February 22, 2004

Vann to share all for hospital’s
Women’s Health Symposium

By Amanda Buck, Bulletin Accent Editor

Liza Vann has shared the details of her life with strangers for nearly a decade, and in that time, the reaction she has received most often is disbelief.

Surely, audiences say after seeing Vann's autobiographical show, "The Top of the Bottom Half," she must have made that stuff up.

Wrong, Vann replies.

"I am one of 12 children," the New York-based actress said recently in a telephone interview. "I have no need to make up anything. I got a full supply of crazy to deal with and deal from.

"Every word I say is true."

Vann, born in Durham, N.C., co-wrote the one-woman show, which she will bring to Martinsville on March 6, in 1995. A rollicking look at life and how to live it, the play covers everything from breast cancer to drug abuse and back again.

And not a word of it is false, Vann said.

"It's all in the show," she said. "Everything I've learned in my life is there."

The seventh of 12 children born over 20 years, Vann's birth order puts her at the top of the bottom half of her siblings — hence the play's title.

"We come in the top half and the bottom half, and I'm the top of the bottom half," she explained. With six sisters and five brothers, Vann has plenty of places to look for inspiration. The one-act show begins with Vann's family and chronicles many of her life's ups and downs, which include a brother's struggle with drug abuse and her own battle with breast cancer.

All those experiences are boiled down into 17 rules for living, Vann said.

"I get on stage, I give 17 rules, I start talking and I don't stop for 65 minutes," she explained with a laugh.

Nor should audiences expect Vann to tread lightly around sensitive subjects, be them health-related or otherwise.

"I'm a little controversial," she said. "...I'm very bossy. I'm just going to tell you how to live your life."

Audiences may take or leave Vann's advice, but all of it was learned by experience, she said. Her non-traditional approach to breast cancer yielded much of that wisdom.

Diagnosed in 1992, Vann took charge of her treatment from the beginning. She did it without realizing that her approach was unusual, she said.

"I didn't start out saying, 'Oh gosh, let me do this different from everybody else,' " she said. "I just did it the way I thought it should be done. I just kind of ran the show."

Vann's proactive approach to her cancer treatment included making critical decisions about surgery and treatment and exploring all the options available to her. Too many women do not do that, she said.

"Women go much too quickly, make decisions when they are not equipped to make them," she said. "...When you are diagnosed, you are not dying tomorrow, you are not even dying next week. You really do have time to explore the options, and to realize that there are a multitude of options, some that they aren't even telling you about."

The take-charge attitude Vann took with cancer is similar to the way she approaches life in general.

"My whole philosophy — I never thought of it as a philosophy — (is) you just take what you get. It comes right at you. Just one day at a time, one step after another," she said. "It's just amazing to me how so many people just can't find a way to do that."

Vann's attitude and humor made organizers of Memorial Hospital of Martinsville and Henry County's Women's Health Symposium 2004 want her for the event, said Delayne Draper, coordinator of business health services at the hospital.

"We wanted to do something very different, rather than just all strictly seminar, educational-type programming," she said. "She just seemed like the perfect fit for it. ... She tied in well with our health topic, being a breast cancer survivor and a very strong female personality."

The symposium's aim is to offer women a fun retreat while giving them the opportunity to learn more about women's health issues, Draper said.

"We have, over the last year, come up with a lot of questions and inquiries about different women's health issues," she said. "We wanted to let them know there is a niche for them at the hospital."

In addition to a panel presentation by local physicians on women's health needs and sessions on various health topics, the day will include breakfast, lunch, health screenings and demonstrations from salons and fitness centers in the area.

"(We want women) to learn some ways to pamper themselves as well," Draper said. "I think it's going to be a lot of fun."

Vann will perform "The Top of the Bottom Half," co-written by Katherine Griffith, at noon on Saturday, March 6.

It is a project dear to Vann's heart.

"It's a piece that I love," she said. "It's a piece about going on. How to go on, and how to get it right."

The day will begin at 8:30 a.m. Tickets are $30 with a full cardiac panel of lab work or $10 without.

Registration is due by Wednesday. For more information, call 666-7865.