V-Week at Vassar

Emma Epstein Life Editor

Lauren Sutherland Senior Editor

Baize Buzan ’10’s eyes do not stray far from the page in front of her as she delivers the somber, almost deadpan meditation on war and compassion that concludes this year’s production of “The Vagina Monologues.” The force of the message is unimpeded by the sporadic blackouts and blinding flashes of spotlight that the actresses have had to ignore during the two-hour final rehearsals.

To call the “Monologues” a play would be to undermine the realism of Eve Ensler’s production, which is based on interviews with over 200 women and at times seems more like a social study than a theatrical performance. A casual arrangement of its 19 cast members is reminiscent of a counseling or support group, but with each monologue, the audience is acutely aware of the empathy and feeling each actress has invested into the role, the labor of interpretation that elevates the “Monologues” to a form of drama beyond mere documentation.

“That’s one of the biggest challenges the actresses face,” explained co-director Kate Manning ’07, who is also a performer. “We have to be aware of the balance of creating a character, knowing that they are real women.” Manning, together with Sara Mason ’08, is co-directing the ever-changing chorus of female experience that spans topics from “vagina workshops,” to abuse, to birth.

In 1998, following the success of the “Monologues,” Ensler conceived of V-Day, a global organization that extends her play’s message through promotion initiatives and fundraising benefits that give aid to women’s shelters and charities worldwide. V-Day is fueled by a vast network of community organizations that are granted free rights to the “Monologues” provided they frame the performance within a “V-Week” of educational and fundraising events. Every year, V-Week takes on a specific “spotlight,” or region of female suffering that is forced upon the public’s consciousness. This year’s theme is “Reclaiming Peace,” a call to aid the oft-overlooked women in conflict zones.

As a contingent of this sprawling campaign, Mason and Manning are spearheading the Vassar chapter with a dual anti-abuse campaign and a celebration of female sexuality that lasts from Feb. 12-17. Throughout the week, “Monologues” cast members have been fundraising for a local charity by selling buttons, pins, bumper stickers, chocolate vaginas, and vagina cookies in the College Center. Counseling and Assistance in Response to Rape and Exploitive Sexual Activity (CARES), Campus Health Organization for Information, Counseling, and Education (CHOICE), Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance (FMLA), Eating Disorder Reachout Service (EDRS), and the Office of Health Education have also set up displays.

The other main event includes two 90-minute workshops. The first, entitled “Happy, Healthy Vulva,” deals with female anatomy, maximum sexual stimulation, points of pleasure, masturbation technique, and health issues. “It’s basically everything you ever want to know about your vagina,” said Mason. A second workshop deals with improving communication between sexual partners and strategies for approaching difficult subjects such as birth control, STDs and unconventional sex acts.

This year’s production features 15 monologues, which Ensler stipulates must be performed each year. Manning and Mason have also selected two monologues from the optional catalogue that befit the V-week spotlight. One, entitled “Crooked Braid,” deals with domestic abuse on Native American reservations. The other monologue, entitled “Memory of Her Face,” bespeaks the theme directly: Three women from Baghdad, Islamabad, and Juarez intertwine accounts of women whose suffering both is dwarfed by and linked to larger conflict.

“Women are not usually in combat,” said Manning. She explained that the spotlight monologue and the two additional selections “deal with the collateral, excess damage, [which] is not glamorous, but absolutely horrific, in ways that are both intimate and terrifying.”

This year, Ensler has decided to place the spotlight monologue at the very end of the production, usurping the position of the biographical “I Was in the Room” that usually concludes the production.

According to Mason, Ensler specified that the spotlight be placed at the end this year due to the exceptional relevance of its message.

A more subdued and psychoanalytic aesthetic will replace last year’s abstract vagina paintings. The red-and-purple-toned set will be bedecked with enlarged prints of Rorschach ink blot tests, a creative decision that emphasizes the intensely psychological element of the “Monologues” while ironically jesting at the tests’ uncanny vaginal resemblance.

Manning and Mason attested to the timelessness of the play’s message, which is renewed and informed by the vicissitudes of world culture and events. “In one monologue, a girl is statutorily raped by a woman, but regards it as a positive experience,” said Mason. “When it came out, lesbianism was just starting to be discussed, and that made the monologue controversial. But [each year] reveals a new layer of questioning. Now that same monologue brings up issues of underage sex and sexuality, which are really current concerns. You are driven to look deeper, to bring up new questions based on prevalent issues.”

Both directors anticipate the continued development of “The Vagina Monologues.” Ensler’s organization sets new goals every year, but claims that substantial gains have been made in increasing awareness about violations of women’s rights. As Ensler told The New York Times in June, “People think you’re crazy when you have dreams. Who cares if people think you’re crazy? So what. Because you know what, I’ve seen changes.”