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The Vibrator Play: The Doctor Will Please You Now

But comedy about docs treating 'hysterical' women is 'very discreet'

By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff

Posted Nov 23, 2009 9:25 AM CST
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(Newser) – In the Next Room, or The Vibrator Play? Why, yes, it is about exactly that—but playwright Sarah Ruhl says that “a lot of it happens under a sheet,” making the comedy “very discreet.” The play, about a 19th-century doctor who treats female patients using a newfangled electrical device and the wife who wonders what all the noise in the next room is about, was inspired by Ruhl’s reading The Technology of Orgasm, NPR reports.

Doctors once treated female “hysteria”—“irritability, sleeplessness, anger,” says one of the actors—through orgasm. The Vibrator Play focuses on the doctor’s wife, who doesn’t understand what’s going on because “these are sounds that she’s never heard before—never from herself,” says another actor. “I loved the innocence of it, the not-knowingness of it,” says Ruhl. “Having women try to describe, in physical terms, what an orgasm was without having the terminology.”

A scene from In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play is shown.
A scene from "In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play" is shown.   (Lincoln Center Theater)
A scene from In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play is shown.
A scene from "In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play" is shown.   (Lincoln Center Theater)
A scene from In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play is shown.
A scene from "In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play" is shown.   (Lincoln Center Theater)
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COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 16 comments
DontLikeYou___
Nov 25, 2009 12:19 PM CST
{{{ Physician Assistant. "Nearly all the school, all of the work, and less of the pay and glory." }}} ---- And less than 1/2 half of a doctor's education. Go with the doctor, you'll be better off for it. Trust me.
DontLikeYou___
Nov 25, 2009 12:18 PM CST
{{{ Doctors once treated female “hysteria”—“irritability, sleeplessness, anger through orgasm. }}} ----- That 19th century doctor was a f**king genius!
ErinORiordan
Nov 25, 2009 12:13 PM CST
I want to see this play! I already knew vibrators were once considered a medical device...there was even a "One Handed Read" on the subject in BUST Magazine.

 
theater • sexuality • vibrator • female sexuality • orgasm

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