Vagina Monologues: Episode One

https://jesslcoutinho.podbean.com/e/vagina-monologues-episode-one/

Hello, and welcome to the inside of Jess's closet! Just kidding. Well, I'm not kidding, I am standing in my closet but, regardless, this is the dramaturgal podcast for the Vagina Monologues.

Now, I realize that many of you have not worked with a dramaturg before, so my role in this production is mostly to do research for the cast and crew. I'll be making these mini podcasts on different subjects related to the play and I'll post them here. There may also be, just, sort of regular blog posts, and if you guys give me feedback, I can do whichever format works best for you guys.

Now, onto the show! Vagina Monologues. I am really excited that you all stayed on even though this isn't what you signed up to do. I think it's really important work. One of the first questions you ask in dramaturgy is: why this play? When I was first informed of the change to the season, I screamed. I was so excited; it felt right. Why? Because in this particular historical moment, we need to get our voices back. We have less rights now than our mothers had, and there's more and more executive orders and bills that are being put forth to disenfranchise us and make us invisible again.

Eve Ensler, now called V, created the monologues from interviews. She wanted to be talking about vaginas, and the word "vagina" was taboo. You can't really talk about violence and issues for people with vaginas if you can't say the word "vagina." And 51% of the population has one, so in order to shed light on it, we have to be able to say it. And apparently it's time that we start saying it again. 30 years on, this play is still relevant and important.

A little background about the Vagina Monologues is a few years after the first performance, it became synonyms with a movement called V-Day. V-Day was initially designed to bring awareness to violence against women and girls. You can take this play and perform it without a license on Valentine's Day, as long as the proceeds go to a related charity. We're doing it in May, so that's not how we're using this piece. We're using this piece as an act of political protest. This show was called "the most important piece of political theater of the last decade" by the New York Times in the 90's. V-Day, which is now a non-profit organization, has a mission and four core beliefs.

The mission is "to tackle issues such as rape and battery, incest, female genital mutilation, and sex slavery." The four core beliefs are:

-"art has the power to transform thinking and inspire people to act."

-"lasting social and cultural change is spread by ordinary people doing extraordinary things."

-"local women best know what their communities need and can become unstoppable leaders"

-"one must look at the intersection of race, class, and gender to understand violence against women."

And there it is: that is why we're doing this. I know I personally have spent a fair amount of time doom-scrolling and shutting down on my couch. And that's actually the goal of the current administration, it's- it's a tactic called "Shock Docterine," but we'll put a pin in that. That's for another episode. By producing this piece, we are gaining back our agency, we're making sure that we remain visible and not "bare-foot and pregnant in the kitchen." That's what you want to do, great, but it should be a choice that you get to make. We're protesting the current administration's attempt to enact Project 2025. We're not on the couch anymore. We are active, we are loud, and we're telling the stories that need to be heard right now.

All that said, moving forward, I plan to talk about V-Day and its sister organization, One Billion Rising. I thought maybe Degenerate Art, which is a designation the Third Reich used to disenfranchise artists. There will be dialect resources, that's not going to be podcast-style because I am not an expert on dialects, but I'll provide links and other resources. I can discuss some of the history around Bosnia in the 90's that's when this play was written and there was a lot of stuff she talks about that is related to that.

I want to avoid very sensitive subject matter in this format. I will happily... not happily, but I will willingly do research on very sensitive topics, but I'll probably email that information as opposed to putting it here. So anything you need me to look up, shoot me a text, and I'll get it to you.

Most importantly, remember to take care of yourselves in this process. This is very heavy subject matter, and your mental health is important.

So, let's go out there and show our communities that we can be extraordinary and inspire them to act. I'm so excited to do this with you, and thank you for your work.