V20: Rise, Resist, Unite! Stage a V-Day Benefit, Plan a Rising - V-Season 2018 is Now OPEN!

Dear Activists & Organizers,

It's been almost 20 years since V-Day was founded, since Eve Ensler’s play The Vagina Monologues shattered taboos, sharing the stories of women as they had never been told before. 2018 will be our 20th year.

Welcome to V-Season 2018. It's hard to believe we are here at this moment in our movement's history. While the stakes could not be higher, we feel the energy of rising up, of resistance, of bold artistic energy and creativity coming forward from V-Day and One Billion Rising activists across the globe. We witness it in your performances and your risings. At the City of Joy in Congo, over one thousand women survivors will have graduated by the end of 2017, and the documentary film also entitled CITY OF JOY is enjoying a successful run at film festivals across the world, exposing audiences to the message of Turning Pain to Power. We could not feel more committed to the work at hand and the movement with V-Day and OBR activists worldwide at its core - is more active than ever, producing art for social change, activating communities and colleges, raising crucial funds for rape crisis shelters, domestic violence shelters, local programs for transgender youth at risk of sexual violence, for immigrant women and girls, and many more groups reflecting the needs of their communities.

Together we have witnessed the power of art and activism to catalyze change on a scale never seen before.

In 2018, staging a production of The Vagina Monologues or A Memory, A Monologue, A Rant and A Prayer is more than just a theatrical experience; it is an ARTISTIC UPRISING, a RADICAL act, an ACT OF RESISTANCE.

2018 Spotlight: The Resistance: Infuse key aspects of your production with the spirit of V20: Rise, Resist & Unite. Consider producing the play in radical spaces. Explore where that might be in your community - ideas include fracking sites, Legislatures, Governor's offices & City Halls, historical bookstores, museums that typically background women artists, churches, mosques, Planned Parenthood Clinics (work with the clinic on how this can uplift the work they do), refugee and immigration offices, prisons (opportunity to highlight the experience of women in prison/make a statement against the prison industrial complex, and for a restorative justice frame), places that typically exclude women, Trump Tower, etc... (Note: always reach out to discuss the idea of the play as a tool for resistance with the frontline groups working on the issues and how it might work or not within their current actions/campaigns/priorities).

Platform Resistance within your production: Collaborate with a range of local anti-violence groups from groups working to end campus sexual assault (in the US many groups are working to counter the upcoming policy changes expected under Betsy DeVos); Say Her Name and Black Lives Matter; groups working to support refugees and immigrant rights, end mass incarceration, promote fair pay and economic justice issues for women workers and more.

Amplify and lift up the most marginalized groups and activists in your communities with your productions: Center the voices of the most marginalized women on your stage, harnessing the power of The Vagina Monologues to create a space for critical conversations and voices. For example, this might include cast members who are undocumented women (who have made the decision to be public about their status), formerly incarcerated women, women workers, Indigenous women, immigrant women, transgender women and gender non-conforming folks.

Testimonies of Resistance, Amplifying New Voices: When women take the stage, incredible things happen, as their issues are voiced and confronted for all to see and hear. In place of a traditional Spotlight monologue, we invite you to select up to three local leaders or activists to showcase after the play, inviting them to speak to the audience about “What and Why my Vagina is Resisting”. Create a platform for those who are doing the crucial, daily work of resistance. Invite them to share with the audience what they are working to change and how the local community can support them. We suggest each speaker is given 2 minutes each to speak and that you work out staging and lighting for this aspect, so that it is an integrated part of the experience for the audience.

DONATION: Donate 90% of your proceeds to a group or groups in your community who are doing anti-violence work. For example, a local rape crisis center or domestic violence shelter.

SPOTLIGHT DONATION: Send 10% of your proceeds to our newly created Spotlight Fund: Frontline Resistors Fund.

Beginning today, activists can register to produce a 2018 V-Day benefit production of The Vagina Monologues and/or A Memory a Monologue, A Rant and a Prayer.

The two artistic works will be available free of charge to registered activists hosting benefit productions solely during the month of February. By focusing the benefit performances during one month - February - we maximize the impact.*

In the face of resistance and at the intersection of art and activism, local volunteer activists and college students produce annual V-Day benefit performances of The Vagina Monologues, and A Memory, A Monologue, A Rant and A Prayer to raise awareness and funds for anti-violence groups in their communities - as well as Risings, documentary film screenings and teach-ins. Through ten of thousands of communities and on college campuses, performances in over 140 countries, V-Day organizers have raised consciousness, changed laws to protect women and girls, funded rape crisis centers and domestic violence shelters (often times these much needed funds kept them from closing), educated their communities, and raised over $100 million in urgently needed funds for groups doing the essential work of ending violence and serving survivors and their families.

RISE 2018, One Billion Rising SOLIDARITY

Through One Billion Rising, activists worldwide have mobilized, engaged, awakened and joined people across the planet to end violence against women and girls. We have made violence against women a global issue, not relegated to country or tribe or class or religion.

ONE BILLION RISING will expand with its theme of REVOLUTION and SOLIDARITY this year. OBR has become a movement unto itself, taking activism out of the theater and into the streets, front and center. As neo-liberal policies and rapacious capitalism have become the engine of most governments, bringing profound consequences for the long suffering working class and marginalized sectors, it is more important than ever to be in solidarity with women on the frontlines. Suffering has reached new heights and this year OBR is seeing a new, dynamic and radical militancy and vibrancy that is opposing and rising against such repression and oppression. Activists across sectors are invited to stage Artistic Uprisings in their communities, create and learn new music and choreography from around the world. Also, stay tuned as new voices and new music are coming to infuse the movement with renewed energy and voice.

Ready to RISE in your community, stage a RISING event >

Sign Up TODAY! V-season is now open!

ABOUT V-DAY:
Our work is grounded in 4 core beliefs:

• Art has the power to transform consciousness and inspire people to act
• Lasting social and cultural change is spread by ordinary people doing extraordinary things
• Local women best know what their communities need and can become unstoppable leaders
• One must look at the intersection of race, class, and gender to understand violence against women

Sign up for a V-Day Event >

Learn more about One Billion Rising and stage a Rising event >

Learn more about the City of Joy >