My friend Valerie and I went to see The Vagina Monologues yesterday at the Union. The performances were last night and tonight, and they are put on by the Women's Outreach Center here at OU.
This was my second year attending, and I was a little nervous that the incredible amount of fun I'd had last year couldn't be beat. So I tried to lower my expectations and not think about the show that much before-hand... which ended up not being terribly difficult to do, since I got out of class late that evening and was running around campus like a maniac for the half hour right before the show. But as soon as I sat down and the lights dimmed, I was able to get properly pumped up for the show. And let me tell you, it was far from a disappointment.
The Vagina Monologues, for those of you who don't know (and can't guess from the title), is a series of monologues written by Eve Ensler, an award-winning playwright and activist. It is a compilation of monologues, all about women issues and well, vaginas.
The play is touching, risqué, beautiful and hilarious-- sometimes all at the same time. I laughed so hard that my eyes watered during the "My Angry Vagina" monologue. And I cried real tears during the monologue of "A Teenage Girl's Guide to Surviving Sex Slavery."
That's the incredible thing about the monologues-- they do such an excellent job of mixing humor with sadness. Because the play is both a celebration of a woman's "down there" and an event to raise awareness about sexual violence, there are a number of deeply saddening monologues and facts (for example, 40 women were raped in Norman, OK alone last year) mixed into the larger number of humorous/contemplative/uplifting monologues.
On a side note, while some of the monologues are hilarious for all, some would be incredibly awkward to sit through if you were a man (of which there were a surprisingly large number at the show). I remember looking around and thinking, you are a brave soul, sir. A very brave soul.
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