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ReviewsFinally, women of color are telling their own stories about sexuality.
The PocketBook Monologues opens to critical acclaim during their sold out performance at Steppenwolf Theater in Chicago.
A fun, provocative stage production with entertaining dialogue and a message to women of color to protect their pocketbooks.
The Pocketbook Monologues is raising the curtain to talk about the "POCKETBOOK", the term black women affectionately describe as the triangle between their thighs, is playing to sold-out houses in New York , Chicago , St. Louis and Milwaukee.
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Chicago Defender
March 11, 2009
Teesee's Town: Sharon McGhee's Pocketbook Monologues at DuSable Museum
by Theresa Fambro Hooks
Five media sistahs join Sharon McGhee March 22 at DuSable Museum for a special Women’s History Month performance of McGhee’s critically acclaimed stage production, "The Pocketbook Monologues," taken from her book of the same name. Dorothy Tucker (CBS- 2), Marion Brooks (NBC-5), Cheryl Burton (ABC-7), Micah Materre (WGN-TV) and Robin Robinson (FOX News) co-star in the brutally honest, funny and poignant recollections about "pocketbooks," a term used by many older African-American women to describe their "intimate selves." It’s the Black woman’s answer to "The Vagina Monologues."
"Hilarious, funny, heart-warming, educational, unique, emotional, intimate and absolutely entertaining" is how I described TPM after seeing it in January ’08 at Steppenwolf Theatre with a mostly female audience. And I strongly urge you to join me as the curtain rises at 4 p.m. in the museum’s auditorium. Host: WVON Radio where McGhee is news director.
"I agree with Dr. Joycelyn Elders, former U.S. Surgeon General, when she says, ‘It is time for women and girls of color to have an honest discussion about the personal responsibilities that accompany intimacy in 2009 and beyond’," McGhee says. "Consider 'The Pocketbook Monologues' the conversation starter. We talk about everything and have a lot of fun, but the underlying message is the health of women and girls with an emphasis on HIV/AIDS awareness."
Examiner.com
April 25 , 2009
"The Pocketbook Monologues," black women and sex is a deep conversation
by Adrianne Murchison, Faith & Media Examiner
Some folks remember when Mama used to say, “Watch your pocketbook.” She wasn’t always talking about the purse hanging from ladies’ shoulders. She was talking about something a little more personal, says Sharon McGhee, creator of the play, “The Pocketbook Monolgues.”
After seeing the acclaimed production of ‘The Vagina Monologues,” McGhee, news director for WVON radio in Chicago, was inspired to bring stories from African American women to the stage.“ The Pocketbook Monologues” tour comes to the Ferst Center for the Arts tonight. The monologues are presented as reading theater, in which the actors read and perform stories that relate to womanhood and sexuality.
“Pocketbook,”McGhee says, is homage to elder African American women, who created the more polite term long ago. “You knew this conversation was taking place below the naval and above the knees, but it wasn’t vulgar,” She says, referring to the play. Still, after seeing disturbing numbers in HIV and AIDs cases in the black community, McGhee was driven to find a platform to address the problem.
“We need the freedom to do discuss sexuality and intimacy so we can get a handle on what is happening with us,” she says. “First of all you need to keep your pocketbook closed. But you know at some point the pocketbook is gonna be opened, and you want to protect it when you do. Big Mama or an auntie will say, ‘Child don’t let someone ramble all in your pocketbook, show some discretion about the choices you make.”
McGhee calls on local talent in each city. The Atlanta show includes Lisa Wu Hartwell and Kandi Burruss, from Bravo TV’s “Real Housewives of Atlanta;” and radio personalities Myra J and Shirley Strawberry.
“I’ll be a 'closed pocketbook,' ” says Wu Hartwell during a break from her reality show. “She is a woman who falls in love with a guy that’s in jail."
“Sometimes we have in our mind what we want our men to be," she adds. "We think that we are going to fall in love with a certain type, but you never know when it happens, and you can’ t really control your feelings.”
Veteran actress Ella Joyce performs two characters as women of wisdom in the show, and appeared in “The Vagina Monologues.” She says that she understands the need for a production that focuses on women of color..
We all [women of different races] deal with the same sexist issues,” Joyce says. “But [African American women's] self-esteem is much different, because of how we grow up as Americans. Being females of color vs. a white female, you are treated differently in this country whether people admit it or not.”
McGhee also performs and says that she ultimately wants young women to recognize their own self-worth.
"I do find that when you delve into women…if they’re not using protection to have sex, they’ re not protecting themselves in other situations either,” she says.