Laura Hanna, senior English and history major, practices her part in the Vagina Monologues in the main lounge of Olson Hall. SAM TWAREK | DAILY KENT STATER

Credit: DKS Editors

Various personal issues that women deal with on a daily basis will be brought to the surface this weekend in “The Vagina Monologues,” a show entirely produced and directed by students. Proceeds will benefit local and national charities geared toward women.

The all-female cast will host two shows starting tomorrow at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. in the Kiva. Tickets will be sold at the door at $6 for students and $7 for adults. Eighty percent of the profits will go to a national charity that benefits the female victims of Hurricane Katrina, 10 percent will go to the Battered Women’s Shelter in Akron and the last 10 percent of the profits will pay for production costs, director Corrie Malcolm said.

Malcolm, a sophomore theater and hospitality management double major, said although she has been involved with theater through acting and with technical work, this is her first time directing a production on campus.

“It’s a lot of responsibility, which is fine,” she said. “It’s a good experience.”

Malcolm said this year’s two-hour show, which is sponsored by the Women’s Liberation Collective, includes monologues that cover topics such as women’s rights, child birth, transgender women, rape, menstruation and abortion.

The script for these monologues was originally a collection of interviews gathered by playwright and feminism activist Eve Ensler, Malcolm said. She traveled the country and interviewed more than 200 women about female issues. Afterward Ensler turned their responses into monologues, according to www.vday.org, the Web site devoted to V-day, Ensler’s global movement to stop violence against women and girls.

V-day allows students to use the script free of charge during a specific time period each year, as long as 90 percent of the profits go to charity, Malcolm said.

“It’s all student-based here,” she said. “It’s just a script that’s used universally.”

Malcolm said auditions and two practices were held before winter break. Cast members learned their lines on their own and then came back at the beginning of this semester to attend practices once a week.

“We have one group practice a week, and they also have one individual practice a week, where they’re in a group with multiple people,” she said. “Then they meet separately one day and practice.”

Malcolm said this year’s show features two original poems written by Beth Vild, cast member and junior English major. Vild’s pieces present her first-hand feelings on date rape and abortion. She said the poem about rape should encourage women and men to think more about their actions.

“It’s kind of pertinent to women on college campuses because that happens on a pretty regular basis,” Vild said. “It’s about being drunk at a party and some guy taking advantage of you.”

Vild’s second poem is about an abortion she had. It’s the last poem she wrote in a series from the entire experience.

“It was the final stage of the grieving period, when I was finally like, ‘I’m really completely okay with this now,'” she said.

Vild said reading these poems are important because they reach out to the young women on campus. She also said the poems mean a lot to her personally.

Malcolm said she thinks the show will go well this weekend.

“I’m really just excited to see it come together,” she said. “We’ve been working on this since October, raising money and fundraising and getting advertisements.”

With help from the WLC, cast members sold advertisements in the programs, sold candy off campus and held a benefit concert where those in attendance contributed a suggested donation, Malcolm said. All proceeds went toward production costs.

Malcolm said she’s hoping to raise $2,000 for the charities through ticket sales. She said she’s involved in this show for a couple of reasons.

“I do it because I really like being involved in theater, and I really think that ending violence against women is an important goal,” she said. “And I think it’s important to let people know the things that are happening around the world, not only to women, but just in general.”

Contact student life reporter Brittany Wasko

at [email protected].