Pace Women’s Justice Center to honor Glenn Close

-- Documentary Makes Its World Premiere at 2004 Sundance Film Festival, Selected As A Special Screening --

VDAY WHITE PLAINS, NEW YORK 2004 will host a private benefit screening of "Until the Violence Stops," a documentary on V-Day, the global movement to end violence against women and girls, on February 6 at 7:30 p.m. at the White Plains Performing Arts Center. "Until The Violence Stops" will world premiere as a special screening at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival on January 17 and on Lifetime Television on February 17 at 10PM ET/PT. A pre-dinner benefit with Eve and Friends will begin at 6:00 p.m. at the Vintage Restaurant. Proceeds from this V-Day White Plains 2004 private benefit screening and dinner will go to Pace Women’s Justice Center. The Center will honor Glenn Close with a special award.

In 2002, eight hundred cities participated in a movement to end violence against women and girls called V-Day, which grew out of Eve Ensler's award-winning play, "The Vagina Monologues." "Until the Violence Stops" is a one-hour documentary that follows the uplifting/empowering impact of V-Day in five international communities, while exposing the pervasive and cultural forms of violence that women experience all over the world.

Directed by first-time director Abby Epstein, the story begins at a star-studded V-Day benefit at Harlem's Apollo Theater, travels to regional events in Ukiah, California, the Philippines and Pine Ridge Indian Reservation near Rapid City, South Dakota, and culminates in the opening of the first V-Day Safe House for girls in Kenya. What emerges is an alternately devastating and hopeful look at the global and grassroots efforts in motion to stop violence against women and girls.

Local sponsors for this V-Day White Plains, NY 2004 include: State Farm Insurance Companies. V-Day White Plains, NY 2004 thanks this sponsor for their generous contributions and their work to end violence against women and girls.

V-Day is proud to announce its 2004 Sponsors: BARNEYS NEW YORK, Bobbie Brown, Dramatist Play Service, Eileen Fisher, Fairmont Hotels And Resorts, Hearst, Lifetime Television, Luna, Marie Claire, Tampax, Time Inc. and Vosges Haut Chocolate.

Pace University will host two benefit performances of the Vagina Monologues on Monday, February 9 at 6 p.m. in the Schimmel Center for the Arts, Pace downtown campus and on Tuesday, February 10 at 7:30 p.m. at the Kessel Campus Center on the Pleasantville Campus. Tickets are $7/$5 with student ID. For more information call 212-346-1723 in New York City or 914-923-2798 in Westchester. Directions to the campuses can be found at www.pace.edu.

The Pace Women’s Justice Center is the first responder for victims of domestic violence in Westchester. The Center provides 24/7 legal services to victims of domestic violence who call 911 or access hospital emergency rooms. Founded in 1991, the Center is the oldest university-based non-profit domestic violence center in the United States. In addition to providing direct, free of charge, individual client counsel, the Center serves as a national resource for lawyers and judges, offers training and public education programs, and promotes research and scholarship on domestic violence, sexual assault, and legal issues faced by older individuals. Under the supervision of staff attorneys, Pace law students represent over 1000 domestic violence victims and their children in Family Court each year.

V-Day is a global movement to stop violence against women and girls initiated by Eve Ensler’s play "The Vagina Monologues." V-Day is a catalyst that promotes creative events to increase awareness, raise money and revitalize the spirit of existing anti-violence organizations. V-Day generates broader attention for the fight to stop worldwide violence against women and girls, including rape, battery, incest, female genital mutilation (FGM) and sexual slavery.

V-Day stages large-scale benefits and produces innovative gatherings, films and programs to educate and change social attitudes towards violence against women. In addition to the documentary "Until the Violence Stops," examples include: community briefings with Amnesty International on the missing and murdered women of Juarez, Mexico; the December 2003 V-Day delegation trip to Israel, Palestine, Egypt and Jordan; the Afghan Women's Summit; the Stop Rape Contest and the Indian Country Project.

Through V-Day campaigns, local volunteers and college students produce annual benefit performances of "The Vagina Monologues" to raise awareness and funds for anti-violence groups within their own communities. In 2003, over 1,000 V-Day benefit events were presented by volunteer activists around the world, educating millions of people about the reality of violence against women and girls and raising $4 million.

The V-Day movement is growing at a rapid pace throughout the world. V-Day, a non-profit corporation, distributes funds to grassroots, national and international organizations and programs that work to stop violence against women and girls. In its first year of incorporation (2001), V-Day was named one of Worth Magazine's "100 Best Charities." In its first six years, the V-Day movement has raised over $20 million. The 'V' in V-Day stands for Victory, Valentine and Vagina.

‘UNTIL THE VIOLENCE STOPS" PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS:

"Until the Violence Stops" features appearances by V-Day Founder/Playwright Eve Ensler and actor/activist Jane Fonda speaking to the local media in Rome and Rapid City about the rampant violence women and girls experience all over the world. The documentary features appearances and performances by a wide range of actors who support the V-Day effort to end violence against women including Fonda, Glenn Close, Isabella Rossellini, Mary Alice, Queen Latifah, Rosie Perez, LisaGay Hamilton, Salma Hayek, Rosario Dawson, Hazelle Goodman, and Tantoo Cardinal.

The film opens in Harlem, New York City, where a group of celebrity performers (including Rosie Perez, LisaGay Hamilton, Salma Hayek and Essence magazine’s Susan L. Taylor) are presenting "V-Day Harlem," a benefit production of "The Vagina Monologues" to raise funds for local organizations. On stage as well as off, the women involved in the production reveal that their lives have been shaped by early experiences with violence and they are eager to share the healing and empowering message of Ensler's play with their community.

In this idyllic Northern California town of Ukiah, the entire community prepares for a V-Day benefit of "The Vagina Monologues" that features 39 women ages 8 to 93. Ukiah city Sheriff Anthony Craver and Under-sheriff Gary Hudson embrace the production as an extension of their daily work as peace officers. Also showcased are the members of the Mendocino quilting group who address the issue through their craft, creating vagina quilts as a way to express their personal experiences with abuse. Displayed in storefronts throughout the town, the handmade quilts tell a story. They are in your face – where you live, where you work – an expression of hurt or pain but also of release and freedom.

Organizer/producer/actress Monique Wilson creates a 5000 seat V-Day event at the Folk Arts Theater in Manila, highlighting the experience of WWII "comfort women."  In the film, these "70-something" grandmothers speak openly about their long untold service as sex slaves to Japanese soldiers during the war. These elders in the community share candid details about the horrors they endured, some when they were just teenagers.

At the Pine Ridge Reservation near Rapid City, South Dakota, the male directors of the Cangleska Women’s Shelter, Marlin Mousseau and Wayne Weston discuss their various experiences with violence. First victims and then perpetrators, these men are now reformed activists, helping and guiding other men of the Lakota tribe. Dramatically conveying the cycle of violence, Mousseau discusses his painful childhood in an abusive home, and how, as an adult, he found himself repeating his father’s behavior. Cosseau shares his own tearful accounts of abuse he inflicted on the women in his life and his struggle to change attitudes of other men in the community. The film highlights the emotionally gripping conversations of two support groups, one for women, and another for men. This deeply personal segment is underlined by a powerful performance from a theater in Rapid City, where Native American actress Tantoo Cardinal performs a special rendition of "Crooked Braid," a monologue by Eve Ensler about a wife braiding the hair of her husband who beats her.

In the Rift Valley of Narok, Kenya, the activist Agnes Pareyio, founder of the V-Day Safe House and creator of an alternative ritual to FGM (Female Genital Mutilation), is a model of creativity, strength, and unique selflessness. For years, Agnes performed her daily mission by foot, walking through fields to schools with her demonstration "box," containing an anatomical model of a woman’s genitalia. In the film and in her daily work, Agnes educates with these before and after models of FGM and teaches about the devastating impact that this practice inflicts on women. Three years ago, V-Day bought Agnes a Jeep, so that she could expand her journeys. Then in 2002,V-Day provided Agnes with the funds to build a permanent school and safe house in Narok, Kenya, for the girls she has found and have found her --girls forced to flee their homes to avoid early marriage and FGM. Many of these young girls are featured in the film, sharing their disturbing stories of how, in saying no to "the cut," they were shunned and banished by their families. These accounts are narrated from the V-Day Safe House, a place that has become a new healthy environment, welcoming these girls and protecting them from mutilation.

"Until the Violence Stops" is director Abby Epstein's first film.  She has directed theatrical productions of "The Vagina Monologues" as well as V-Day's worldwide campaign.

Additional information, including images and the V-Day logo, are available online: http://www.vday.org/docpresskit

Founded in 1976, Pace Law School is a New York Law School with a suburban campus in White Plains, N.Y., 20 miles north of New York City. Part of Pace University, the school offers the J.D. program for full-time and part-time day and evening students. Its postgraduate program includes the LL.M. and S.J.D. degrees in Environmental Law and an LL.M. in Comparative Legal Studies. Pace has one of the nation's top-rated Environmental Law programs and its Clinical Education program also is nationally ranked, offering clinics in domestic violence prosecution, environmental law, securities arbitration, criminal justice and disability rights. www.law.pace.edu 

Pace is a comprehensive, independent university with campuses in New York City, Pleasantville and White Plains, NY and a Hudson Valley Center at Stewart International Airport in New Windsor, NY. More than 14,000 students are enrolled in undergraduate, graduate, and professional degree programs in the Dyson College of Arts and Sciences, Lubin School of Business, School of Computer Science and Information Systems, School of Education, Lienhard School of Nursing and Pace Law School. www.pace.edu