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V did it first
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The global phenomenon of The Vagina Monologues has an interesting local angle
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Playwright Eve Ensler (centre) with Hollywood stars Jane Fonda (extreme left) and Marisa Tomei who had come down for the performance that never was. Dolly Thakore is to Fonda's left. Mahabanoo Mody Kotwal is to Tomei's right.
THE FORBIDDEN V-word is in news again. When the celebrated controversial play by Eve Ensler, The Vagina Monologues, pitched its tent in Chennai as part of its India tour, the police saw red. They banned the production — which boasts of big names like Jane Fonda and Marisa Tomei as part of the cast — "on finding certain portions of the script objectionable" and warning it could "pose a threat to public order".
Earlier, the show had gone on in Mumbai, though Shiv Sena leader Pramod Navalkar fumed: "It is against Indian culture to openly talk about private parts. What are we coming to? Under the guise of permissiveness everything is being done these days!" Mahabanoo Mody Kotwal, who has brought the play to India, said: "In India, we use sex to sell everything from washing powder to pain reliever. And yet, we cannot discuss sex, sexuality, and related matters like normal, healthy adults should."
The Vagina Monologues, based on Eve's interviews with women from across the world, has characters speaking about their bodies and sexuality — both pleasures and abuses — in the most uninhibited, honest, and irreverent way. And honesty is, of course, unacceptable and shocking, especially when it concerns the tricky issue of female sexuality. The play has earlier faced ban in Malaysia and China.
On the other hand, ever since its publication in 1998, The Vagina Monologues has spawned a cult of sorts, egging on thousands of women to accept their bodies and not be ashamed of them. Jane Fonda, in an interview with Tehelka, says that being part of the play has transformed her "from a cerebral feminist to an embodied feminist". The V-Day Initiative, a movement to end violence toward women, has grown from this work. The play is staged on February 14 in many parts of the world to raise funds for work towards stopping violence on women.
This global phenomenon has an interesting local angle. And the ongoing hullabaloo makes it a good time for a recap: Ruchika Chanana staged The Vagina Monologues in Bangalore two years ago, and though there were a few murmurs, the three private productions of the play went off quite smoothly. Two productions were at the now-defunct 180 Proof and one was at National Law School. The latter show was followed by a discussion. So Bangalore's was the first production in India, though the controversial India tour is being claimed as the first.
Ruchika says that the group (Kimaaya Productions) had paid royalty to Eve and got the rights for a private show. They wanted to see "how Bangalore would react" and go ahead with a public show as well. But that did not happen, though much of the audience was full of praise and admiration for someone "brave enough to do something like this". The audience was moved and touched, especially since the production came with an "Indian touch". The director's note, read at the end of the play, also tied the monologues to our context.
But some "how can you?!"s did come Ruchika's way. A complaint was filed in Cubbon Park police station, taking exception to the "obscene" title of the play. But the inspector concerned concluded that "vagina" is "not an obscene world, but a scientific and technical term". He watched the play too and found nothing objectionable, recalls Ruchika. Reason enough for Bangalore to do a "collar up"!
But besides the moral policemen, some feminists too have picked quarrels with the play on many grounds — that it's too Freudian, it goes back to the '60s male-bashing mould, it's too elitist and Western, and so on. Whatever the differing points of view may be, Ruchika feels that the play packs a punch because it is "a play from the heart", based on experiences of real women. The members of the Bangalore cast came to identify with many of the experiences delineated in the play, and what more proof do we need to say that it's immediate, she asks.
Come to think of it, why all this fuss about calling a vagina a vagina in a country known for Kamasutra and Khajuraho sculptures? How come we have tolerance for Dada Kondke's ghastly double entendres and item numbers but not for some plain-speaking?
But it's a different ball game when women start speaking about things "themselves" and so "shamelessly" at that! Ruchika talks about how the female body has always been "site of controversy". And Eve asks in an interview with Tehelka: "Vagina is actually more disturbing to people than acid rain, Scud missiles, or WMDs, which are in the front page of every newspaper. But talk about the vagina and people think we're shocking... It's part of our bodies, why isn't it part of our everyday vocabulary?"
BAGESHREE S.
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