Indian Head, MD – As part of the V-DAY 2016 worldwide event to end violence against women, Hickory Dickory Dark Productions partnered with the Indian Head Center for the Arts to present Eve Ensler’s Obie-winning episodic play, The Vagina Monologues, at the Black Box Theatre in Indian Head Feb. 27.

The first draft of the play was written in 1996 and Ms. Ensler originally starred in this Off-Broadway one-woman show. When she left the play, it was re-cast with three celebrity actresses. Eve went on to star in a TV version broadcast on HBO. Ensler and others subsequently launched V-DAY, a global non-profit movement that has raised over $100 million for groups working to end violence against women and girls. V-DAY events are scheduled worldwide each year between February 1 and April 30.

Productions are staged to raise funds for local shelters and centers; the Black Box Theatre production donated 100 percent of proceeds to House of Ruth, raising over $1,400. Founded in 1976, House of Ruth in Washington, DC, helps women, children and families in greatest need and with the fewest resources build safe, stable lives and achieve their highest potential, ending homelessness and life-long abuse.

Each monologue of the play deals with an aspect of the feminine experience such as sex, love, rape, female genital mutilation, birth, masturbation and orgasm, along with various common names for the vagina. Every year a new monologue is added to highlight a current issue affecting women around the world. The script was developed through interviews which Ensler conducted with over 200 women. She wrote the piece to “celebrate the vagina.” In 1998 the purpose changed to a movement to stop violence against women.

The monologues represent a variety of women’s voices such as those of a six-year-old girl, a vagina workshop participant, a woman witnessing the birth of her granddaughter, a Bosnian survivor of rape, and a feminist happy to have found a man who “liked to look at it”, among many others.

The Black Box Theatre production featured a different actress in every role, and was directed by Kristin Kauffman. Demand for tickets was so high that the Director turned away enough people to have filled the hall completely for a second performance. The monologues were read by fourteen actresses from note-cards, as per the production requirements, and were communicated with great sensitivity, intensity, and humor, as appropriate to each story.  The single sold-out performance boasted the following cast:

Laurie Foster, Amanda LePore, and Rose Talbot (Introduction); Lisa Zimmerman (Hair); Ellynne Brice Davis (The Flood); Kristin Kauffman (The Vagina Workshop); Amanda LePore (Vagina Happy Fact); Joanne Fuesel, Emily Funderburk, Leni Weisl, Kristin Kauffman, and Rebecca Masters (They Beat the Girl Out of My Boy – Or So They Tried); Christine Carter (Because He Liked to Look At It); Amanda LePore (Not-So-Happy Fact); Emily Funderburk (My Angry Vagina); Rose Talbot (My Vagina Was My Village); Tasnim McWilliams (My Short Skirt); Joanne Fuesel (The Little Coochi Snorcher That Could); Leni Weisl (Reclaiming Cunt); Ellynne Brice Davis and Lisa Zimmerman (A Six-Year-Old Girl Was Asked); Rebecca Masters (The Woman Who Loved to Make Vaginas Happy ); Lynne O’Meara (I Was there in the Room); Laurie Foster (My Revolution Begins in the Body); Full Cast (Rise, Dance, Disrupt)

Thanks go to the volunteers in the lobby, behind the scenes in the tech booth, and behind the camera, and to the supportive and appreciative audience for embracing the message of The Vagina Monologues.

As a tie-in with the fundraising effort for House of Ruth in this Feb. 27 performance of The Vagina Monologues, Caught My Eye in Leonardtown will donate 10 percent of its proceeds on specialty items from March 17 -20 with the presentation of a coupon at time of purchase. Caught My Eye is open Thursdays through Sundays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information you may contact www.CaughtMyEyesite.wordpress.com, or www.Facebook.com/CaughtMyEyesite.

V-DAY’s work is grounded in four core beliefs:
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.

Over 3,800 instances of domestic violence were reported in Charles County between 2010 and 2014; in St. Mary’s County 3,308 cases were reported; and in Calvert County, 1,816 cases were reported (according to the printed program notes).

The Indian Head Center for the Arts is a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization with a mission to bring live theater and culture to Southern Maryland and especially to Indian Head.

For more details about the Black Box Theatre production of The Vagina Monologues you may contact: www.HickoryDickory Dark.com.