Vagina Monologues return to Fredonia

Co-directed by Briana Wilson ‘11 and Mary Hilton ‘11

It's no longer a secret; women love to talk about their vaginas. On stage, in the public space of the multipurpose room in the Williams Center, female Fredonia students proved to be no exception.

They spoke loud and clear so to ring out the centuries of silence that had wrapped itself tightly around the throat of female sexuality. They also spoke the words used casually today, heard in dorm rooms and passing hallways about some girl, some pussy, some cunt. They took the vagina, the part and made it whole again, made it woman.  

On Feb. 17, 18 and 19 Briana Wilson, senior applied music major and Mary Hilton, senior TV and digital film major co-directed the famous play by Eve Ensler, The Vagina Monologues.

True to its nature, the performance did not represent a typical play – there was no unifying plot, conflict or an elaborate setting but there were characters and what they had to say and how they said it mattered the most. In a starkly lit room performers appeared by spotlights, seated on stools as they both rejoiced, mocked and critiqued the roles of womanhood.

The monologues are based on interviews Ensler conducted with 200 women on various subjects including sex, relationships and violence towards women. Through these interviews she collected personal stories, both comedic and tragic, about the female body. It incorporates the sexual experiences of women of all varying ages, professions, race, class and experience.  Since then, it has exploded into a global celebration of female sexuality.

"That's why I began this piece. I was worried about vaginas. I was worried what we think about vaginas," Ensler said in the introduction to the play, "And I was even more worried that we don't think about them. I was worried about my own vagina. It needed a context, a community and a culture of other vaginas. There is so much darkness and secrecy surrounding them, like the Bermuda Triangle."

Ensler's conscious decision to create a dialogic play surrounding vaginas is important because it gives female sexuality voice, context and a presence outside of its historical otherness.

The passion Ensler built into her script was powerful in that it reclaimed and celebrated the vagina in public spaces where men and women are invited into the discussion. The play itself demands passionate and willing performers to assume roles that may still be viewed as taboo.

Hilda Myer, junior technical theatre major was one such performer. Her monologue, "Because He Liked to Look At It" proved to be powerful and witty as she broke the audience into laughter at times and quietly but tentatively listening at others. Her performance was about a woman who came to love her vagina through a sexual relationship she had with a man who really cared to embrace her womanhood, vagina and all.

For Myer, her favorite aspect of the show is, "to watch it affect people … It's all about getting an emotional response, it's good to have the audience laugh and cry," said Myer. Her interest in The Vagina Monologues peaked when she had the opportunity to watch a performance during high school and she immediately loved it.

Other monologues contain no humor at all. They are truly disheartening experiences that mimic real issues women throughout the world continue to face. Brittany Fischer and Sarah Flanagan performed a compelling monologue of one Iraqi woman's story of the physical and sexual abuse she endured, until "she was bone."

"My favorite part of the performance was the rotational monologue, it talks about her missing face," Gabe Erlichman, senior theatre major said. "I don't like the content of that monologue but I think it's the most powerful monologue in the show… a lot of [the performances] are loud and humorous but this one is very serious, somber and real."

This year's cast proved to be very talented, all 44 actresses. Of course the larger roles stand out and stay longer in the viewers memory.

The monologue by Chante DeLong in the second act "The Little Choochie Snoorcher That Could" was delivered with such personality she gave life and movement to the conflicting memories her character associates with her vagina or her "choochie snoorcher" as she called it.

Additionally the monologue, "Reclaiming Cunt," played by Rose Guinta was by far the most phonetically challenging and it certainly could not be played by a woman that blushes easily at the mention of such a culturally, engendered and imprisoned word. Guinta performed confidently to re-sexualize the word as pleasing and euphoric and ultimately orgasmic. She reaches her climax as her quivering lips, tighten and tantalize to the last letter of the word, pleading to her audience, "tell me, cunt, cunt, say it, tell me cunt."

Tyffany Howlett, sophomore history major said the show, "is absolutely hysterical and empowering and it makes me love my vagina so much. I feel great and pumped up and energized and it's also very touching, even the funny stories."

Apart from encouraging a healthy emotional and dialogic response from audience members, The Vagina Monologues increases its awareness by donating proceeds from ticket sales to help stop violence and oppression against woman. These particular performances were sponsored by Fredonia's own women's student union.

The shows gave 90 percent of their proceeds to The Agnes Home of Jamestown, while 10 percent will be sent to V-Day to support the 2011 spotlight: The Women and Girls of Haiti. Each year V-Day increases awareness by focusing on a specific group of women in the world who are resisting violence with courage and vision.

This year's spotlight on the women and girls in Haiti focuses on the increased rates of sexual violence since the devastating earthquake that took place in January 2010. All funds raised through the Spotlight Campaign will be used to support a revolutionary national campaign in Haiti lead by a coalition of women activists.