Entertainment

<< Previous   of   Next >>   ADVERTISEMENT   "Birth" 7 p.m. Sunday, Everett Theatre, 2911 Colby Ave., Everett. $16, 425-258-6766, www.everetttheatre.org.   CONTACT THE HERALD Melanie Munk, Features Editor munk@heraldnet.com   Published: Friday, September 14, 2007 New Everett's 'Birth' looks at maternity issues By Theresa Goffredo, Herald writer Birth. What could be more natural for a woman? Or not? Playwright Karen Brody takes a look at maternity care, home birth vs. planned Caesarean section, the use of a midwife and other aspects of having a baby in her play "Birth." The production plays for one night, at 7 p.m. Sunday at Everett Theatre, 2911 Colby Ave. The show is being performed in cities around the world such as Amsterdam, Maui, Houston and Seattle. Proceeds from the show benefit local, national and international charities working to improve maternity care. The thoughtful and funny production has a happy ending and sends the audience away feeling good but asking questions. Because besides being entertaining, the play's purpose is to improve birthing options for mothers and increase awareness about making maternity care more mother-friendly. "That's one point of the show: to tell mothers the truth and educate them," said producer Lynn Hughes, who has been involved in the maternity care field for 20 years. "And then let's take this play and encourage women to ask for and demand those things, demand answers. Why do you want to do this test and procedure on me? Women need to know their options and be well-educated and demand to be told the truth." The play is drawn from interviews Brody conducted with 100 women in 2004 about their childbirth experiences. The audience hears the true stories of eight of these women who help the audience explore all the ways of giving birth in this country, Hughes said. "And we're not judging it," Hughes said. "There's one gal who scheduled her C-section and she was happy about that. And another who called her epidural 'empowering.'" The cast runs the spectrum of women from strong-willed Vanessa to career-driven Beth to violated Natalie to angry and somewhat deflated Lisa. The underlying theme of each story is personal choice. "This play is part of being mother-friendly," Hughes said. "Let's be careful of the technology we use. Let's do informed consent every time a woman is tested or technology is used on her and have her fully informed on the why and wherefores of it." In addition to being a playwright, Brody is a mother and founder of BOLD, Birth on Labor Day, a global movement to make maternity care mother-friendly. "Maternity care today simply isn't mother-friendly," Brody said in press materials. "In many communities, pregnant mothers are faced with few options that support low or no-intervention birth choices; in other communities, women feel they went with the standard medical care and were treated poorly." In summing up the play, Hughes said there are some hysterical parts and some sad stories too, but the audience does leave uplifted, adding, "There's a lot of emotion in it all." Reporter Theresa Goffredo: 425-339-3424 or goffredo@heraldnet.com

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