By Emily Robbins
Carly Assael, this year’s director of “The Vagina Monologues,” said she was self-conscious the first time she saw the play as a sophomore in high school.
“I went to the show with my mother. I was nervous and didn’t know what to expect,” Assael said. ” I thought it would be tasteless.”
But by the end of the show, Assael was smitten with the play’s message of female empowerment. She was pleased someone had finally put all the things women experience not just on paper, but into performance.
Assael, a senior theatre major, was selected by Professor Janet Bobcean, the Theatre Department Chair, and Professor Dell Lewis, the Director of the Center for the Arts, to direct this year’s NU performance of “The Vagina Monologues.” Assael has been involved with “The Vagina Monologues” since her freshman year at Northeastern. As a freshman, she appeared in the monologue “He Liked to Look at It.” In her sophomore year, she performed “Vagina Workshop,” and in last year’s production she was a soundboard operator.
As the leader of this year’s Vagina Monologues, Assael’s mission is to get Northeastern more involved in V-Day – a global movement to stop sexual abuse against women and create a society where women are comfortable talking about sex.
V-Day was created in 1998 by Eve Ensler, author of “The Vagina Monologues,” as a means of support for anti-violence organizations around the world. According to Ensler’s Web site, V-Day has raised over $30 million to help organizations bring more public attention to the abuse, rape and incest happening around the world and in American communities.
“The overall goal of V-Day, according to Eve, is to stop violence against women,” Assael said. “We need to be aware that, as women, we represent a powerful sex and we should be comfortable with ourselves and confident.”
Assael recently visited Visual Arts Professor Mira Cantor’s figure-drawing class to get them involved in a special V-Day assignment. The art students created ink drawings of a female model who posed for the class. Assael said she coached the students to create figures “suggestive of the female body.” The exercise brought awareness of V-Day to the students, and Assael may use the pieces for her production.
Also in the works are possible V-Day workshops about safe sex. Assael has been in contact with Laura Weiss, a clinical social worker at Northeastern University Health and Counseling Services who specializes in sexual assault issues.
As a side project, Assael said she’d like to set up informational sessions for students about sexual abuse and resources students might not know about, like safe places to report rape.
Katie Schmaling, a senior history major, thinks V-Day is a step in the right direction.
“I think women deserve more respect in general and it would be a good way to get more people involved,” Schmaling said. “Hopefully people would spread the positive attitude [by] word of mouth.”
When the audience leaves “The Vagina Monologues,” Assael would like it to leave the play more informed and less inhibited.
“I would like the audience to leave and be able to say ‘vagina’ without being a pussy about it,” said Assael. “If you can’t say it, violence will keep happening to women and people will overlook what they should be talking about.”
“The Vagina Monologues” will be performed Feb. 17-18 in Blackman Auditorium at 8 p.m. Profits from the show will go toward women’s shelters in the Boston area.
