How to Defend Yourself

How to Defend Yourself
Written by	Liliana Padilla
Date premiered	March 13, 2019 (2019-03-13)
Place premiered	Actors Theatre of Louisville
Original language	English
Subject	Self-defense Sexual assault Campus sexual assault

How to Defend Yourself is a 2019 play by Liliana Padilla. The play was produced by the Actors Theatre of Louisville in 2019 and Victory Gardens Theater in Chicago in 2020. It premiered Off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop in 2023. The play was the winner of the 2019 Yale Drama Series Prize.

The play takes place in a college gym, where sorority leader Brandi leads a self-defense workshop, organized in response to the recent sexual assault of sorority sister Susannah. As the students learn the tenets of fending off attackers and how not to "be a victim", they begin to channel their own rage, anxieties, trauma, confusion, and desires.

Plot summary

A self-defense workshop is organized by Brandi, the VP of the Zeta Chi sorority, and Kara, the sisterhood chair, in response to the violent sexual assault of sorority member Susannah at an Alpha Epsilon fraternity party. In attendance are Diana, an outgoing first-year who wishes to channel her fighting spirit, Mojdeh, Diana's childhood best friend who is hoping to eventually join Zeta Chi, and Nikki, a shy wallflower who wishes to build her inner strength. Also joining are two members of the Alpha Epsilon: Andy, who can be somewhat insensitive but is overall well-meaning in his fight agains rape culture, and Eggo, who is confused by consent culture after a complicated breakup. Brandi leads the class in exercises and various fighting techniques, but struggles to control the more discussion-based aspects of the workshop due to her own mixed feelings on sex.

Mojdeh, who is jealous of Diana's perceived sexual promiscuity, tries to come into her own at college by joining dating apps and hoping to improve her social standing through the class. Before one class, she tells an elaborate story of her date with another student, involving them showering together and him treating her well, only to find that “it didn’t fit” when they tried to have sex. After the others leave the room, however, Mojdeh admits to Diana that she mostly lied about the date, and that it was actually humiliating. As she goes on about how no one will desire her in college, Diana kisses her in an attempt to make her feel desired. Mojdeh rejects Diana, claiming she is not attracted to her, and later blows her off after class to go home with Andy.

Kara and Brandi come into conflict over her behavior in class, from derailing a discussion on consent by describing a desire to be "used" during sex, to showing up hungover and refusing to participate. After being forced to stay behind when Brandi goes to visit Susannah at the hospital, Kara goads Diana to hit her before breaking down and revealing she encouraged Susannah to sleep with Spencer after she herself had rough sex with him, questioning if she gave him a pass to rape Susannah. Diana tries to comfort her, telling her it is "not that hard to[...] not rape someone."

Nikki seems to grow the most from the class, using Brandi's techniques to try to unlock her inner strength. However, her progress comes to a halt when she is stalked and assaulted on the way to workshop, and none of the methods worked as he was still much larger and stronger than her. She storms out of the gym, claiming the class is futile. As the other classmates leave to check on her, Brandi tries to defend the class and what they are learning, but struggles to find the words to justify her reasoning as she begins to break down over her own repressed sexual trauma.

In a final, surreal sequence, flashbacks of the cast attending parties in college, high school, and middle school are shown, before a final flashback of an elementary school birthday party, where a six year-old Susannah, played by a young child, makes a wish.

Productions

How to Defend Yourself was first presented at the Wagner New Play Festival 2018 at University of California, San Diego while Padilla was pursuing their playwriting MFA, in a production directed by Kim Rubenstein running from May 11 to May 17. It premiered at the Humana Festival of New American Plays at the Actors Theatre of Louisville in 2019, directed by Marti Lyons and running from March 13 to April 7. It then played at Chicago's Victory Gardens Theater from January 24 to February 23, 2020, again directed by Lyons in a co-production with the Actors Theatre of Louisville.

The play will premiere Off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop in 2023, with previews beginning February 22 prior to a March 13 opening, with the production scheduled for a limited run to April 2. The production is co-directed by Padilla, Rachel Chavkin, and Steph Paul, who previously served as the movement director for the Actors Theatre and Victory Gardens productions.

Characters and original cast

Role	UC San Diego (2018)	Humana Festival (2019)	Victory Gardens (2020)	Off-Broadway (2023)
Diana	Fedra Ramirez	Gabriela Ortega	Isa Arciniegas	Gabriela Ortega
Mojdeh	Ariana Mahalatti
Nikki	Molly Adea		Andrea San Miguel	Amaya Braganza
Brandi	Andrea Van Den Boogaard	Anna Crivelli		Talia Ryder
Kara	Mary Rose Branick	Abby Leigh Hufstettler	Netta Walker	Sarah Marie Rodriguez
Andy	Garrett Schulte	David Ball	Ryan McBride	Sebastian Delascasas
Eggo	Trevor Rinzler	Jonathan Moises Olivaires	Jayson Lee
Susannah	Does not appear	Phoenix Gilmore	Unknown	Teagan Meredith

• Diana – 18, a Mexican-American student and the childhood best friend of Mojdeh. Obsessed with guns, and never afraid to go first. She loves confrontation except when she is the one who has made a mistake. She has a promiscuous sexual history, which puts her in conflict with the less-experienced Mojdeh.
• Mojdeh – 18, an Iranian-American student who is desperate to lose her virginity and get into a sorority. She desires being wanted, and looks to others to know what is cool.
• Nikki – 20, person of color, a wallflower with a vivid inner world. Over the course of the class, she begins to find her strength, but her boldness soon leads her to danger.
• Brandi – 21, white, the vice president of the sorority and a valedictorian, with a black belt in karate. She is obsessed with self-defense and never feeling vulnerable, heavily implied to be due to some past sexual trauma.
• Kara – 21, person of color, the sisterhood chair of the sorority and Susannah's best friend. She maintains an air of humor and wit, but hides her own guilt over events that may have led to Susannah's rape.
• Andy – 21, white, a varsity athlete and leader in the Alpha Epsilon fraternity. He can be insensitive, but he is earnest in his efforts to fight rape culture. He feels guilt as he may have witnessed Susannah's assault but did not intervene because he did not recognize it as non-consensual.
• Eggo – 20, person of color, a fraternity member who is confused by consent culture and terrified of rejection. Much of his confusion was caused by a previous partner breaking up with him due to his failure to "surprise" her in bed, questioning if there is a difference between sex that is a surprise and sex that is assault.
• Susannah – The largely unseen victim whose sexual assault sets off the events of the play. She only appears at the end, aged 6.

Reception

The Victory Gardens production was received warmly by Chicago theater critics. Chris Jones of the Chicago Tribune praised the play for dealing with a charged topic through complex characters, noting the show's ultimately optimistic tone despite its dark subject matter. Sheri Flanders writing for the Chicago Sun-Times described the play as "thoughtfully written", noting its focus on community reactions to sexual assault as opposed to the perpetrator and victim.