10 Facts About This Year's 'Vagina Monologues'

It was 16 years ago this February when a play called The Vagina Monologues, by Eve Ensler, sparked a revolution of sorts, helping women regard their bodies with fresh appreciation and insisting on a new societal comfort regarding women’s bodies and identities.

The Vagina Monologues has since become much more than a stage production, broadening into a worldwide phenomenon focused on helping women wherever they are oppressed.

This year, on Saturday, Feb. 15, students will stage their annual Smith production of The Vagina Monologues, at 8 p.m. in John M. Greene Hall. The Vagina Monologues is for everyone, as Eve Ensler emphasized when she visited Smith to kick off a nationwide tour for the play’s 10th anniversary in 2008. For those who could use more information about the production, here are:

10 Interesting Facts About This Year’s Vagina Monologues at Smith

1. Both directors of this year’s production are named Alex: Alex Olkovsky ’14 and Alex Neff ‘14.
2. The majority of proceeds from ticket and merchandise sales will be donated to Safe Passage, a local shelter that assists women and children in abusive domestic situations.
3. This year’s cast includes several seniors, who said they’ve always wanted to be part of the show but were too nervous to audition before.
4. To help promote this year’s production, students will sell milk chocolate and cherry chocolate lollipops in the Campus Center leading up to the show.
5. As usual, Vagina Monologues cast members will be dressed in all black, accented with red accessories, such as suspenders, headbands, lipstick, and others.
6. This year’s cast is particularly diverse, including performers of varying ages, backgrounds, genders, hometowns, and stages in their Smith careers (even a graduate student!).
7. The message of The Vagina Monologues: “Love yourself, love who you are, love your body.”—Genevieve Guilfoile ’13, former Vagina Monologues producer. Enough said.
8. The Vagina Monologues is part of V-Day, a global movement to end violence against women and girls.
9. The V-Day campaign has raised more than $75 million for women’s anti-violence groups worldwide, and has been named among “100 Best Charities.”
10. Producers of this year’s Vagina Monologues are also producing The Smith Monologues, a series of brief, original shows based on the Monologues in which students write and perform their own stories, poetry and other creative works. The first performance took place in November 2013, and another one is planned for April.

Tickets for The Vagina Monologues are $10 for general admission, $5 for Smith students, available at the door or for purchase at the Campus Center, garden level, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Thursday and Friday, Feb. 13-14.