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g THE GAMECOCK ♦ Friday, February 15, 2002 CONTACT US THEY SAIDIT inv>( 1 U U MARCUS AURELIUS: “Reject your Story ideas? Questions? Comments? sense of injury and the injury itself E-mail us at gamecockmixeditor@hotmail.com disappears.” The Monologues Play based on interviews with 200 women seeks to raise consciousness and restore joy to feminist movement PHOTO BY ROBERT GRUEN Top right: Bronwyn McNutt instructs performers in this weekend's “The Vagina Monologues” during Wednesday's rehearsal. Above: Cast members rehearse for “The Vagina Monologues” In the Russell House Theater this weekend. BY SARAH K. HAMMOND THE GAMECOCK A lifelong activist, playwright Eve Ensler has covered subjects like homelessness and nuclear disarmament. But she never cre ated the kind of frenzy with those plays as she has now that she has tapped into the word vagina. “Let’s just start with the word vagina,” reads the beginning of “The Vagina Monologues.” “It sounds like an infection at best, maybe a medical instru ment: ‘Hurry, nurse, bring me the vagina.’ Vagina. Vagina. It’s a to tally ridiculous, completely un sexy word. If you use it during sex in an attempt to be politically correct, you kill the act right there.” This weekend, “The Vagina Monologues” finally comes to Co lumbia with a student production at the Russell House Theater di rected by Michelle Crisp and pro duced by Bobbie Wofford and Bronwyn McNutt. What began in 1996 as a one woman show at the off-broadway HOME for Contemporary Theatre and Art at HERE has touched peo ple from Zaire to Romania, London to San Francisco. It is still running in New York at the Westside The atre with a three-woman cast that has featured countless high-profile women, including actresses Jane Fonda, Calista Flockhart, Glenn Close and Rudolph Giuliani’s es tranged wife, Donna Hanover. The play is based on Ensler’s interviews with 200 women. “I was worried about vaginas,” Ensler said. “I was worried about what we think about vaginas, and even more worried that we don’t think about them... I talked to old women, young women, married women, single women, lesbians, college professors, actors, corpo rate professionals, sex workers, African-American women, His panic women, Asian American women, Native American women, Caucasian women, Jewish women. At first, women were reluctant to talk. They were a little shy. But once they got going, you couldn’t stop them.” Ensler is interested in demys tifying the vagina. She’s also in terested in restoring joy to the feminist movement that she took part in as a young woman. Both humor and grief figure into this play. The monologues have titles like “My Angry Vagi na” and “If Your Vagina Got Dressed What Would It Wear?” The monologues also include the story of a gang rape in Bosnia. “The Vagina Monologues” isn’t just a play anymore. In ad dition to raising awareness, En sler has seen her play raise a lot of money in the commercial sphere. She decided to make the play work for women everywhere by establishing V-Day, the glob al movement to stop violence against women and girls. Ensler finds the word “chari ty” full of weakness, contrary to the spirit of the V-Day move ment. V stands for Victory, Valentine, and Vagina. V-Day is a day on or around Valentine’s Day for which theatrical and artistic events are produced around the world to raise money and transform consciousness. McNutt, a second-year com puter science student, read about V-Day in the back of her copy of “The Vagina Monologues,” a gift from last Valentine’s Day. Presi dent of the Women Students’ As sociation, McNutt signed USC up to produce the play as part of V Day’s college campaign. Student organizers around the nation are mounting more than 600 benefit performances of the play. The proceeds from USC’s production will go to Sistercare, the Revolu tionary Association for the Women of Afghanistan and USC’s Sexual Health and Trauma Ser vices. Thirty-seven women will perform on the Russell House stage. “Everyone just seemed so in terested and enthusiastic that we wanted to include as many If you’re going... WHAT: “The Vagina Monologues” WHERE: Russell House Theater WHEN: Feb. 16 and 18 at 8 p.m. and Feb. 17 at 2 p.m. BOX OFFICE CONTACT: 79.9-6551 TICKETS: Tickets are $5 for students, $8 nonstudent tickets people as possible,” McNutt said. “Our age range is 17 to 49.1 really wanted it to be well mixed. We have 22 white women and 15 racially diverse women, including African-American, Asian, Indian, and Polish (women).” The actresses are going through an unorthodox re hearsal process, mostly doing group-building exercises be cause they don’t have the op ' portunity to interact onstage. The script is always growing as Ensler speaks to more women. The USC production will use an updated script, which involves new monologues based on En sler’s interviews with women in Afghanistan. “The hardest thing is that be cause it’s called ‘The Vagina Monologues,’ it sort of sets the stage that it’s going to blanket the entire topic, and you really can’t,” McNutt said of producing the play. “It’s impossible to dis cuss every single issue that women face and every single way that they see it. I think a lot of people may leave saying ‘that re ally didn’t speak to me.’ Other people will leave saying, ‘I can’t believe someone else thought that.’ “ Comments on this story?E-mail gamecockmixeditor@hotmail.com Contemporary sculpture show finds venue at the Art Garage Art by USC students and teachers to be displayed BY ERIC SUTTON THE GAMECOCK Tomorrow night, 3D@USC will display some student and teacher art at The Art Garage. The force behind the show is visiting assis tant professor Bernadette Vielbig. The show will bring her students and their art together at the rela tively new venue. Though it’s new, The Art Garage has already hosted a number of shows. It also rents in expensive studio space to artists. Vielbig said: “The 20 or more works represent a variety of me dia and stylistic impressions of what constitutes contemporary sculpture. While most of this work is the result of projects, each has managed to communicate the in dividual voices of the different artists.” Vielbig is the woman behind USC’s metal foundry. When she arrived, the foundry was in shambles, but through her labor ing, it is now a functioning part of the USC art department. The foundry is the facility that stu dents use to cast bronze to make sculptures. 3D@USC will run through the entire month. The opening is free to the public, with an auction at the end of the night. Drinks and b.ors d’oeuvres will be served. “I think it is great being here so long and finally having a venue for student work,” said Billy Mak er, a fourth-year art student. “Bernadette has done a great job putting the show together. I think this show will be a good step in bringing together the artists’ community at USC.” Student Lisa Caldwell said.“I took the self-portrait idea and the use of large-scale murals and made it my own,” Elizabeth Adams is a post-doc toral rstudent who received her English doctorate in creative writ Left: "Plush Perv" by Jerl Ford. Mixed media assemblage 3D design. Above: "Ode to the Colonel" by Stephanie Leach. Mixed media assemblage 3D display. Student and faculty art will be on display at the as part of 3D@USC. The show will run through the entire month. PHOTOS SPECIAL TO THE GAMECOCK ing under James Dickey. She is a poet and “likes to combine poetry with her physical art work,” as in her piece “Possibilities of Flight.” Other students displaying their art include Stephanie Leach, Caitlin Bright, Michele Skillman, Eric Miller, Daniel Bailey, Lindsey Brown, Ginger Hogg, Eun Hyen Kim, Tommy Bonner, Kevin Pena, Elizabeth Adams and Dot Ross-Vaughn. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecockrhixeditor@hotmail.com Country music icon Jennings dies at 64 BY JIM PATTERSON THE ASSOCIATED PRESS NASHVILLE, TENN. - Despite the black cowboy hat and bad guy image, country star Waylon Jennings was known as a stand up guy. But when it came to his songs, it was a different story. “You start messin’ with my music, and I get mean,” he told The Associated Press in 1992. “As long as you are honest and upfront with me, I will be the same with you. But I still do things my way.” Jennings died peacefully Wednesday at his Arizona home after a long battle with diabetes related health problems, said spokeswoman Schatzi Hage man. He was 64. “Waylon Jennings was an American archetype, the bad guy with a big heart,” said Kris Kristofferson, who sang with Jennings in the Highwaymen. Jennings’ list of hits spans four decades and includes coun try music standards like "Good Hearted Woman” and "Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys,” both duets with Nelson. He made 60 albums and had 16 country singles that reached No. 1. His "Greatest Hits” album in 1979 sold 4 million - a rare ac complishment in country music for that era. Singer George Jones called it a “great loss for country music.” Jennings “had a voice and a way with a song like no one else,” said country star Emmy PHOTO BY SPECIAL TO THE GAMECOCK Waylon Jennings released 60 albums during his career. lou Harris, adding “He was also a class act as an artist and a man.” Jennings had been plagued with health problems in recent years that made it difficult for him to walk. In December, his left foot was amputated. He often refused to attend mu sic awards shows on the grounds that performers shouldn’t compete against each other. He didn’t show up at his induction into the Country Mu sic Hall of Fame last year. “Whenever country music got a little too impressed with itself, Waylon was there to let them know what the music’s roots were. He was very uncompromis ing about that,” said Lenny Kaye, a guitarist with the Patti Smith Group who helped Jennings write his 1996 autobiography. Bom in Littlefield, Texas, Jen nings became a radio disc jockey at 14 and formed his own band 0 ♦ WAYLON, SEE PAGE 7 MOVIE REVIEW Warfilm doesn’t compare to greats “HART’S WAR” Starring Bruce Willis out of ☆☆☆☆☆ BY ADAM MCALLISTER THE GAMECOCK War movies are a dime a dozen, particularly this season, when theatergoers get the chance to choose between different wars with different stars and different agendas. During the next few weeks, viewers will be able to decide between Ridley Scott’s Battle of Mogadishu epic “Black Hawk Down,” Mel Gibson’s Vietnam epic “We Were Soldiers” or “Hart’s War,” the Bruce Willis World War II prisoner-of-war film. However, “Hart’s War” unfortunately falls into the trap of the wannabe epic, a type of movie that is only a derivative of far superior features. POW films are not a new thing - previous examples include 1937’s “Grand Illusions” or 1953’s “Stalag 17.” Regrettably, very little has been improved upon over four decades. Classics such as those will never be surpassed. Despite this, “Hart’s War” does well on its own as simple entertainment. The film follows Lt. Tommy Hart (Colin Farrell), a second-year law student ripped out of his surroundings and placed behind a desk during World War II. During a planned siege, he is captured and placed into a POW camp, where he finds himself swept away. He is enveloped in a whole new culture, finding people sustained by what they can barter for or scrounge. His every move is watched, not only by his Nazi captors, but by a new makeshift order of command within the camp led by Col. William McNamara (Willis), a seemingly by-the book career military man. Uprooting the camp after Hart arrives are two other soldiers, black Tuskegee Airmen forced to live with their racist peers. Tempers begin to flare as racial rivalries are drawn, leaving only Hart to intervene. After a framed escape and brutal murder, a white soldier is killed, leaving innocent Lt. Lincoln Scott, who is black, to face the consequences. This sets in motion events that ultimately "lead to the film’s cluttered downfall, including a court martial, attempted escapes and countless selfless sacrifices. Director Gregory Hoblit, last working behind the camera of “Frequency,” had good intentions for this feature, but they fall short in an attempt for something better. What starts off as a simplified plot mostly given away mostly in the previews ends Up burying itself under too many wartime devices. We have already seen the racial conflicts in war, we have already seen the daring escapes, and we have already seen the “do-what-it takes” attitude, all of which are displayed in this movie. What does provide a welcome relief is fresh-faced Farrell, who only recently has become a hit Hollywood name after critically acclaimed roles in “Tigerland” and the soon-to be released “Phone Booth.” Rarely do we get a chance to follow the progression from a young actor into bigger and better roles, such as Steven Spielberg’s upcoming “Minority Report.” Ultimately, Farrell’s acting prowess coupled with Willis’ veteran sensibility provides the saving grace for “Hart’s War.” What we are left with is a decent film, but one that could have been something much better. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecockmixeditor@hotmail.am