The women involved in The Vagina Monologues like to talk about how "important" the performance is.

That word came up a lot at Sunday night's rehearsal in Osmond Laboratory, in a classroom filled with red chairs and a blackboard sprawled with the cheerful mantra, "Pussies unite!"

The Vagina Monologues is direly important for women to see, these women say. They say it's important for men to see, too. They say it's important for men who think men don't rape, for women who don't talk about "down there," for girls who are looking for solidarity and ladies who are looking for themselves.

But it's just a show, isn't it? Drama. A piece of art. A stage. A curtain. Some actors. Some lines. An audience.

Rachel Kugelman, this year's Monologues director, said she believes there's more than that. She stressed that The Vagina Monologues is not merely theater; it's activism.

"We hope audiences feel a sense of urgency and severity about these issues," said Kugelman (senior-marketing and theatre). "A lot of the pieces are fun, but there's also a gravity to many of them."

Eve Ensler's Vagina Monologues makes its seventh Penn State appearance at 8 tonight, with performances continuing through Saturday evening. The event is part of a global movement called V-Day, which works to stop violence against women and girls, including rape, battery, incest, female genital mutilation and sexual slavery. Proceeds from this weekend's performance will be donated to the Centre County Women's Resource Center and a women's shelter in Iraq.

Though the Monologues have been produced at Penn State for several years, this year's presentation feels especially climactic to the 44-person cast and crew, said one of the show's two assistant directors, Lindsay Keiter (sophomore-history, women's studies and film).

Some of the bumps along the way included Schwab Auditorium being previously reserved for the show's typical Valentines Day slot and a lack of expected funding from the Undergraduate Student Government.

"It presents such a universal experience, but the Monologues was almost forgotten about this year," Keiter said.

Instead of accepting any of those as barriers, the cast saw them as obstacles, booking Schwab for the week before Valentine's Day and raising more than $2,000 in private donations.

"We couldn't fathom this not happening and didn't want to disappoint students who come back to see it every year and those people who have yet to see it. We all worked to solicit businesses and friends and family, and a lot of us donated our own money so the show could go on," said Jackie Baksa (senior-communication arts and sciences and women's studies), one of eight women performing in the menstruation-centric monologue "I Was 12. My Mother Slapped Me."

For Jamie Relis (senior-advertising), soliciting donations for the Monologues provided some moments even more shocking then chatting about vaginas in front of a crowd of thousands.

"When I went to ask for donations, some people were receptive, but it was unexpected to have some women look me in the eye and tell me they just weren't interested," Relis said. "I'd expect that from men a bit more, but this is about women and gender and something we can all relate to and learn from."

The show's text remains primarily the same from year to year, but Kugelman pointed out that fresh faces keep the show exciting.

She explained that actors are allowed to perform on stage for one year, and after that they must move on to a leadership position to give other women the opportunity to get on stage and do all that moaning, wailing and whimpering that's made the Monologues so universal yet so provocative.