readValue(jsonInput, new TypeReference<List<MyClass>>(){});

Another way to specify the List type:

List<MyClass> myObjects = mapper.readValue(jsonInput, mapper.getTypeFactory().constructCollectionType(List.class, MyClass.class));

This is overly complicated, Jackson handles lists via its writer methods just as well as it handles regular objects. This should work just fine for you, assuming I have not misunderstood your question:

public void writeListToJsonArray() throws IOException {  
    final List<Event> list = new ArrayList<Event>(2);
    list.add(new Event("a1","a2"));
    list.add(new Event("b1","b2"));

    final ByteArrayOutputStream out = new ByteArrayOutputStream();
    final ObjectMapper mapper = new ObjectMapper();

    mapper.writeValue(out, list);

    final byte[] data = out.toByteArray();
    System.out.println(new String(data));
}