Baldwin Wallace University VDAY held the third annual production of The Vagina Monologues By Eve Ensler on Friday, Feb. 21 at 8 pm in the Gamble Auditorium.
All proceeds from the event benefited the Akron Battered Women’s Shelter and VDAY, a global activist movement to end violence against women and girls.
The directors and production staff consisted of Amber Hugee, Production Manager, Livay Davis, Production Assistant, and Francesca Mamlin, Stage Manager.
The performance is made up of different monologues read by a variety of women. Originally, Eve Ensler performed every monologue herself.
Each of the monologues deals with different areas of the feminine experience, touching on matters such as sex, love, rape, menstruation and other topics.
Ensler’s theme that is seen in the performance is female empowerment, and the individuality.
Ensler explains that it is important to be aware and face the hard issues straight on and become immersed with oneself.
“When you rape, beat, maim, mutilate, burn, bury, and terrorize women, you destroy the essential life energy on the planet,” Ensler said.
Sophia Viglione, BW senior and double major in Religion and English explains the importance of the performance and the impact it had on the audience.
“I came with no expectations, which turned out to be a good thing, because I couldn’t have imagined what was planned and what was going to be addressed,” Viglione said.
“The monologues were arranged in a way where sensitive topics were touched upon, and the performances did a really nice job of not hiding female sexuality, but they instead embraced it,” Viglione continued.
Some of the acts consist of “One Billion Will Rise For Justice,” “My Angry Vagina,” “I Was There in the Room,” “Because He Liked to Look at It” and “The Vagina Workshop”.
“Some of the acts were very intense and talked about cross cultural issues,” Viglione said.
“I think that some of those intense parts were uncomfortable for some of the audience, but it was powerful. Definitely something that needed to be heard by everyone.”
Viglione also stressed the importance of the issues that were addressed.
“These are all really important issues for every female, and even though the performances started out light hearted, it helped because it acclimated the audience as it grew more intense and forceful.
Alex Farone, also a senior and English major, attended the performance last year and was pleased with this year’s event as well.
“It all just has such an important message and people usually do not like to talk about these things,” Farone said.
“It’s amazing that Ensler interviewed hundreds of women and pulled all this information together so that each monologue is told in the perspective of a different woman. The monologues are subjects not usually talked about, but they are the things every woman knows,” Farone said.
The Vagina Monologues creates awareness for people against violence and helps women become interested and involved in different campaign events, such as VDAY’s One Billion Rising For Justice, which the organization defines as a call to women, men and youth around the world to gather safely outside places where they are entitled to justice, such as court houses, police stations, government offices, school administration buildings, work places, sites of environmental injustice, military courts, embassies, places of worship, homes, or simply public gathering places where women deserve to feel safe but too often do not. This year’s One Billion Rising For Justice campaign took place on Friday, Feb. 14.
The organization explains the importance of the “One Billion,” and states that one in three women on the planet will be raped or beaten in her lifetime, which adds up to one billion women.
“In 2013, one billion women and men shook the earth through dance to end violence against women and girls. This year, on 14 February 2014 we are calling on women and men everywhere to harness their power and imagination to rise for justice,” states the VDAY organization.
To learn more about VDAY visit www.vday.org, or visit facebook.com/BWvawam.
