'The Vagina Monologues' returns Female conversations give everyone something to talk about

Author: Joyce Man

If one were to single something out about this year's production of "The Vagina Monologues," it would be the performance's attempt to leave no one singled out. This, after all, is the quintessential play about discovering the female self through community sharing.

The formula is simple but the result is always impressive, if done right. The actors get up on stage and talk about the trials of tampons, the embarassment of sex, the devastation of rape, while the audience laughs, ponders and cries in its seat, and voila!, a connection is made. Judging from the choruses of laughter and unified silences in McCullough Social Space last Saturday evening, there was a plenty of voila! and there was definitely a connection.

Yet, tackling the "V-Mons" should be difficult for the very same reason that it should be easy. The script is so striking and controversial that it imports a formidable impression on its audience. Written by Eve Ensler '75, it is an Obie Award-winning collection of monologues that is performed world-over, over and over. So, the most humorous parts­­ - the "Cunt" scene, for example, and that memorable triple-orgasm moan could easily be replayed with fresh enthusiasm or fall flat from over-kill.

Directors Retta Leaphart '06 and Meghan Nesmith '06, both four -year veterans of "The Vagina Monologues," met this challenge.

The best part about the "Monologues" is the fact that there is absolutely nothing "mono," nothing deserted nor singular, about the orators. The script's driving force is its applicability to all women. The characters, whether they be a sexually-repressed grandmother (played convincingly by talented first-year Judith Dry), or a woman raped in war, are capable of pulling on the heartstrings of all women. In the world of vaginas, so to speak, no female is an island, and the two directors seized upon this idea.

The best decision they made was to have all their actors stand onstage throughout the performance to reflect the emotions of each principle orator. In addition to providing for smoother transitions from monologue to monologue, this tactic allowed for their collective energy to show. "We wanted to create a company of women," said Leaphart. "Every year, we feel that the group bonds in rehearsals, but there is little opportunity to showcase our community on stage. By keeping the women on-stage [throughout], we… created an atmosphere of supportive energy."

Indeed, with a stage full of women clad in reds, purples and blacks, who laughed and sympathized expressively in tandem, the unity would have been hard to miss. And just in case someone did miss it, there is no substitute for an army of panting and moaning women in the throes of orgasm, three of them in unison, to slap the feeling of shared experience in your face.

Beyond having their actors collectively complaining about that strange curiosity known as the tampon or openly discussing that great questions "What does your vagina smell like?" Leaphart and Nesmith attempted to interject freshness into the "V-Mons." In a video feed at the introduction, female students from around campus told tales about women who inspired them, ordinary women of extraordinary feats who were deemed "vagina warriors."

But what of the other side of the award-winning play? If "The Vagina Monologues" is known for its championing of the female voice, it has equally raised controversy. One particular scene, "The Little Coochie Snorcher that Could," is a 14-year-old girl's tale of an empowering sexual experience with an older woman. In 2000, one columnist from the highly-conservative newspaper at Georgetown University, The Hoya, responded by jumping on the contradiction between the play, which attempts to battle female rape, and the scene, which seems to legitimize the sexual seduction of an under-aged girl by a woman as "good rape." The columnist, Robert Swope, was subsequently fired before the column was even published.

While there has not been such a response on our campus, when conversing with Leaphart and Nesmith, it becomes obvious that they gave Sharp's criticism thought. For any director, there is the dilemma between remaining faithful to the script and responding to its problems. In this case, they chose to follow Ensler, more or less word for word, and with good justification. "Ensler has very prescriptive rules for the production of the show. There is virtually no flexibility in terms of which monologues to perform," said Nesmith. "My personal feeling about this piece is the overall experience by the woman in the monologue is extremely positive. [The experience] is not about the older woman obtaining sexual pleasure, but rather about empowering the younger woman to find her own sexuality and to understand and appreciate her body."

Beyond minor criticisms that this year's production was less engaging than previous ones, most of the audience, men and women alike, applauded the cast for their strong performance. Kerri Duquette-Hoffman, a representative of WomenSafe, a group working to help victims of rape and to prevent violence against females, was moved by Katie Peters '06 and Dylan Graetz's '08 performance of the scene, "My Vagina Was My Village," despite having seen it many times. "[That piece] always makes me cry. They did a good job of performing it, given it's very heavy and somber, and it's placed in the middle of a play that is mostly very up-beat."

Finally, the "VMons" came full circle by giving the audience a chance to get involved. All the profits, a predicted $3,000, will be donated directly to WomenSafe.