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A new monologue
Playwright Eve Ensler turns her attention to the issue of violence against women

BY TAMARA WIEDER

YOU’VE PROBABLY HEARD the ad spots on the radio, featuring the terribly embarrassed woman who wants to buy tickets to see The Vagina Monologues but can’t work up the nerve to utter the word "vagina." It was precisely that discomfort with labial language that inspired Eve Ensler to write her critically acclaimed play in the first place. Based on her interviews with a variety of women about their own vaginas, The Vagina Monologues has been performed by a host of celebrity actresses around the world — and by Ensler herself.

But the play isn’t the only thing keeping Ensler busy these days. In 1997, she launched V-Day, a global movement aimed at ending violence against women and girls. A 2001 V-Day benefit at Madison Square Garden sold out; this year’s 10-week calendar of V-Day-related events includes more than 500 benefit performances of The Vagina Monologues. Last year, Ensler toured Afghanistan and witnessed the atrocities committed against women there; now, V-Day is actively involved with the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), and helped to bring a group of Afghan women to Brussels in December for the Afghan Women’s Summit for Democracy.

Q: I understand these are your final appearances in The Vagina Monologues. Why is that?

A: Well, I’d been doing the play for a long time, and then basically I stopped doing it; I don’t think I’ve done it for about a year. And I’m doing it again because I really love doing it in Boston and I’ve never done it in a big way in Washington. But it’s now being done everywhere, all over the place, by a lot of wonderful people, and to be honest, I’m working on a lot of new things. I may, in a couple of years, do a few performances here and there, but this is going to be the last of the big [runs] ... it’s time do the next [project].

Q: What is it about Boston that you enjoy so much? Are the audiences here different in some way?

A: They’re just great, incredibly supportive, fun. There’s a lot of college empowerment workshops there, you know, College Campaign workshops.

Q: How different do you think the show is when you’re performing it, as opposed to when other actresses are appearing in it?

A: Well, I think because I did the interviews with people, there’s a certain going back to the origin, like the core. I think there’s good from each; I mean, I’m not an "actress," so I don’t bring that, but I think I bring the telling of the stories from the beginning, whereas I think when the performers do it, they bring this incredible talent of performing.

Q: Have there been particular actresses who have really stood out to you?

A: Every time I see it I’m amazed. Because everybody brings such a particularly original, diverse, complicated way of doing things. So I can’t say that one has stood out over another; it’s just made me aware of how complicated and varied and rich women are.

Q: Does it make the actresses nervous when you’re in the audience?

A: I think it makes them nervous, particularly if they don’t know me.

Q: What role do you play in choosing who’s going to appear?

A: Well, in the casting in New York and in the cast that tours and in the casting in LA, I have approval over those, so I play a pretty definite role in deciding.

Q: When you wrote The Vagina Monologues, did you ever envision it becoming what it has?

A: No. Absolutely not. It’s all been this great vagina miracle.

Q: What were your original goals with the show?

A: Being able to say the word out loud. To do it and not die.

Q: Now that people are getting more comfortable with the word "vagina," are there other words you’d like to tackle?

A: Well, you know, it’s interesting. I was thinking the other day why we’re comfortable with words like anthrax and smallpox, and it’s all about the difference between moving toward life or moving toward death. And I think one of the reasons people are so scared of the word "vagina" is because it represents life. And on some deep level, we’re all really terrified to be alive. And so we do everything we can to kind of dampen it or hurt it or destroy it or break it down so it’s not so scary. So any words, I think, that are connected to life, those are the words I’d like us to get comfortable with.

Q: Talk to me about V-Day. Where did the idea come from?

A: It came out of my first tour I did with Vagina Monologues; I went to all these different grassroots venues around the world, and everywhere I went, so many women lined up at the end of the show to tell me how they’d been beaten or raped that I began to have a little breakdown. So I just said, either I’m going to stop doing the show or I’m going to figure out how to use it to stop violence against women. And in ’97 a group of wonderful actresses got together, and we came up with this idea of V-Day, which is a day, Valentine’s Day, a decision, a catalyst, a movement, an energy, to end violence against women. The first year we got all these great actors together and asked them to perform The Vagina Monologues at this big venue, and that evening was unbelievably successful, and we raised hundreds of thousands of dollars, and that launched V-Day. And then the next year, Karen Obel created the College Campaign and brought it to 65 colleges. And every year it’s just expanded and expanded. Last year we ended up filling Madison Square Garden, 18,000 people, and it was at 250 colleges. And this year I think we’ll probably be at between 500 and 600 colleges, and 200 cities around the world. Our mission is basically to stop sex slavery, stop female-genital mutilation, incest, rape, and domestic battery.

Q: Talk to me about your experiences in Afghanistan.

A: It was devastating. I would say if you want to understand what misogyny looks like when it’s fully realized, you just have to go to Afghanistan.

Q: Are you still in touch with the women there?

A: Oh, very much so. V-Day became a primary supporter of RAWA. And they’ve come over here several times since, and we just ended up being one of the conveners for the Afghan Women’s Summit that took place in Brussels, and we brought 40 Afghan women from around the world, particularly inside Afghanistan, to come and create a future. They came up with something called the Brussels Proclamation, which is this genius document outlining all the things that they would like to see for the reconstruction of Afghanistan. And then we brought them on tour here for the last two weeks, where they went to Secretary of State Colin Powell, they met with the Senate, they met with Secretary-General Kofi Annan, they met with the Security Council to present the proclamation.

Q: How are they feeling, in the midst of the fall of the Taliban?

A: Scared. Because nothing’s assured. And in many ways, the Northern Alliance is just as scary as the Taliban.

Q: Are they hopeful, and are you hopeful, that the war is ultimately going to be a good thing for the women of Afghanistan?

A: Well, I think it remains to be seen. That’s why we’re really fighting that the women have a central say on what happens there, and where all this reconstruction money gets spent. And I think the Americans can do anything — they can fight to make sure none of that money gets released unless it’s going to women and unless women are part of the equation.

Q: What’s next for you?

A: Well, there’s a lot happening. I have a play up here in Hartford that’s moving to New York, we think in February; the HBO special is coming out in February; V-Day is obviously right around the corner, and I’m probably going to go to 25 cities where they’re celebrating; and then I’m going to sit down at the end of April and write. I’ve got several deadlines.

Q: How would you define feminism? Do you have your own definition?

A: I guess I would say that when women know their desire, feel entitled to their desire, can locate their desire, and manifest their desire in the world, that would be feminism.

Q: What if someone wrote a show called The Penis Monologues? Would you go?

A: It would be redundant, wouldn’t it? We kind of live the penis monologues, as far as I can tell.

Eve Ensler performs The Vagina Monologues at the Wilbur Theatre, in Boston, through February 3. Call (617) 931-2787. Tamara Wieder can be reached at twieder[a]phx.com

Issue Date: January 10 - 17, 2002

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