Last week in conjunction with VDAY Bakersfield I put together a production called HERSTORY.
The show had the tag line; "Real stories about women." The concept was conceived when my friend Alison and I directed The Vagina Monologues in 2011. As an bond building exercise we had our cast write their own monologue to share with their cast mates.
The stories that were shared during that exercise made us double up in laughter, or made us sob or just nod our heads in agreement. And the feeling we left with after that night was amazing. We all felt connected not only as friends, but as women. Because no matter what we are told we always believe that our experiences in life are unique to us. It's hard to think that someone else could have been abused. It is hard to believe that someone else could have been abandoned as a child. Or lived through a rape. Or lost a child. O couldn't have a child. All the women that participated knew they were not alone.
I knew as soon as that exercise was over that I wanted to bring that show to more people. And not just women. I wanted to include men to. Men have been influenced, good or bad, by women. So why should they be excluded right? I pitched the concept at The Empty Space to be a one night event during VDAY. And it was accepted. Yay!
When I posted the call for submissions I had no idea the response I would get. Would people think this was some sort of kumbaya, woman power kind of thing and write it off as a silly idea. And the first couple weeks the outlook for my show looked grim. Up until the week of the show actually. At that time I only had five submissions. And while all of them were AMAZING, there were only five. Well, six if you count mine. Not good.
The week before the show was to go up I was inundated with submissions from ladies that wanted to participate. And before I knew it I had 20 people signed up. Sadly only one was male, but hey! At least one man signed up to participate. All but 2 of the stories I was able to read before hand. And those were from two friends that I trusted to not make a mockery of the event, And the day of the show I was approached by two cast members of The Vagina Monologues 2012 that asked to participate. So I added them to the schedule. Sadly we lost two right before the show started, but they were kids and it was a late night for them.
The night of the show I was terrified no one would come and watch. I was terrified none of the story sharers would show up. I was terrified that I had chosen the wrong story to share myself. All of the stories were so personal and raw that maybe me choosing a funny story would make me look like I didn't take my own production seriously. Oy!
The call time for all of the participants was 1015 so we could go over show order in the 30 minutes before the house opened. At 1010 all but one person was there and she had left to get food for her daughter and friends. I was shocked. I went over the show order, everyone was excited and chatting with each other. All seemed happy and nervous. I as ecstatic and nervous.
Now I could worry that no one would show up.
I opened the doors to our guests at 1045pm. I expected to open the door to three maybe five people. To my surprise there were at least twenty waiting to get in. And when those twenty came in there were a steady stream of people that kept coming in. We topped off at about 35 people. And counting all of the story sharers we had roughly 55 people in the audience.
My nerves got worse.
I gave my opening welcome speech and before I knew it...the show was over. Just like the night with my cast the stories made everyone laugh, cry and think.
I don't know about anyone else in attendance, but the stories told made me see the people sharing them in a different light. I understood things, I sympathized, I related. It was an amazing experience.
I can not thank the people that participated enough. I can not express how brave everyone was to get up there in front of people they did not know and share such a personal event. You all told things that we usually refuse to tell even our closest friends.
All of you are beautiful people and I thank you for being a part of HERSTORY.
I must confess, I did choose a funny story after reading the submissions I received. After so many really deep and sometimes sad stories I wanted to balance out with something funny. There are several stories I can share that aren't funny. And I will share them, most likely through this blog. Maybe I will even share one tonight, but if not it will definitely soon.
Until then, be good to each other. We have enough bad in this world, don't add to it.
love, peace and sunshine.
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