V A G I N A S
CENTER STAGE

Eve Ensler, "Vagina Monologues" author
PHOTO: SUSAN JOHANN
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a theater review by
Dr. Susan Block

With our respective vaginas still a little achey from another active Saturday night at the Speakeasy but now tucked safely into our panties, Kim and I ventured out Sunday evening to see Eve Ensler's multiple-award-winning "Vagina Monologues" at the Cañon Theater in Beverly Hills.

Naturally, the theater was packed with vaginas between the legs of a couple hundred mostly well-heeled West Los Angeles women, plus a sprinkling of vagina-friendly husbands and boyfriends. Just before curtain, our vaginas feeling a little full, Kim and I decided to relieve ourselves and high-tailed it up to the ladies room and, wouldn't you know it, 90% of the vaginas in the theater had the same idea. The line was so long, it wound down the stairs and into the lobby, while--wouldn't you know it!--there was no line at all to the men's room. There were the penis-owners, trotting briskly in and out of their door, while the vagina-owners had to wait, another painful reminder of the biological and sociological difficulties of what we ladies possess between our thighs. A typical vagina-unfriendly situation.

We discussed our plight, chuckling ironically about the name of the evening's entertainment versus the inequity of the situation at hand. Suddenly, as if a light turned on in our heads (or between our legs?), a gaggle of us vagina power-charged gals decided to storm the men's room. We hesitating a few moments, our ladylike schooling questioning our more primal vaginal urges. Then, all at once, we threw caution down the stairs and marching into the men's room, feeling for all the world like New Age suffragettes demanding our equal vaginal-relief rights. The few assorted men milling about "their" room couldn't help but let us in. Triumphant, we did our vaginal business, and left the toilet seats down.

Thus empowered, we settled our happy, relieved vaginas into our seats and found ourselves in the midst of a virtual vaginal lovefest: Eve Ensler's brilliant, hilarious, touching, disturbing, inspiring and even, in parts, erotic, multiple-award-winning masterpiece THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES.

The production at Beverly Hills' Cañon Theatre features Julie Kavner, Julianna Margulies and Rosie Perez performing Ensler's words with passion, humor and a sense of pussy power that is more infectious than an STD. Perez delivers the sexiest performance. Especially moving was her characterization of an abused teenager who finds sexual salvation in the arms of an older woman, and her orgasmic, house-rocking sound-poem soliloquoy on the word "cunt."

Rosie Perez

But Kavner and Margulies are marvelous too. Margulies, best known for her Emmy-Award-winning portrayal as Nurse Carol Hathaway on "ER," is especially charming as a British ingenue discovering the wonders of her vagina and herself at a Betty Dodson-like workshop. Though Dodson herself would probably insist on using the correct term, "vulva," for the outside part of the female genitals which includes the clitoris, Kavner gives a great performance as a somewhat ditzy, but genuinely inspired participant in one of these pussy-power seminars..

Julianna Margulies

Kavner, best known as the voice of Marge on the Simpsons (but who sounds to me just like Peter Falk), shines when raging hilariously about her "angry vagina," fed up with uncomfortable tampons and speculums and other vaginal tortures of the modern age. I'm sure that Marge feels the same way

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Julie Kavner

Going from one "Vagina Monologue" to another is like riding a femaleist roller coaster--soaring with arousal one moment and dipping into despondency the next. But like the best of rides, this one left us feeling exhilarated, inspired and with a slight tingly feeling between the legs.

V is for Vagina (& Vulva too)!

Whether you're a vagina owner or a vagina lover, or even if you're just vagina-curious, go see "The Vagina Monologues," directed by Joe Mantello, at the Cañon Theater. By the way, the cast at the Cañon changes every three weeks. But Eve Ensler's dazzling words are always the same. A portion of the proceeds goes to promote V-Day, a movement to end violence toward women.

Tickets are on sale now at the Canon Theater box office, by telephone (310.859.2830) or online at www.vmlosangeles.com. Don't miss this uniquely thrilling theatrical experience.

Take your girlfriend. Or your mom. Your daughter, your sister, your sister-in-law. Take your husband (or boyfriend) too. Just warn him that with a rousing show like this one, the vaginas in the theater may just rise up and storm the men's room.

Get the Book

Get Eve Ensler's Brilliant Book
The Vagina Monologues