Looking for free dramatic monologues to captivate your audience? Whether you’re an actor preparing for an audition or a drama enthusiast exploring the depths of theatrical expression, our curated list of “22 Dramatic Monologues from Theater and Film” offers a diverse collection of performances that highlight the complexity of human emotions. From classic plays to contemporary films, these free monologues provide a rich tapestry of characters and narratives that will inspire, challenge, and move you.

Dramatic Monologues for Women

1. “Steel Magnolias” by Robert Harling

Character: M’Lynn
Summary: M’Lynn talks about the last moments with her daughter Shelby, expressing her deep sorrow and the strength she found in that painful experience.
Monologue: “No. I couldn’t leave my Shelby. I just sat there and kept pushin’ the way I always have where Shelby was concerned…hoping she’d sit up and argue with me. Finally, we all realized there was no hope. At that point, I panicked. I was afraid that I wouldn’t survive the next few minutes while they turned off the machines. Drum couldn’t take it. He left. Jackson couldn’t take it. He left. But I couldn’t leave. I just sat there, holding Shelby’s hand while the sounds got softer and the beeps got farther apart until all was quiet. There was no noise, no tremble, just peace. I realized as a woman how lucky I was. I was there when this wonderful person drifted into my life and I was there when she drifted out.”
For the full monologue, visit Scribd and WhySanity.

2. “V for Vendetta” by the Wachowskis

Character: Valerie
Summary: Valerie’s monologue is a poignant recount of her life and love before and during the oppressive regime, emphasizing the importance of preserving one’s integrity.
Monologue: “I know there’s no way I can convince you this is not one of their tricks. But I don’t care. I am me. My name is Valerie. I don’t think I’ll live much longer, and I wanted to tell someone about my life. This is the only autobiography that I will ever write, and God, I’m writing it on toilet paper. I was born in Nottingham in 1985. I don’t remember much of those early years, but I do remember the rain. My grandmother owned a farm in Tottlebrook, and she used to tell me that God was in the rain. I passed my eleven-plus and went to girl’s grammar. It was at school that I met my first girlfriend. Her name was Sarah. It was her wrists; they were beautiful. I thought we would love each other forever. I remember our teacher telling us that it was an adolescent phase that people outgrew. Sarah did. I didn’t. In 2002, I fell in love with a girl named Christina. That year I came out to my parents. I couldn’t have done it without Chris holding my hand. My father wouldn’t look at me; he told me to go and never come back. My mother said nothing. I’d only told them the truth. Was that so selfish? Our integrity sells for so little, but it is all we really have. It is the very last inch of us, but within that inch we are free. An inch, it is small and it is fragile, and it is the only thing in the world worth having. We must never lose it or give it away. We must never let them take it from us. I hope that, whoever you are, you escape this place. I hope that the world turns and that things get better. But what I hope most of all is that you understand what I mean when I tell you that even though I do not know you, and even though I may never meet you, laugh with you, cry with you, or kiss you, I love you. With all my heart, I love you.”
For the full monologue, visit WhySanity and HubPages.

3. “Danny and the Deep Blue Sea” by John Patrick Shanley

Character: Roberta
Summary: Roberta reveals her traumatic past and emotional struggles, making it a powerful exploration of a deeply troubled character.
Monologue: “And I dreamed about the ocean. It was real blue. And there was the sun, and it was real yellow. And I was out there, right in the middle of the ocean, all by myself, and I could hear the water, just the way it sounds in a conch shell. And I thought, maybe this is what it’s like to be dead. But I was still myself, you know? And then I looked down, and I couldn’t see the bottom of the ocean. It was like a mile down. And I got really scared because I knew I couldn’t swim a mile. So I tried to get back to shore. But it was so far away. And the water got into my nose and my mouth, and it was so cold. And I thought, this is it. This is the end of everything. And then, suddenly, I felt this hand on my back. And I turned around, and there was this man standing on the water, smiling at me. And I knew he was gonna save me.”
For the full monologue, visit WeAreActors.

4. “ONE” by Terrence Mosley

Character: Mother
Summary: A single mother tells her adult son about his absent father and their heritage.
Monologue Snippet: “Your father was a complicated man, but he loved you in his own way. He left us, yes, but not because he didn’t care. He was running from his own demons, ones that were too strong for him to fight. I see so much of him in you. The good parts. The strength, the passion. But you need to know where you come from, our heritage, our struggles. It’s what makes us who we are. It’s what makes you who you are.”

For the full monologue, you can check out Backstage.

5. “And Turning, Stay” by Kellie Powell

Character: Amy
Summary: Amy, a high schooler, talks about being led on by boys and her broken heart.
Monologue Snippet: “I thought he loved me. I really did. But it was all a game to him, a cruel joke. I let myself believe in his words, his promises. And now here I am, broken, with nothing but memories of his lies. It hurts so much, more than I thought possible. How could someone be so heartless? How could I be so naive? I don’t know if I’ll ever trust again.”

For the full monologue, refer to dramatic literature anthologies or online script libraries.

6. “Bargaining” by Kellie Powell

Character: Hannah
Summary: Hannah tells her boyfriend that she is immortal, revealing a deep personal secret.
Monologue Snippet: “There’s something I need to tell you. Something I’ve never told anyone. I’m immortal. I’ve lived for centuries, seen the rise and fall of empires, watched loved ones come and go. It’s a lonely existence, one that’s hard to explain. I thought I could be normal with you, but I can’t hide it anymore. You deserve to know the truth about who I am, about what I am. I love you, but this is my burden to bear, not yours.”

For the full monologue, refer to dramatic literature anthologies or online script libraries.

7. “The Promise of You” by Daniel Martine

Character: Carolyn
Summary: Carolyn reflects on her life when Bobby returns.
Monologue Snippet:
“Bobby, you know, when you left, I thought it was the end for me. I couldn’t see beyond the heartbreak. But then I found strength in places I never knew existed. I built a life, a home, something stable. And now you’re back, stirring all these old feelings, making me question everything again. But I’m not that same girl you left behind. I’ve grown, I’ve changed. I promised myself I’d never go back to that place of dependency and fear. You have to understand that the woman standing before you now is not the same one you walked away from.”

For the full monologue, please refer to online libraries

8. “Richard Fisher’s Funeral” by Kellie Powell

Character: Drew
Summary: Drew explains why she won’t forgive her father at his funeral.
Monologue Snippet:
“Why should I forgive him? He was never there. Not when I needed him. Not when Mom needed him. His promises were as empty as his seat at my graduation, as hollow as his words when he said he loved us. And now, you want me to stand here and pretend that he was some kind of hero? No, I won’t do it. He doesn’t deserve it. He doesn’t deserve my forgiveness, and he doesn’t deserve my tears. He was nothing but a stranger to me, a ghost haunting the corners of my life.”

For the full monologue, visit Not My Shoes and Stage Plays.

9. “Snow White Gets Her Say” by Chris Wind

Character: Catherine
Summary: Catherine plots her revenge on all the men who have wronged her.
Monologue Snippet:
“You think you know my story, don’t you? The pretty little princess waiting to be saved. But let me tell you something, that tale is a lie. They twisted my life into some kind of fairy tale, but there was nothing magical about it. I was used, betrayed, and left to fend for myself. But I’m not the naive girl they thought I was. I’ve learned, I’ve grown stronger. And now, it’s my turn to rewrite the story. To take control. To make them pay for every lie, every deceit. They won’t see me coming, but they’ll remember my name. Catherine, the one who took her revenge.”

For the full monologue, visit Stage Plays and Scribd.

10. “The Seagull” By Anton Chekov

Character: Nina
Summary: Nina returns to Sorin’s estate, having been abandoned by Trigorin once her allure and innocence faded. Upon encountering her former lover, Treplev, she succumbs to emotional breakdown.

Monologue: Why do you say that you have kissed the ground I walked on? You should kill me rather. I am so tired. If I could only rest—rest. I am a sea-gull—no—no, I am an actress. He is there too. Ah, well—no matter. He does not believe in the theatre; he used to laugh at my dreams, so that little by little I became down-hearted and ceased to believe in it too. Then came all the cares of love, the continual anxiety about my little one, so that I soon grew trivial and spiritless, and played my parts without meaning. I never knew what to do with my hands, and I could not walk properly or control my voice. You cannot imagine the state of mind of one who knows as he goes through a play how terribly badly he is acting. I am a sea-gull—no—no, that is not what I meant to say. Do you remember how you shot a seagull once? A man chanced to pass that way and destroyed it out of idleness. That is an idea for a short story, but it is not what I meant to say.

(She passes her hand across her forehead)

What was I saying? Oh, yes, the stage. I have changed now. Now I am a real actress. I act with joy, with exaltation, I am intoxicated by it, and feel that I am superb. I have been walking and walking, and thinking and thinking, ever since I have been here, and I feel the strength of my spirit growing in me every day. I know now, I understand at last, Constantine, that for us, whether we write or act, it is not the honour and glory of which I have dreamt that is important, it is the strength to endure. One must know how to bear one’s cross, and one must have faith. I believe, and so do not suffer so much, and when I think of my calling I do not fear life.

Download This Monologue Here

Dramatic Monologues for men

11. Biff Monologue from “Death of a Salesman” by Arthur Miller

Monologue: “Pop! I’m a dime a dozen, and so are you! … I am not a leader of men, Willy, and neither are you. You were never anything but a hard-working drummer who landed in the ash can like all the rest of them! I’m one dollar an hour, Willy! I tried seven states and couldn’t raise it. A buck an hour! Do you gather my meaning? I’m not bringing home any prizes anymore, and you’re going to stop waiting for me to bring them home! … I’m nothing! I’m nothing, Pop. Can’t you understand that? There’s no spite in it anymore. I’m just what I am, that’s all.”

For the full monologue, you can refer to the following page:

• We Are Actors – Biff Monologue Death of a Salesman

12. “Ben Is Back” by Peter Hedges

Character: Ben
Summary: Ben admits his role in a friend’s death due to an overdose, showcasing his guilt and the strain in his relationship with his mother.
Monologue Snippet: “Mom, I can’t live with this guilt anymore. Every time I close my eyes, I see his face. I was the one who gave him the drugs. I thought it was just for fun, but it turned out to be lethal. I’m so sorry, Mom. I need you to understand that I’m not the same person anymore. I can’t keep pretending that everything is okay when it’s not. Please, forgive me.”

For the full monologue, refer to Peter Hedges Delivers Ben is Back .

13. “Lobby Hero” by Kenneth Lonergan

Character: William
Summary: William’s monologue explores his moral dilemma of protecting his brother versus telling the truth to the police.
Monologue Snippet: “Jeff, you don’t understand. If I tell the truth, my brother goes to jail. But if I lie, I become a part of this corrupt system. How do I choose between my family and my integrity? It’s tearing me apart inside. Every night I lie awake, wondering if I’m doing the right thing. How can you protect someone you love without losing yourself in the process?”

For the full monologue, refer to Lobby Hero by Kenneth Lonergan .

14. “Brooklyn Boy” by Donald Margulies

Character: Eric
Summary: Eric reflects on his father’s dedication to his work, which he never understood, revealing a complicated father-son relationship.
Monologue Snippet: “My father sold shoes. In a Buster Brown store on Sheepshead Bay Road. He wasn’t a partner, he was an employee. For thirty-nine years. He gave his life to that store. It wasn’t even his to profit from, yet he still gave everything to that goddamn store. I could never understand what was so attractive about that place, why he chose to spend so much of his days there and not at home. I remember watching him closely in the morning, trying to uncover the mystery of manhood, the rituals of work.”

For the full monologue, refer to Brooklyn Boy by Donald Margulies .

15. “Of The Fields, Lately” by David French

Character: Ben
Summary: Ben recalls the shame and embarrassment he felt towards his father during a baseball game in his youth.
Monologue Snippet: “He rushed out the door and down to the school-yard, the first game he had ever come to, and my mother put his supper in the oven, for later … I hadn’t reminded my father of the game. I was afraid he’d show up and embarrass me. Twelve years old and ashamed of my old man. Ashamed of his dialect, his dirty overalls, his bruised fingers with the fingernails lined with dirt, his teeth yellow as old ivory. Most of all, his lunch pail, that symbol of the working man.”

For the full monologue, additional context can be found in dramatic literature anthologies or libraries.

16. “Basilica” by Mando Alvarado

Character: Joe
Summary: Joe expresses his deep sense of failure and seeks understanding from his loved one.
Monologue Snippet: “Ah babe, I’m not doing so good. I just feel so … I wish I could tell you that I got the strength. But, you know I would be bullshitting. You always had a way of seeing through me. I know. Like that time, I came home. You put me on that stupid Weight Watcher’s Diet. Small portions, no fast food. I was still the same waist size since high school. So I came home. You knew I had a Whataburger. But I said, ‘No babe, I had a salad and one of those meals.’”

For the full monologue, refer to dramatic literature anthologies or online script libraries.

17. “The Rookie Cop” by Adam J. Wahlberg

Character: Veteran Cop
Summary: A seasoned cop educates his rookie partner, leading to a significant revelation.
Monologue Snippet: “I’m John. A veteran cop who doesn’t believe in being soft on rookies. I’ve seen it all. The crimes, the victims, the broken system. You, kid, you think you know what you’re getting into, but you don’t. There’s a darkness in this job that you won’t find in the academy textbooks. Every call we take, every arrest we make, it changes you. You start questioning your morals, your sense of justice. But here’s the thing, kid, if you can hold onto that small part of yourself that believes in doing right, you’ll survive. Barely, but you’ll survive.”

For the full monologue, you can refer to Reddit.

18. “Spoon River Anthology” by Edgar Lee Masters

Character: Tom Merritt
Summary: Tom recounts the events leading to his murder from beyond the grave.
Monologue Snippet: “I was the happiest soul that ever lived, until one day, my wife’s lover took my life. I stood there, unaware, and then I felt the cold steel. It was quick, but in that moment, I thought of everything I loved and lost. From the grave, I now see how my death was just another story in the long line of tales that make up Spoon River. My end, a sad song amidst the chorus of the town’s stories, forever echoing in the silence of the cemetery.”

For the full monologue, refer to Project Gutenberg and Full Text Archive.

19. “Good Will Hunting” by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck

Character: Sean
Monologue: “Thought about what you said to me the other day, about my painting. Stayed up half the night thinking about it. Then something occurred to me and I fell into a deep, peaceful sleep and haven’t thought about you since. You know what occurred to me? You’re just a kid. You don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about. You’ve never been out of Boston.”

Sean :So if I asked you about art, you’d probably give me the skinny on every art book ever written. Michelangelo, you know a lot about him. Life’s work, political aspirations, him and the pope, sexual orientations, the whole works, right? But I’ll bet you can’t tell me what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You’ve never actually stood there and looked up at that beautiful ceiling; seen that. If I ask you about women, you’d probably give me a syllabus about your personal favorites. You may have even been laid a few times. But you can’t tell me what it feels like to wake up next to a woman and feel truly happy. You’re a tough kid. And I’d ask you about war, you’d probably throw Shakespeare at me, right, “once more unto the breach dear friends.” But you’ve never been near one. You’ve never held your best friend’s head in your lap, watch him gasp his last breath looking to you for help. I’d ask you about love, you’d probably quote me a sonnet. But you’ve never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Known someone that could level you with her eyes, feeling like God put an angel on earth just for you. Who could rescue you from the depths of hell. And you wouldn’t know what it’s like to be her angel, to have that love for her, be there forever, through anything, through cancer. And you wouldn’t know about sleeping sitting up in the hospital room for two months, holding her hand, because the doctors could see in your eyes, that the terms “visiting hours” don’t apply to you. You don’t know about real loss, ’cause it only occurs when you’ve loved something more than you love yourself. And I doubt you’ve ever dared to love anybody that much. And look at you… I don’t see an intelligent, confident man… I see a cocky, scared shitless kid. But you’re a genius Will. No one denies that. No one could possibly understand the depths of you. But you presume to know everything about me because you saw a painting of mine, and you ripped my fucking life apart. You’re an orphan right?

[Will nods] 

Sean : You think I know the first thing about how hard your life has been, how you feel, who you are, because I read Oliver Twist? Does that encapsulate you? Personally… I don’t give a shit about all that, because you know what, I can’t learn anything from you, I can’t read in some fuckin’ book. Unless you want to talk about you, who you are. Then I’m fascinated. I’m in. But you don’t want to do that do you sport? You’re terrified of what you might say. Your move, chief.

Download This Monologue Here

20. “Scent Of A Woman”

Character:  Lt. Col. Frank Slade
Summary: Slade has Charlie accompany him to New York City, intending to savor one last weekend before ending his own life. Throughout their time together, Charlie forms a bond with Slade and ultimately prevents him from committing suicide. Slade then decides to return to the prep school with Charlie to attend the disciplinary committee meeting. George has made a deal to name the three students involved in the prank but plans to claim he didn’t see them clearly due to not wearing his contact lenses, implying only Charlie truly saw the culprits. Charlie refuses to reveal their identities, prompting the headmaster to prepare to recommend Charlie’s expulsion. At this moment, an outraged Slade delivers the following speech:

Monologue Snippet:
“I have seen boys like these, younger than these, their arms torn out, their legs ripped off. But there is nothing like the sight of an amputated spirit. There is no prosthetic for that. You think you’re merely sending this splendid foot soldier back home to Oregon with his tail between his legs, but I say you are executing his soul! And why? Because he’s not a Baird man. Baird men. You hurt this boy, you’re going to be Baird bums, the lot of you. And Harry, Jimmy, Trent, wherever you are out there, FUCK YOU TOO!”

For the full monologue, you can refer to the sources below:

• American Rhetoric – Movie Speech from Scent of a Woman

21. “The Seagull” By Anton Chekov

Character: Treplev
Summary: Treplev’s relationship with his mother, a renowned actress, is intricate; they meet sporadically each year since he reached adulthood. Aspiring to be a playwright, Treplev strongly criticizes contemporary theatrical norms. The monologue in question is directed at his uncle, Sorin, beginning with him methodically plucking petals off a flower.

Monologue: She loves me, she loves me not; she loves me, she loves me not; she loves me, she loves me not. You see? My mother doesn’t love me. Of course not! She wants to live, to love, to wear bright dresses, and here I am, twenty-five years old, a constant reminder that she is no longer young. When I’m not there, she’s only thirty-two, but when I am, she’s forty-three – and for that, she hates me. Besides, she knows I don’t accept the theatre. She loves the theatre, she thinks she is serving humanity and the sacred cause of art, while in my opinion, the theatre of today is hidebound and conventional. When the curtain goes up, and, in a room with three walls and artificial light, those great geniuses, those priests of holy art, show me how people eat, drink, love, walk about, and wear their jackets; when from those banal scenes and phrases they try to fish out a moral – some little moral that is easily grasped and suitable for domestic use; when, in a thousand variations, I am served the same thing over and over and over again – then I flee, as Maupassant fled from the Eiffel Tower, which made his brain reel with vulgarity.

Download This Monologue Here

22. “Jesus Hopped The A Train” By Stephen Adly Guirgis

Character: Angel
Summary: Angel, a young Puerto Rican man, is incarcerated at Riker’s Island prison awaiting trial for the murder of a cult religious leader. In this scene, he converses with his court-appointed attorney.

Monologue:

ANGEL: . . . We usta, me and Joey, we usta sneak out our house on Sun-
day nights, jump the turnstiles. And we would hop down onto the
subway tracks, walk through the tunnels, lookin’ for shit, makin’ ad-
ventures, playin’ like we was G.I. Joes . . . Pick up a empty can a
Hawaiian Punch or some ol’ beer bottle for fake walkie-talkies . . .
and we’d have our snow-boots on so we could be astronauts. And we
would pretend we were the last two survivors on earth and that we
came from the future . . . stupid . . . the future . . . like in that Planet
of the Apes movie with the two guys? Only we had no weapons, juss
chocolate milk . . . And we’d get so lost in our games and our dis-
coveries and our made-up stories . . . so many stories: lookin’ for ghosts,
lookin’ for apes, lookin’ for fortunes, runnin’ from rats, talkin’ bout
girls, talkin’ bout Thelma from “Good Times,” talkin’ bout daydreams,
talkin’ ’bout Bruce Lee versus Evil Knievel, talkin’ in words that was-
n’t even words, . . . and . . . and it would always surprise us when we
saw the Lights . . . even though we could feel the train coming, but
it was the Lights . . . The closer those Lights came, rumble of the tracks,
sound a the conductor’s horn blarin’ at us. We’d get so excited we’d
freeze — two seconds of freezin’ cold . . . hypnotized . . . holdin’ hands,
waitin’, waitin’, then: Bang . . . We’d jump off the rails, hug the wall,
climb back up the platform, start runnin’, runnin’, tearin’ ass clear
across town back to Riverside or Cherry Park . . . One time . . . one
particular time, when we was holdin’ hands right before we jumped
off the rails, somethin’ happened, and we couldn’t let go, couldn’t un-
tangle ourself from each other, and we were inside that Light, and we
both saw skeletons and radiation, and we was paralyzed in a way that
I juss can’t explain, till somethin’ blew us apart, juss blew us, and we
landed safe . . . We didn’t move for a long time . . . We was cryin’
and Joey ripped his brother’s coat . . . We wasn’t speakin’ till we got
to our block and Joey said that it was The Light that ripped us apart
and saved our lives . . . Joey said, “Jesus hopped the A train to see us
safe to bed” . . .

Download This Monologue Here

Dramatic Monologue FAQs

1. What are dramatic monologues?

Monologues are solo performances given by a character in a play or a film, where they express their thoughts, emotions, and experiences. A dramatic monologue specifically involves a character revealing intense feelings or deep revelations, usually in a serious or emotional manner.

2. How can I use free dramatic monologues for auditions?

Using free dramatic monologues for auditions can showcase your acting skills and ability to convey emotions effectively. Choose a monologue that resonates with you and fits the character you are auditioning for. Practice delivering the monologue with authenticity and emotion to make a strong impression on the casting team.

3. Where can I find free monologues for women and dramatic monologues for men?

You can find a variety of free monologues online, including monologues for women and dramatic monologues for men. Websites dedicated to theater resources, script databases, and acting forums often offer a selection of monologues categorized by gender and genre.

4. What are some tips for performing a dramatic monologue effectively?

To perform a dramatic monologue effectively, immerse yourself in the character’s emotions and motivations. Understand the context of the monologue and the character’s journey. Practice vocal variations, body language, and emotional depth to engage the audience and make the monologue impactful.

5. Are there specific phrases or lines commonly used in dramatic monologues?

Yes, there are certain phrases or lines that are often found in dramatic monologues, such as: “I’m still young,” “You’re older,” “Don’t make,” “Know what it’s like,” “I’m ready to talk,” and “I’m not trying.” These lines convey intense emotions and help build the dramatic tension in the performance.

6. How can I effectively connect with the audience during a dramatic monologue?

To connect with the audience during a dramatic monologue, focus on sincere and authentic delivery. Maintain eye contact, vary your tone to reflect emotions, and use pauses to emphasize key moments. Allow yourself to be vulnerable and let the audience empathize with the character’s experience.

Dive into these dramatic monologues for men and women and discover the essence of storytelling that transcends the stage and screen. Each piece not only showcases the actor’s talent but also brings to life the intricate layers of the characters they portray. Explore, practice, and perfect these monologues to enhance your performance skills and leave a lasting impression on your audience.

The post 22 Free Dramatic Monologues from From Theater and Film appeared first on We Are Actors.

August Wilson is one of the most influential playwrights in American history. His series of ten plays, The Pittsburgh Cycle, capture the varied experiences of Black Americans in 20th century. Each play is set in a different decade ranging from the years 1904 to 1997. Five of his plays have been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and two of his plays, Fences and The Piano Lesson, won it. Nine of his plays have been nominated for the Tony Award for Best Play. Wilson said the main themes of all of his plays are “love, honor, duty and betrayal.” Please enjoy this list of August Wilson monologues we have compiled for you!

FENCES MONOLOGUES

ROSE

Context: Rose defends her martial commitment to Troy.

Rose: I been standing with you! I been right here with you, Troy. I got a life too. I gave eighteen years of my life to stand in the same spot with you. Don‘t you think I ever wanted other things? Don‘t you think I had dreams and hopes? What about my life? What about me. Don‘t you think it ever crossed my mind to want to know other men? That I wanted to lay up somewhere and forget about my responsibilities? That I wanted someone to make me laugh so I could feel good? You not the only one who‘s got wants and need. But I held on to you, Troy. I took all my feelings, my wants and needs, my dreams . . . and I buried them inside you. I planted a seed and watched and prayed over it. I planted myself inside you and waited to bloom. And it didn‘t take me no eighteen years to find out the soil was hard and rocky and wasn‘t never gonna bloom. But I held you, Troy. I held you tighter. You was my husband. I owed you everything I had. Every part of me I could find to give you. And upstairs in that room . . . with the darkness falling in on me . . . I gave everything I had to try and erase the doubt that you wasn‘t the finest man in the world. And wherever you was going . . . I wanted to be there with you. Cause you was my husband. Cause that‘s the only way I was gonna survive as your wife. You always talking about what you give . . . and what you don‘t have to give. But you take too. You take . . . and don‘t even know nobody‘s giving!

Age: 30s 40s
Gender: Female
From: Monologues From Plays
Type: Drama
One minute monologue: No

Download This Monologue Here

TROY

Context: Troy tries to defend his reasoning for cheating on Rose through a baseball metaphor.

Troy: Rose, I done tried all my life to live decent . . . to live a clean . . . hard . . . useful life. I tried to be a good husband to you. In every way I knew how. Maybe I come into the world backwards, I don‘t know. But . . . you born with two strikes on you before you come to the plate. You got to guard it closely . . . always looking for the curve-ball on the inside corner. You can‘t afford to let none get past you. You can‘t afford a call strike. If you going down . . . you going down swinging. Everything lined up against you. What you gonna do. I fooled them, Rose. I bunted. When I found you and Cory and a halfway decent job… I was safe. Couldn‘t nothing touch me, I wasn‘t gonna strike out no more. I wasn‘t going back to the penitentiary. I wasn‘t gonna lay in he streets with a bottle of wine. I was safe. I had me a family. A job. I wasn‘t gonna get that last strike. I was on first looking for one of them boys to knock me in. To get me home. Then I saw that girl . . . she firmed up my backbone. And I got to thinking that if I tried . . . I just might be able to steal second. Do you understand, after eighteen years I wanted to steal second.

Age: 40s 50s
Gender: Male
From: Monologues From Plays
Type: Drama
One minute monologue: No

Download This Monologue Here

THE PIANO LESSON MONOLOGUES

BOY WILLIE

Context: Boy Willie asserts his commitment to living at the top of life, even though he feels how he and his family started at the bottom.

Boy Willie: What I want to bring a child into this world for? Why I wanna bring somebody else into all this for? I‘ll tell you this . . . If I was Rockefeller I‘d have forty or fifty. I‘d make one everyday. Cause they gonna start out in life with all the advantages. I ain‘t got no advantages to offer nobody. Many is the time I looked at my daddy and seen him staring off at his hands. I got a little older I know what he was thinking. He sitting there saying, ―I got these big hands but what I‘m gonna do with them? Best I can do is make a fifty-acre crop for Mr. Stovall. Got these big old hands capable of doing anything. I can take and build something with these hands. But where‘s the tools? All I got is these hands. Unless I go out here and kill me somebody and take what they got . . . it‘s a long row to hoe for me to get something of my own. So what I‘m gonna do with these big old hands? What would you do? See now . . . if he had his own land he wouldn‘t have felt that way. If he had something under his feet that belonged to him he could stand up taller. That‘s what I‘m talking about. Hell, the land is there for everybody. All you got to do is figure out how to get you a piece. Ain‘t no mystery to life. You just got to go out and meet it square on. If you got a piece of land you‘ll find everything else fall right into place. You stand right up next to the white man and talk about the price of cotton . . . the weather, and anything else you want to talk about. If you teach that girl that she is living at the bottom of life, she‘s gonna grow up and hate you.

Age: 20s 30s 40s
Gender: Male
From: Monologues From Plays
Type: Drama
One minute monologue: No

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WINNING BOY

Context: The Wining boy grieves for his repetitive, narrow lifestyle of being a musician.

WINING BOY : I give that piano up. That was the best thing that ever happened to me, getting rid of that piano. That piano got so big and I‘m carrying it around on my back. I don‘t wish that on nobody. See, you think it‘s all fun being a recording star. Got to carrying that piano around and man did I get slow. Got just like molasses. The world just slipping by me and I‘m walking around with that piano. Alright. Now, there ain‘t but so may places you can go. Only so many road wide enough for you and that piano. And that piano get heavier and heavier. Go to a place and they find out you play piano, the first thing they want to do is give you a rink, find you a piano, and sit you right down. And that‘s where you gonna be for the next eight hours. They ain‘t gonna let you get up! Now, the first three or four hours of that is fun. You can‘t get enough whiskey and you can‘t get enough women and you don‘t never get tired of playing that piano. But that only last so long. You look up one day and hate the whiskey, and you hate the women, and you hate the piano. But that‘s all you got. You can‘t do nothing else. All you know how to do is play that piano. Now, who am I? Am I me? Or am I the piano player? Sometime it seem like the only thing to do is shoot the piano player cause he the cause of all the trouble I‘m having.

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Male
From: Monologues From Plays
Type: Drama
One minute monologue: No

Download This Monologue Here

Context: Berniece argues in defense of keeping the piano, and thereby the ancestors’s legacy, in opposition to supporting the violent ways of Boy Willie.

BERNIECE

Berniece: You ain‘t taking that piano out of my house. (She crosses to the piano) Look at this piano. Look at it. Mama Ola polished this piano with her tears for seventeen years. For seventeen years she rubbed on it till her hands bled. Then she rubbed the blood in … mixed it up with the rest of the blood on it. Every day that God breathed life into her body she rubbed and cleaned and polished and prayed over it. ―Play something for me, Bernice. Play something for me, Bernice. Every day. ―I cleaned it up for you, play something for me, Bernice. You always talking about your daddy but you ain‘t never stopped to look at what his foolishness cost your mama. Seventeen years‘ worth of cold nights and an empty bed. For what? For a piano? For a piece a wood? To get even with somebody? I look at you and you‘re all the same. You, Papa Boy Charles, Wining Boy, Doaker, Crawley . . . you‘re all alike. All this thieving and killing and thieving and killing. And what it ever lead to? More killing and thieving. I ain‘t never seen it come to nothing. People getting burned up. People getting shot. People falling down their wells. It don‘t never stop.

Age: 20s 30s 40s
Gender: Female
From: Monologues From Plays
Type: Drama
One minute monologue: No

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Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom

Context: Levee refuses to be beat down about the imposing authority of white men within his life and musicianship.

LEVEE: Levee got to be Levee! And he don‘t need nobody messing with him about the white man —cause you don‘t know nothing about me. You don‘t know Levee. You don‘t know nothing about what kind of blood I got! What kind of heart I got beating here! (Pounds his chest) I was eight years old when I watched a gang of white mens come into my daddy‘s house and have to do with my mama any way they wanted. (Pause) We was living in Jefferson County, about eighty miles outside of Natchez. My daddy‘s name was Memphis . . . Memphis Lee Green . . . had him near fifty acres of good farming land. I‘m talking about good land! Grow anything you want! He done gone off of shares and bought this land from Mr. Hallie‘s widow woman after he done passed on. Folks called him an uppity nigger cause he done saved and borrowed to where he could buy this land and be independent. (Pause) It was coming on planting time and my daddy went into Natchez to get him some seed fertilizer. Called me, say, ―Levee, you the man of the house now. Take care of your mama while I‘m gone. I wasn‘t but a little boy, eight years old. (Pause) My mama was frying up some chicken when them mens come in that house. Must have been eight or nine of them. She standing there frying that chicken and them mens come and took hold of her just like you take hold of a mule and make him do what you want. (Pause) There was my mama with a gang of white mens. She tried to fight them off, but I could see where it wasn‘t gonna do her any good. I didn‘t know what they were 59 doing to her . . . but I figured whatever it was they may as well do to me too. My daddy had a knife that he kept around there for hunting and working and whatnot. I knew where he kept it and I went and got it. I‘m gonna show you how spooked up I was by the white man. I tried my damndest to cut one of them‘s throat! I hit him in the shoulder with it. He reached back and grabbed hold of that knife and whacked me across the chest with it. (Raises his shirt to show a long ugly scar.) That‘s what made them stop. They was scared I was gonna bleed to death. My mama wrapped a sheet around me and carried me two miles down to the Furlow place and they drove me up to Doc Albans. He was waiting on a calf to be born, and say he ain‘t had time to see me. They carried me up to Miss Etta, the midwife, and she fixed me up. My daddy came back and acted like he done accepted the facts of what happened. But he got the names of them mens from mama. He found out who they was and then we announced we was moving out of that county. Said good-bye to everybody . . . all the neighbors. My daddy went and smiled in the face of one of them crackers who had been with my mama. Smiled in his face and sold him our land. We moved over with relations I Caldwell. He got us settled in and then he took off one day. I ain‘t never seen him since. He sneaked back, hiding up in the woods, laying to get them eight or nine men. (Pause) My daddy wasn‘t spooked up by the white man. Nosir! And that taught me how to handle them. I seen my daddy go up and grin in this cracker‘s face . . . smile in his face and sell him his land. All the while he‘s planning how he‘s gonna get him and what he‘s gonna do to him. That taught me how to handle them. So you all just back up and leave Levee alone about the white man. I can smile and say ―yessir to whoever I please. I got time coming to me. You all just leave Levee alone about the white man.

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Male
From: Movies
Type: Drama
One minute monologue: No

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KING HEDLEY MONOLOGUES

RUBY

Context: Ruby reflects on her complex relationship with her son, asserting that only God knows why people are brought into this world.

RUBY: I done tried everything I know. King don‘t believe I love him. It‘s a mother‘s love. It don‘t never go away. I love me but I love King more. Sometimes I might not love me but there don‘t never come a time I don‘t love him. He don‘t understand that. King don‘t know he lucky to be here. I didn‘t want to have no baby. Seem to me like I got off to a bad start. I wanted to have an abortion. Somebody sent me up there to see Aunt Ester. I thought she did abortions. It didn‘t take me long to find out I was in the wrong place. She was sitting in a room with a red curtain. A little old woman wearing a stocking cap. I can‘t say if she had any teeth or not. She was just sitting there. Told me to come closer where she could put her hands on my head. I got real peaceful. Seem like all my problems went away. She told me man can plant the seed but only God can make it grow. Told me God was a good judge. I told her that‘s what scared me. She just laughed and told me, ―God has three hands. Two for that baby and one for the rest of us. That‘s just the way she said it. ―God got three hands. Two for that baby and one for the rest of us. You got your time coming. I never will forget that. I used to look at King and try and figure it out. But I ain‘t seen nothing to make her say that. I thought maybe she was just telling me that but she ain‘t supposed to lie about nothing like that. I just ain‘t never seen nothing that would make him that special. That‘s what I‘m telling you about that baby you carrying. You never know what God have planned. You can‘t all the time see it. That‘s what Louise used to tell me. You can‘t all the time see it but God can see it good.

Age: 40s 50s 60s
Gender: Female
From: Monologues From Plays
Type: Drama
One minute monologue: No

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KING HEDLEY

Context: King Hedley critiques the rampant discrimination in the American justice system.

I ain‘t sorry for nothing I done. And ain‘t gonna be sorry. I‘m gonna see to that. ‘Cause I‘m gonna do the right thing. Always. It ain‘t in me to do nothing else. We might disagree about what that is. But I know what is right for me. As long as I draw a breath in my body I‘m gonna do the right thing for me. What I got to be sorry for? People say, ―Ain‘t you sorry you killed Pernell? I ain‘t sorry I killed Pernell. The nigger deserve to die. He cut my face. I told the judge, ―Not Guilty. They thought I was joking. I say, ―The motherfucker cut me! How can I be wrong for killing him? That‘s common sense. I don‘t care what the law say. The law don‘t understand this. It must not. They wanna take and lock me up. Where‘s the understanding? If a burglar break in a white man‘s house to steal his TV and the white man shoot him they don‘t say he wrong. The law understand that. They pat him on the back and tell him to go on home. You see what I‘m saying? The jury come back and say, ―Guilty.‖ They asked them one by one. They all said, ―Guilty. Had nine white men and three white women. They all said, ―Guilty. They wouldn‘t look at me. I told them to look at me. Look at that scar. I got closer to where they could see my scar. The judge like to had a fit. They had six deputies come at me from all sides. They said I tried to attack the jury. I was just trying to get closer so they could see my face. They tried to run out the door. They took and put me in solitary confinement. Said I was unruly.

Age: 30s 40s
Gender: Male
From: Monologues From Plays
Type: Drama
One minute monologue: No

Download This Monologue

We hope this list of August Wilson monologues helps you with some material for acting class or even some material to work on in private.

Wilson said his writing was most influenced by “the four Bs”: the playwright Amiri Baraka (author of Dutchman), the Argentine poet Jorge Luis Borges, the painter Romare Beardem and blues music. In trying to emulate Bearden, Wilson said: “I try to make my plays the equal of his canvases. In creating plays I often use the image of a stewing pot in which I toss various things that I’m going to make use of—a black cat, a garden, a bicycle, a man with a scar on his face, a pregnant woman, a man with a gun.” In writing The Pitsburgh Cycle, Wilson sought to feature strong female characters, elements of the supernatural and highlight the poetry in the everyday life of Black America. His legacy remains in productions of his work, film adaptations (a particular focus of Denzel Washington’s) and in the National August Wilson Monologue Competition, “inspiring high school students to find and express themselves through theatre.”

Aryana Williams: First Placed Winner of The August Wilson Monologue Competition

August Wilson Monologues FAQs

1. What is the August Wilson Monologue Competition?

The August Wilson Monologue Competition (AWMC) is an annual event where high school students from across the country perform monologues from August Wilson’s American Century Cycle of plays. The competition aims to introduce young people to Wilson’s work and to provide a platform for them to develop their acting skills

2. What is the significance of August Wilson’s monologues in American theater?

August Wilson’s monologues hold a singular place in American theater due to their rich characters, vivid language, and unflinching portrayal of the African American experience. Wilson’s work has been celebrated for its ability to capture the nuances and complexities of black life in America, and his influence can be seen in the work of many contemporary playwrights.

3. Which monologue is featured in the Netflix film “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”?

The Netflix film “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” features a monologue from the play of the same name, which is part of August Wilson’s American Century Cycle. The monologue is performed by the character Levee, played by Chadwick Boseman in his final role

4. Where can I find a performance of August Wilson’s monologues?

You can find performances of August Wilson monologues in theaters across the country, as well as on film and television. PBS’s American Masters series has produced a dramatic reading of a monologue from “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” performed by Ebony Jo-Ann.

The post August Wilson Monologues appeared first on We Are Actors.

Leslye Headland is a graduate of NYU Tisch and is an established playwright, screenwriter and
director. Her featured plays served as a foundation for later film and television adaptations including the
pre-nuptial drama, Bachelorette, which made its world premiere in 2010 at Second Stage – and later
was adapted into the 2012 romantic comedy starring Kirsten Dunst, Isla Fisher, Lizzy Caplan and Rebel
Wilson. The following year, in 2013 her play ‘Assistance,’ was acquired by NBC for television, starring
Krysten Ritter, Zach Cregger and Alfred Molina.
Leslye Headland has written each of her plays to highlight the Seven Deadly Sins – Cinephillia (Lust),
Bachelorette (Gluttony), Assistance (Greed), Surfer Girl (Sloth), Reverb (Wrath), The Accidental Blonde (
Envy) and Cult of Love (Pride).
Below you will find some of the most popular Leslye Headland monologues that offer both challenge, and artistic discovery. Headland is brilliant in the relatable characters she creates, written to empower actors to empathize and seize their true desire. Have so much damn fun.

Bachelorette
2010, Dark Comedy
Scene Two:

Katie: Everyone hated me. But you know what? It’s better than being ignored, which is all anyone does
to me now. You know what I hate the most about my job. When I say, “Can I help you?” And
people just look at me like I am a lighting fixture. I mean, even the people who have nothing but
disdain for me don’t piss me off as much as the people who think I’m part of the scenery.
(Drinks) Then, of course, they inevitably have to come back to me and ask for some fat size
because they’re fat.
Later

Joe: Will that make you feel better?
Katie: Fine. (Joe gets his things and exits the suite without lingering. A prisoner being released. He leaves the door ajar. Katie cries. Not like a grown person but like a little girl whose toy is broken. She boxes her own ears. A harsh attempt to snap herself out of feeling. To herself, methodically.) Stop it. Stop it. You’re worthless. You’re worthless. You’re worthless. Everyone hates you everyone hates you everyone hates you … (She sees Regan’s purse and rummages through it.) Come on. Come on. (She finds a pills bottle. A different one than Regan used earlier. A different color.) Jack. Pot. (Katie takes a handful of pills. She doesn’t empty the bottle. She replaces the bottle in Regan’s purse. She swallows the pills and washes them down with champagne. She chokes, then chugs again. )

Stop here if performing the scene without Joe. If you have a Joe then continue –
(Joe bursts back into the suite. He goes straight to Katie and kisses her deep and long. Movie star kissed her. I mean, sweeps her off her feet.)

Joe: Did that work? (Katie stare at him,) I’ve always wanted to do something like that. (Katie sways back and forth
for a moment. Then …)
Katie: Joe?
Joe: Yeah?
Katie: It’s not working. (Blackout)

Age: 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama, Comedic

Scene Three

The suite is empty as it was. A disaster.
After a moment, Regan emerges from the bedroom. A bed sheet wrapped around her. She goes for the coffee and gulps a mug full. The coffee is ice cold so she instantly opens her mouth and coffee spills all over he chest.

REGAN: Shit. Fuck. (Her cell phone catches her eye. She looks at it.) Douchebag. (She makes a call. Into the phone. ) What?!… Why the fuck are you calling me a million times? … It was on vibrate …I’m at Becky’s thing. I told you we would be out late … You go out every fucking Saturday with your meathead friends and I go out once … ONCE in the last six months and you give me shit for it … Uh huh .. Yeah … Well, I don’t care … because you’re an idiot … Yeah … I TOLD you we’d be OUT late … (She see’s Joe’s bowl, She finds a lighter and takes a hit. Into the phone.) You don’t care anyway… your residency my ass-fuck-face … No, I’m not smoking … I’m NOT SMOKING … I Fucking quit three years ago .. for you .. and you don’t trust me … thats what this comes down to … You … you … CAN I SAY SOMETHING?! (Jeff enters from the bedroom. He’s practically dressed. He picks up a coffee as well. He spits it back into the cup. Into the phone) Can I say one thing at this juncture before you start acting like … LISTEN! If you can’t trust me, then I don’t know what the fucking point of me EVER leaving the house … I’ll just bake a casserole and then lie around with my legs open until you feel like … YOU ARE SUCH A BABY! … That’s stupid … Well, I think you’re stupid … I’ll be home when I feel like coming home … FINE! MAYBE I WILL! (She hangs up and tosses the cell phone away.)

Age: 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama , Comedic

Assistance
2010, Comedy

NORA:
I wasn’t sure what the dress code was here so I… well, I bought this yesterday.
Like it was the first day of school or something. And now I’m telling you about it.
Which of course, sort of defeats the purpose of buying the new outfit for
the new job.
But none of my other clothes are like this so you would’ve found out anyway. It was
really expensive too. Which was stupid. Because I was only gonna wear it once.
…..
NORA:
Like, when I was younger, maybe fifteen, I read an article about him in the
Washington Post and it… well, I decided that I wanted to do that. You know. So I went
to the library and rifled through the periodicals and the microfiche and studied his…
career. So whatever, I got a dream, you know. Like he, or what he’s done anyway, gave
me a dream. I never thought about what I wanted to do until I discovered him. So I went
to the same college he did. I got the job at Canal Street. Intern, Receptionist, Assistant
and now Assistant to
the President. Assistant to Daniel. So I’m getting closer. This is
sort of a big day for me.

Age: Late 20s, Early 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Comedic

Heather, in a winter coat, is on her cell phone. She
waits for a bus. She is very upset. She listens to a tirade
from the person on the other
her end of the conversation.

HEATHER:

Mom.

Pause.

Mom! I’m not punishing you. I’m not doing anything.

Pause.

I don’t know what you want from me. I got FIRED. I got fired. I tried to get there and I
got fired for trying to get there. So all that work doesn’t even mean anything now.
Okay? I’m unemployed again and now I have to start all over somewhere else and I
worked on getting that position for years. Angling. Bribing. Dodging. To get that job.

For you.

Pause.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! Why else would I put myself through that? I did it for you

and Dad. I WENT THROUGH ALL OF THAT FOR YOU!

Pause.
BECAUSE I WANTED YOU TO BE PROUD OF ME! BECAUSE I WANTED YOU TO SAY AT PARTIES

THAT I’M DANIEL WEISINGER’S ASSISTANT AND BE PROUD OF ME!

Pause.

I’m not going back there. I’m not. I won’t do it. I won’t beg for my job back. Because

I’m EMBARRASSED.

Pause.

BECAUSE I ALREADY DID AND THEY WOULDN’T GIVE IT BACK TO ME!

Pause.

DANIEL DOESN’T CARE THAT YOUR BROTHER IS DEAD! HE DOESN’T GIVE
A RAT’S ASS THAT I HAD TO GO TO A FUNERAL. HE DOESN’T CARE
ABOUT ME! I AM REPLACEABLE! HE DOESN’T KNOW ME FROM SOME
GUY WITH AN MBA IN BUSINESS THAT SOME OVERPRICED
NORTHEASTERN SCHOOL HANDED HIM YESTERDAY

—
Pause.

I’M NOT IMPORTANT. DON’T YOU GET THAT?!?!?? I’M NOT IMPORTANT.
THIS IS THE ONLY THING THAT MADE ME IMPORTANT AND NOW IT’S

GONE BECAUSE OF YOU!!! AND YOUR STUPID

—
Pause.

I DON’T CARE THAT YOU’RE SORRY. I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I WANT MY FUCKING JOB BACK, MOM. I FUCKING EARNED IT AND I
WANT IT back…Mom. I can’t do this. I can’t fight about this right now.
I have to go into a job interview in 20 minutes. I can’t talk about this right now.

Pause.

I’m sorry, too. I’m sorry. I think I have to come home… for a little bit. I can’t work

like this anymore. I think I’m going crazy.

Pause.

Okay. I’ll call you afterwards and let you know how it went. Okay. Okay.

Pause.

I love you too, Mom. Bye

–

uh.
She hangs up the phone and stares at nothing.

Age: Late 20s, Early 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Comedic

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Theresa Rebeck is widely known as a female powerhouse of the modern theatre. Her work spans from Broadway, to film and television as well as literary novels. Rebeck is the most Broadway – produced female playwright of our time, with shows including Dead Accounts ; Seminar and Mauritius. Her most recent film screenplay is Jessica Chastain’s spy thriller ‘The 355,’ with her previous television works of ‘SMASH,’ and ‘NYPD Blue.’ Listed below are some incredibly witty Theresa Rebeck monologues that will help you exercise your bite, and keep you on your heels!

Spike Heels
1990, Drama / Comedy

Georgie: Yeah, right, he “gave” me the damn job. I fucking work my ass off for that jerk; he doesn’t give me shit. I earn it, you know? He “gave” me the job. I just love that. What does that mean, that I should be working at McDonald’s or something, that’s what I really deserve or something? Bullshit. Fuck you, that is such fucking bullshit. You think I don’t know how to behave in public or something?
Jesus, I was a goddamn waitress for seven years, the customers fucking loved me. You think I talk like this in front of strangers; you think I don’t have a brain in my head or something? That is so fucking condescending. Anytime I lose my temper, I’m crazy, is that it? You don’t know why I threw that pencil, you just assume. You just make these assumptions. Well, fuck you, Andrew. I mean it. Fuck you.
I mean, I just love that. You don’t even know. You’ve never seen me in that office. You think I’m like,
incapable of acting like somebody I’m not? For four months I’ve been scared to death but I do it, you know. I take messages, I call the court, I write his damn letters. I watch my mouth, I dress like this – whatever this is; these are the ugliest clothes I have ever seen – I am gracious, I am bright, I am promising. I am being this other person for them because I do want this job but there is a point beyond which I will not be fucked with! So you finally push me beyond that point, and I throw the pencil and now you’re going to tell me that that is my problem? What, do you guys think you hold all the cards or something? You think you have the last word on reality? You do, you think that anything you do to me is okay, and anything I do is fucked because I’m not using the right words. I’m, like, throwing pencils and saying fuck you, I’m speaking another language, that’s my problem. And the thing is – I am America. You know? You guys are not America. You think you are; Jesus Christ, you guys think you own the world. I mean, who made up these rules, Andrew? And do you actually think we’re buying it?

Age: 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Comedic Monologues For Women

Download This Monologue Here

Lydia:
I don’t know you. You and I have never met. And you are wreaking havoc on my life. At first, I admired
Andrew’s interest in your welfare. He cares about people; he truly cares and I think that’s wonderful. But these past few months, I must admit, I have become less interested in his interest. Not only do I listen to him talk about you incessantly, any time I come over to have dinner or spend the night here, I am bombarded by you. When you come home at night, we hear your little heels clicking on the ceiling. When you leave in the morning, we hear your little heels. When you go to bed we hear you brush your teeth and talk on the phone, and listen to the radio and on certain evenings I could swear that we can even hear you undress. I am not enjoying this. For the past two months, I have been under the distinct impression that any time I spend the night here, I am actually sleeping with two people- Andrew, and yourself. In fact, when you came home with Edward tonight my first thought was, my God, the bed is already crowded enough; now we have to fit Edward in too? Now. I don’t know what went on between you and Andrew. I want you out of my life! Is that understood?

Age: 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Comedic monologues for women

The Scene
2006 – Dark Comedy Act II, Scene 4
Clea: (Yelling)
You know what we should do tonight? My friend can get me into this party. Its up on the Upper West Side so its totally not like a really hip scene or anything, but there is going to be some movie stars there, she wouldn’t tell me who, but they also have this hot tub there? On the roof. She went to a party at this place a couple of weeks ago, and everyone takes their clothes off and gets in the hot tub. And then they have these cater waiters come around, Im not kidding, with Sushi. So you sit in the hot tub and like talk and eat sushi naked. It sounds so nineties, doesn’t it? Movie stars and sushi and a hot tub? Maybe they’ll play R.E.M. on the “record player.” Or do lines of cocaine. It’s so unbelievably retro, a hot tub on a roof. I sooo want to go.

Act II, Scene 7
Clea: I said LET GO! (She shoves him away, steely.) Get it together would you? God, you’re a mess, you’re really just a total wreck and there’s a party going on in there, Charlie! Get a clue! There’s four casting agents in there! Plus Nick – Ok, I’m going to tell you this I don’t know why because you so don’t deserve it but the fact is, he still needs somebody to play the homeless guy in the third act and it’s only two lines and I could get him to just give it to you if you would just – just tell Nick how much you love the pilot, he will really like that. You know part of the reason he gets so edgy with you is because he thinks you’re really talented, like fucked up but talented and honestly, if you just said some nice things it would solve everything ! Just don’t talk about having a glass of water with him. OK? That is too nuts. Holy beggars, also off the table, OK? OK Charlie? Honestly, you are so much work, I’m going to have to get a massage for a week to get over this. I mean it. It’s a party! OK Charlie? It’s a party.

Age: 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Comedic monologues for women

Dead Accounts
2012 – Dark Comedy
Jenny: That’s what he said! Can you believe that? “The truth is complicated.” I’m thinking, not so complicated that they can’t send you to jail, you jerk. Yes, I rea—I know, Stuart, but after everything I did for him, my family? My father! My father got him that job. Oh do not tell him I’m here, he will have an aneurysm if he—yes, I know, but of course I feel, I’m not—no, Jack’s not here. I mean, he is here, I saw him, but he’s not here right now.
I walked in the front door, and before I could say three words there was this very convenient story about his father, and a kidney stone, and they all rushed off to some hospital. I mean, he did seem to be in some pain so what do I know, but I thought it was pretty coincidental, and I would not put it past Jack to actually give his father a kidney stone just to avoid dealing with this. He walked off with twenty-seven million dollars from a major international financial institution, and nobody apparently can figure out how he did it. I think a kidney stone is relatively simple next to that. I know—I KNOW I sound ridiculous but I’m truly at my wit’s end, Stuart. I’ve been sitting here for eight hours, by myself, in this house, why do people live in houses like this in the Midwest, you should see this place. There actually is, seriously, linoleum floors. Linoleum, it’s not a myth. And the cabinets are horrible. But get this: There are little ceramic plates on the walls with pictures painted on them, I’m not making this up. And the flatware is just, I don’t understand it. I don’t know what it’s made of. Some sort of strange gray metal. Oh, oh, and the dishes are Corelle. It says on the back of them: Corelle. I don’t know what “Corelle” is, that’s my point! It’s just so deliberately without taste. And yes there are yards with grass and trees, Jack used to go on endlessly about all the grass and trees and air in the Midwest but honestly, I always found him to be needlessly smug about that stuff. Nature, like they invented nature. When they didn’t invent it at all; let’s face it, it’s just here. Big deal. A f***ing tree.

Age: Late 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Comedic monologues for women

Seminar
2011 – Comedy Scene 2
Kate: She disappears into the apartment, yelling back, Martin waits.(off)
Everybody acted like, they all said he’s ROUGH but he’s A GREAT TEACHER BUT I DON’T SEE
WHAT’S SO GREAT ABOUT JUST BEING ABUSED. THAT’S NOT TEACHING THAT’S JUST BEING
A SHITHEAD. IF I WANT SOMEONE TO TELL ME I’M WASTING MY TIME I CAN JUST TALK TO
MY MOTHER. EVERYONE THINKS IT’S SO COOL AND FUN TO BE MEAN TO ARTISTS BUT IF WE
WEREN’T HERE THERE WOULD BE NOTHING BUT ANARCHY AND IMMORTALITY AND
CHAOS. WE ARE THE SOULD OF TE CULTURE AND PEOPLE CAN JUST FUCKING BE NICE TO US
ONCE IN A WHILE.
She reappears, carrying bags of chips and diet soda and ice cream. She sits down and starts to eat.

Scene 2

Kate:That’s right I’ve been working on it for six years because people like it – Frank Conroy read it, before he died, he was the writer in residence up at Bennington for one month and he read that story and you know what he said to me? He said it was “much better than most.” Not better than most. “Much better than most.
Martin: “Much better than most,” that is so lame, Kate.

Kate: Yes, it would be lame, coming from you but it didn’t come from you, it came from Frank Conroy. You know who else likes that story? Tobias Wolf. He read it when I took that summer writing class and he said it had some nice things in it.

Age: Late 20s, 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Comedic monologues for women

We hope you enjoyed this list of Theresa Rebeck Monologues! Please check out more monologues on our monologue database!

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John Patrick Shanley is is one of the more prominent modern playwrights who’s work is worked on by actors in drama schools all over the world. For that reason we have compiled a list of John Patrick Shanley Monologues to help you with some material to work on in class.

Doubt: A Parable Monologues

Summary: Mrs. Mueller tells Sister Aloysius that her son needs a man in his life.

MRS. MULLER: You accept what you got to accept and you work with it. … Well he’s got to be somewhere, maybe he’s doin’ some good too … Well maybe some of them boys want to get caught. … That’s why his father beat him. Not the wine. … I’m talkin’ about the boy’s nature, nun. Not anything he’s done. You can’t hold a child responsible for what God gave him to be. … But then there’s the boy’s nature … Forget it then. Forcing people to say things. My boy came to your school ‘cause they were gonna kill him in the public schools. His father don’t like him. He come to your school, kids don’t like him. One man is good to him, this priest. And does a man have his reasons? Yes. Everybody does. You have your reasons but, do I ask the man why he’s good to my son? No. I don’t care why. My son needs some man to care about him. And to see him through the way he wants to go. And thank God this educated man, with some kindness in him, wants to do just that.

Age: 30s 40s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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FLYNN: It’s me that cares about that boy, not her. Has she ever reached out a hand to that child or any child in this school? She’s a block of ice! Children need warmth, kindness, understanding! What does she give them? Rules. That black boy needs a helping hand or he’s not going to make it here! But if she has her way, he’ll be left to his own undoing. Why do you think he was in the sacristy drinking wine that day? He’s in trouble! She sees me talk in a human way to these children and she immediately assumes there must be something wrong with it. Something dirty. Well, I’m not going to let her keep this parish in the Dark Ages! And I’m not going to let her destroy my spirit of compassion! 

SISTER JAMES: I’m sure that’s not her intent.

FLYNN: I care about this congregation!

SISTER JAMES: I know you do.

FLYNN: Like you care about your class! You love them, don’t you?

SISTER JAMES: Yes.

FLYNN: That’s natural. How else would you relate to children? I can look at your face and know your philosophy: kindness.

SISTER JAMES: I don’t know. I mean, of course.

FLYNN: What is Sister Aloysius’ philosophy do you suppose?

SISTER JAMES: I don’t have to suppose. She’s told me. She discourages… warmth. She’s suggest I be more… formal.

FLYNN: There are people who go after your humanity, Sister James, who tell you the light in your heart is a weakness. That your soft feelings betray you. I don’t believe that. It’s an old tactic of the cruel people to kill kindness in the name of virtue. Don’t believe it. There’s nothing wrong with love.

SISTER JAMES: Of course not, but…  

FLYNN: Have you forgotten hat was the message of the Savior to us all? Love. Not suspicion, disapproval and judgement. Love of people. Have you found Sister Aloysius a positive inspiration?

Age: 30s 40s 50s 60s
Gender: Monologues For Men
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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The Dreamer examines His Pillow Monologues

DONNA: Alright. [a long pause] Tommy an me … When he loves me. In bed. When he puts his arms around me, and I can feel his skin, his heart beating, his breath, and I smell him, it’s like Africa. It’s like, I get scared because all of my guts shake … Sometimes I press my hands against myself because I think things are coming loose inside. He just touches me, starts to barely touch me, and I’m so frightened because it’s so much, it’s so hot, it’s so close to losing my mind. It’s beyond pleasure. It’s … he takes me over. Like there’s a storm, I get caught in this storm with electricity and rain and noise and I’m blind I’m blind. I’m seeing things, but just wild, wild shapes flying by like white flyin rain and black shapes. I feel I feel this this rising thing like a yell a flame. My hair I can feel my hair like slowly going up on its toes on my skull my skull. Everything goes up through me from my belly and legs and feet to my head and all these tears come out but it can’t get out that way, so it goes down against my throat swells an through down to where it can get out GET OUT GET OUT. But it doesn’t go out, so I, I EXPAND. Like to an ocean. To hold the size of it. An then it’s maybe something you could speak of as pleasure, since then somehow I can hold it. I’m this ocean with a thousand moons and comets reflecting in me. And then I come back. Slowly. Slowly. From such a long way. And such a different size. And I’m wet. My body my hair. The bed is just soaked, torn up and soaked. There ain’t a muscle left in me. I’m all eyes. My eyes are the size of like two black pools of water in the middle of an endless night. And Tommy’s there. And he did it to me. He took me completely. I wasn’t me anymore. I was just a blast a light out in the stars. What could be better than that? What could be better? It’s like gettin to die, an get past death, to get to the universe, an then come back. In the world where we talk and fight and he fucks me over, it all just seems so unimportant after that. I don’t understand how he can do that for me an then turn around an be such a, well, smaller. It is a small world this world, in comparison to where we go in bed. And I guess we gotta be smaller in it.

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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DONNA: An Mona. A really lousy picture, self-picture. But it scared me. I think more than anything that’s ever happened to me. I heard the fuckin Twilight Zone music. Cause here I am, goin along, thinkin things are one way, that I’m choosin an goin my own way, an maybe doin a terrible fuckin botch a that, but doin it. An then I see this picture. And I think, Do I really know what’s goin on in my life? Or am I just a complete molecule or some shit. If this guy Tommy is turnin into you, then I’m in some kinda car I don’t even know I’m in, and some guy inna scary mask is drivin, an he’s had the route the map since the doctor smacked my ass. Where am I? I’m in love with this guy Tommy. He’s drivin me crazy, yeah. He’s tearin my heart out an steppin on it, yes. The whole thing I’m doin looks to be a total fuckup, but I can deal with that I can live with that. But what I wanna know gotta know is IS THIS MY LIFE OR WHAT? Is this my pain? My love? Or if what’s goin on here like history? You treated my mother like shit. You cheated on her. You lied to her. You humiliated her in public. When you had money, you wouldn’t give her any. When she had money, you took it. You walked on her face with muddy shoes. When she was in the hospital, you didn’t visit her. And then finally she just fuckin died. Now I hate your fuckin guts for that, but I decided a long time since that I wasn’t gonna spend my whole life wishin you dead or different, cause I didn’t want my life bossed by your life. I even thought, Maybe she deserved it. I knew I didn’t know the whole story and never would an what was it my business anyway? But that was before. Today, I saw that picture on Tommy’s wall, an it was writin on the wall to me, an the writin said, Watch Out. You could be in the middle of somebody else’s life. So that’s why I’m here. Because before I thought I didn’t have to know about you to do my life, and now I see I better find out a few things. It’s like medical history.

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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Savage In Limbo Monologues

(Tony Aronica describes why he’ll only date ugly girls from now on.)
Tony: I was in my car outside this place over the weekend. I hadda couple a drinks and I was a little fuzzy, so I was waitin till I cleared. It was dark. I was sittin there. And this unknown girl got in. She just got in the car. And she started talkin to me. She started rappin to me about the Soviet Union. Yeah. ’bout their economy. Housin. How they feel about China bein’ right there. Everything. Everything about the Soviet Union. She musta talked for two hours. Russian paranoia. Tass. The Gulag. I’m sittin there an’ I’m takin’ this in. The Trans-Siberian Railroad. hat kinda tanks they got in Eastern Europe. Why they need American wheat. And then she was finished. She’d told me everything she knew. So I took her in the back seat and I banged her. And do you know something? It was the best. It was the best I ever had. And it whadn’t cause she knew a lotta tricks or like that. It was ’cause she’d told me about the Soviet Union. And then she left. Now here’s the thing. She was very ugly. I don’t even wanna talk about how she looked. Mucho ugly. I didn’t think I could ever be with a woman like that. But it came about outta whatever, happpenstance, and I was. And it turned out to be better than what I went after. Do you see what I mean? Do you see what I’m comin’ towards? I always went for the girl like you. And what finally fuckin’ come to me, what finally fuckin’ penetrated the wall here, was that there was somethin’ else. Somethin’ I never even thought about, didn’t have a clue about. When I talked to you, I called it ugly girls. I don’t know what to call it. There’s other people. Like in science fiction. Another dimension right there but you can’t see it. I got into it for a minute by accident. Through a crack. I caught a flash. The dimension a ugly girls. I’m like one a those guys inna factory and they bring in all new machines. That’s what I feel like. Like I gotta retrain or I’m gonna lose my place. Some girls you look at some girls you don’t. I wanna see the things I didn’t see before an let the stuff I was lookin at go by. I’ve done the fuckin thing we’re in. Linda. I’ve been with you, I talked to you. I know what that is. That’s what I meant when I said you didn’t know nothin, but I whadn’t sayin it right. You look at what I look at. You know what I know. I wanna look at somethin else. I wanna know somethin else. I’m thirty-two years old. I wanna change.

Age: 20s 30s 40s
Gender: Monologues For Men
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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SAVAGE: I feel strong. Like I’m wearin chains and I could snap ’em any time. I feel ready. I go to work and I feel like I could take over the company, but I just type. I go home and I see my mother in her chair and I feel like I could pick her up with one hand and chuck her out the window and roll up the rug and throw a big party. Everybody’s invited. I go to the library and I wanna take the books down off the shelves and open all the books on the tables and argue with everybody about ideas. I wanna think out loud. I wanna think out loud with other people. You know what’s wrong with everybody? Too smart. I know it sounds crazy. I know. But it’s true. Everybody’s too smart. It’s like everybody knows everything and everybody argued everything and everything got hashed out and settled the day before I was born. It’s not fair. They know about gravity so nobody talks about gravity. It’s a dead issue. Look at me. My feet are stuck to the fuckin floor. Fantastic. But no. That’s gravity. Forget it. It’s been done it’s been said it’s been thought, so fuck it. It’s not fair. I’ve been shut outta everything that mighta been good by a smartness around that won’t let me think one new thing. And it’s been like that with love, too. You’re a little girl and you see the movies and maybe you talk to your mother and you definitely talk to your friends and then you know, right? So you go ahead and you do love. And somethin a what somebody told ya inna movie or in your ear is what love is. And where the fuck are you then, that’s what I wanna know? Where the fuck are you when you’ve done love, and you can point to love, and you can name it, and love is the same as gravity the same as everything else, and everything else is a totally dead fuckin issue?

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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Danny And The Deep Blue Sea Monologue

Age: 20s 30s 40s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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Italian American Reconciliation Monologue

ALDO: So our fathers are dead. We can’t go on trying ta make our fathers love us or fightin our fathers or tryin ta kill our fathers. What’s the point of killing a dead man cause he won’t love you? A dead man don’t need killin and a dead man can’t love you at all. I know you’re crazy and just me talking ain’t gonna make you sane. But comon! We’re all crazy, that ain’t no excuse. You been treated me bad my whole life and enough already. I been nuts, too. I’m tryin to be well, too. Let’s drop this shitload, this weight of sorrow, these sandbags on our necks from a million years ago, and try to talk to each other about now. You can’t kill me Janice. You been trying your whole life, an I just won’t die. Even when you fire a gun at me, it explodes in your hand. Even if I die, I’ll still be jumping around inside your head. You know, this distance you are from me, this distance now, if we talk to each other, this could be the least distance there ever has been between us.

There’s somethin I’ve wanted to say to you for a long time but I never did. I’m sorry your marriage broke up.

Age: 20s 30s 40s
Gender: Monologues For Men
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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We hope you have enjoyed this list of John Patrick Shanley Monologues. Please see our other Shanley related article below.

John Patrick Shanley Plays

John Patrick Shanley is an American playwright, screenwriter, and director. He won the 1988 Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for the film Moonstruck.

The post John Patrick Shanley Monologues appeared first on We Are Actors.

The Godfather of American playwrights Eugene O’Neill has a catalog of plays that remain unmatched in American theater. From Long Days Journey Into Night to The Iceman Cometh his plays are still amongst the most revered by actors all over the world. If you are a young man working your way through drama school you will most likely be be dealt with the task of working on parts like Jamie and Edmund Tyrone or a young woman with Anna Christie.

Eugene O’Neills deeply personal work makes for all-encompassing uncut characters that will elevate and actors work craft when working on the roles. The completeness of the characters force actors to bring a “full bucket” in order to do the roles justice. There can be no half way work when working on O’Neill and that is why it is important immerse yourself in his work as a young actor. In that spirit we have put together a list of Eugene O’Neill monologues for you to explore and work on.

Obsessed by a fairy tale, we spend our lives searching for a magic door and a lost kingdom of peace. – Eugene O’Neill

Eugene O’Neill Monologues

Monologues from Anna Christie

ANNA: I s’pose if I tried to tell you I wasn’t- that- no more you’d believe me, wouldn’t you? Yes, you would! And if I told you that yust getting out in this barge, and being on the sea had changed me and made me feel different about things,’s if all I’d been through wasn’t me and didn’t count and was yust like it never happened- you’d laugh, wouldn’t you? And you’d die laughing sure if I said that meeting you that funny way that night in the fog, and afterwards seeing that you was straight goods stuck on me, had got me to thinking for the first time, and I sized you up as a different kind of man- a sea man as different from the ones on land as water is from mud- and that was why I got stuck on you, too. I wanted to marry you and fool you, but I couldn’t. Don’t you see how I’d changed? I couldn’t marry you with you believing a lie- and I was shamed to tell you the truth- till the both of you forced my hand, and I seen you was the same as all the rest. And now, give me a bawling out and beat it, like I can tell you’re going to. Will you believe it if I tell you that loving you has made me- clean? It’s the straight goods, honest! Like hell you will! You’re like all the rest!

Age: 20s 30s 40s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama
One minute monologue

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ANNA: I s’pose if I tried to tell you I wasn’t- that- no more you’d believe me, wouldn’t you? Yes, you would! And if I told you that yust getting out in this barge, and being on the sea had changed me and made me feel different about things,’s if all I’d been through wasn’t me and didn’t count and was yust like it never happened- you’d laugh, wouldn’t you? And you’d die laughing sure if I said that meeting you that funny way that night in the fog, and afterwards seeing that you was straight goods stuck on me, had got me to thinking for the first time, and I sized you up as a different kind of man- a sea man as different from the ones on land as water is from mud- and that was why I got stuck on you, too. I wanted to marry you and fool you, but I couldn’t. Don’t you see how I’d changed? I couldn’t marry you with you believing a lie- and I was shamed to tell you the truth- till the both of you forced my hand, and I seen you was the same as all the rest. And now, give me a bawling out and beat it, like I can tell you’re going to. Will you believe it if I tell you that loving you has made me- clean? It’s the straight goods, honest! Like hell you will! You’re like all the rest!

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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Monologues From The Hairy Ape

YANK: I scared her? Why de hell should I scare her? Who de hell is she? Ain’t she de same as me? Hairy ape, huh?

(With his old confident bravado.)

I’ll show her I’m better’n her, if she on’y knew it. I belong and she don’t, see! I move and she’s dead! Twenty-five knots a hour, dats me! Dat carries her but I make dat. She’s on’y baggage. Sure!

(Again bewilderedly.)

But, Christ, she was funny lookin’! Did yuh pipe her hands? White and skinny. Yuh could see de bones trough ’em. And her mush, dat was dead white, too. And her eyes, dey was like dey’d seen a ghost. Me, dat was! Sure! Hairy ape! Ghost, huh? Look at dat arm!

(He extends his right arm, swelling out the great muscles.)

I coulda took her wit dat, wit’ just my little finger even, and broke her in two.

(Again bewilderedly.)

Say, who is dat skoit, huh? What is she? What’s she come from? Who made her? Who give her de noive to look at me like dat? Dis ting’s got my goat right. I don’t get her. She’s new to me. What does a skoit like her mean, huh? She don’t belong, get me! I can’t see her.

(With growing anger.)

But one ting I’m wise to, aw right, aw right! Youse all kin bet your shoits I’ll git even wit her. I’ll show her if she tinks she- She grinds de organ and I’m on de string, huh? I’ll fix her! Let her come down again and I’ll fling her in de furnace! She’ll move den! She won’t shiver at nothin’, den! Speed, dat’ll be her! She’ll belong den!

Age: 20’s, 30’s, 40’s
Gender: Monologues For Men
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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MILDRED: Please do not mock at my attempts to discover how the other half lives. Give me credit for some sort of groping sincerity in that at least. I would like to help them. I would like to be some use in the world. Is it my fault I don’t know how? I would like to be sincere, to touch life somewhere.

(With weary bitterness.)

But I’m afraid I have neither the vitality nor integrity. All that was burnt out in our stock before I was born. Grandfather’s blast furnaces, flaming to the sky, melting steel, making millions- then father keeping those home fires burning, making more millions- and little me at the tail-end of it all. I’m a waste product in the Bessemer process- like the millions. Or rather, I inherit the acquired trait of the by-product, wealth, but none of the energy, none of the strength of the steel that made it. I am sired by gold and darned by it, as they say at the race track- damned in more ways than one.

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama
One minute monologue

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Monologues From Long Days Journey Into Night

EDMUND: You’ve just told me some high spots in your memories. Want to hear mine? They’re all connected with the sea. Here’s one. When I was on the Squarehead square rigger, bound for Buenos Aires. Full moon in the trades. The old hooker driving fourteen knots. I lay on the bowsprit, facing astern, with the water foaming into spume under me, the masts with every sail white in the moonlight, towering high above me. I became drunk with the beauty and the singing rhythm of it, and for a moment I lost myself–actually lost my life. I was set fee! I dissolved in the sea, became white sails and flying spray, became beauty and rhythm, became moonlight and the ship and the high dim-starred sky! I belonged without, past or future, within peace and unity and a wild joy, within something greater than my own life, or the life of Man, to Life itself! To God if you want to put it that way. Then another time, on the American line, when I was lookout in the crow’s nest on the dawn watch. A calm sea, that time. Only a lazy ground swell and a slow drowsy roll of the ship. The passengers asleep and none of the crew in sight. No sound of man. Black smoke pouring from the funnels behind and beneath me. Dreaming, not keeping lookout, feeling alone, and above and apart, watching the dawn creep like a painted dream over the sky and sea which slept together. Then the moment of ecstatic freedom came. The peace, the end of the quest, the last harbor, the joy of belonging to a fulfillment beyond men’s lousy, pitiful, greedy fears and hopes and dreams! And several other times in my life, when I was swimming far out, or lying alone on the beach, I have had the same experience. Became the sun, the hot sand, green seaweed anchored to a rock, swaying in the tide. Like a saint’s vision of beatitude. Like the veil of things as they seem drawn back by an unseen hand. For a second you see–and seeing the secret, are the secret. For a second there is meaning! Then the hand lets the veil fall and you are alone, lost in the fog again, and you stumble on toward nowhere, for no good reason! (He grins wryly) It was a great mistake my being born a man, I would have been much more successful as a seagull or a fish. As it is I will always be a stranger who never feels at home, who does not really want and is not really wanted, who can never belong, who must always be a little in love with death!

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Monologues For Men
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

Download This Monologue Here

Edmund: God, Papa, ever since I went to sea and was on my own, and found out what hard work for little pay was, and what it felt like to be broke, and starve, and camp on park benches because I had no place to sleep, I’ve tried to be fair to you because I knew what you’d been up against as a kid. I’ve tried to make allowances. Christ, you have to make allowances in this damned family or go nuts! I have tried to make allowances for myself when I remember all the rotten stuff I’ve pulled! I’ve tried to feel like Mama that you can’t help being what you are where money is concerned. But God Almighty, this last stunt of yours is too much! It makes me want to puke! Not because of the rotten way you’re treating me. To hell with that! I’ve treated you rottenly, in my way, more than once. But to think when it’s a question of your son having consumption, you can show yourself up before the whole town as such a stinking old tightwad! Don’t you know Hardy will talk and the whole damn town will know! Jesus, Papa, haven’t you any pride or shame? (Bursting with rage.) And don’t think I’ll let you get away with it! I won’t go to any damned state farm just to save you a few lousy dollars to buy more bum property with! You stinking old miser! (He chokes huskily, his voice trembling with rage, and then is shaken by a fit of coughing.)

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Monologues For Men
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

Download This Monologue Here

JAMIE {swaying and blinking in the doorway -—in a loud voice). What ho What ho.

EDMUND {sharply). Nix on the loud noise

JAMIE {blinks at him). Oh, hello, Kid. [With great seriousness]
I’m as drunk as a fiddler’s bitch.

EDMUND {dryly). Thanks for telling me your great secret.

JAMIE {grins foolishly). Yes Unnecessary information Number One, eh?

{He bends and slaps at the knees of his trousers.)

Had serious accident. The fron’ steps tned to trample on me. Took advantage of fog to waylay me Ought to be a hghthouse out there. Dark in here, too {Scowling ) What the hell is this, the morgue?
Lesh have some light on subject.

{He sways forward to the table reciting Kipling.) Ford, ford, ford o’ Kabul river, Ford o’ Kabul river in the dark! Keep the crossing-stakes beside you, an’ they will surely gmde you ’Cross the ford o’ Kabul nver in the dark.”

{He fumbles at the chandelier and manages to turn on the three bulbs.)

Thash more like it. To hell with old Gaspard. Where is the old tightwad? Can’t expect us to live in the Black Hole of Calcutta,

{His eyes fix on the bottle of whisky.)

Say! Have I got the DT’s?

{He reaches out fumhlingly and grabs it.)

By God, It’s real. What’s matter with the old man tonight? Must be ossified to forget he left this out. Grab opportunity by the forelock.  Key to my success.
{He slops a big drink into a glass.)

EDMUND. You’re stinking now. That will knock you stiff.

JAMIE. Wisdom from the mouth of babes. Can the wise stuff Kid. You’re still wet behind the ears.

{He lowers himself into a chair, holding the drink carefully aloft}

EDMUND. All right. Pass out if you want to.

JAMIE Can’t, that’s trouble. Had enough to sink a ship, but can’t sink, here’s hoping. {He drinks.)

Age: 20s 30s
Gender: Monologues For Men
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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Mary explains her use of the morphine to Cathleen, the servant.

MARY. I have to take it because there is no other that can stop the pain – all of the pain – I mean, in my hands. Poor hands! You’d never believe it, but they were once one of my god points, along with my hair and eyes, and I had a fine figure too. They were a musician’s hands. I used to love the piano. I worked so hard at my music in the Convent – if you can call it work when you do something you love. Mother Elizabeth and my music teacher both said I had more talent than any student they remembered. My father paid for special lessons. He spoiled me. He would do anything I asked. He would have sent me to Europe to study after I graduated from the Convent.I might have gone – if I hadn’t fallen in love with Mr. Tyrone. or I might have become a nun. I had two dreams. To be a nun, that was the more beautiful one. To become a concert pianist, that was the other. I haven’t touched a piano in so many years. I couldn’t play with such crippled fingers, even if I wanted to. For a time after my marriage I tried to keep up my music. But it was hopeless. One-night stands, cheap hotels, dirty trains, leaving children, never having a home – See, Cathleen, how ugly they are! So maimed and crippled! You would think they’d been trough some horrible accident! So they have, come to think of it. I won’t look at them. They’re worse than the foghorn for reminding me – But even they can’t touch me now. They’re far away. I see them, but the pain has gone.

Age: 40s 50s 60s
Gender: Monologues For Women
Type: Monologues From Plays
Genre: Drama

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We hope you enjoy this list of Eugene O’Neill monologues and just to remind you there are many more monologues in our monologue database that you can access below

Monologues For Actors

The post Eugene O’Neill Monologues appeared first on We Are Actors.

One of the greatest American Playwrights of all time Arthur Miller has penned some of the most iconic theater characters of all time like Willie Lowman from Death Of A Saleman. With all these incredible works and characters come really beautiful and timely monologues. As a working actor or actor in training you should almost certainly work on some or all of Arthur Miller’s great plays and really familiarize yourself with some of the iconic monologues. Working on monologues will only hone your craft and work that muscle which will translate into better character work and even scene work. In honor of the great Arthur Miller and all he has done for theater we have put together an incredible list of Arthur Miller Monologues from some of his most iconic plays.

Arthur Miller Monologues

Death Of A Salesman Monologues

Summary: Biff, who has been living in his father’s shadow for his whole life, finally confronts his old man about the realities of his work prospects and his desire to be freed from his father’s unrealistic expectations of him.

BIFF: Now hear this, Willy, this is me. You know why I had no address for three months? I stole a suit in Kansas City and Iwas jailed. I stole myself out of every good job since high school. And I never gotanywhere because you blew me so full of hot air I could never stand taking orders fromanybody! That’s whose fault it is! It’s goddamn time you heard that! I had to be boss bigshot in two weeks, and I’m through with it! Willy! I ran down eleven flights with a pen inmy hand today. And suddenly I stopped, you hear me? And in the middle of that officebuilding, do you hear this? I stopped in the middle of that building and I saw – the sky. Isaw the things that I love in the world. The work and the food and the time to sit andsmoke. And I looked at the pen and said to myself, what the hell am I grabbing this for?Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I doing in an office,making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting forme the minute I say I know who I am! Why can’t I say that, Willy? Pop! I’m a dime adozen, and so are you! I am not a leader of men, Willy, and neither are you. You werenever anything but a hard-working drummer who landed in the ash-can like all the restof them! I’m one dollar an hour, Willy! I tried seven states and couldn’t raise it! A buck anhour! Do you gather my meaning? I’m not bringing home any prizes any more, andyou’re going to stop waiting for me to bring them home! Pop, I’m nothing! I’m nothing,Pop. Can’t you understand that? There’s no spite in it any more. I’m just what I am,that’s all. Will you let me go, for Christ’s sake? Will you take that phoney dream andburn it before something happens?

Willy: Business is definitely business, but just listen for a minute. You don’t understand this. When I was a boy, eighteen, nineteen, I was already on the road. And there was a question in my mind as to whether selling had a future for me. Because in those days I had a yearning to go to Alaska. See, there were three gold strikes in one month in Alaska, and I felt like going out. Just for the ride, you might say. Oh, yeah, my father lived many years in Alaska. He was an adventurous man. We’ve got quite a little streak of self-reliance in our family. I thought I’d go out with my older brother and try to locate him, and maybe settle in the North with the old man. And I was almost decided to go, when I met a salesman in the Parker House. His name was Dave Singleman. And he was eighty-four years old, and he’d drummed merchandise in thirty-one states. And old Dave, he’d go up to his room, you understand, put on his green velvet slippers, I’ll never forget, and pick up his phone and call the buyers, and without ever leaving his room, at the age of eighty-four, he made his living. And when I say that, I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want. ‘Cause what could be more satisfying than to be able to go, at the age of eight-four, into twenty of thirty different cities, and pick up a phone, and be remembered and loved and helped by so many different people? Do you know? When he died, and by the way he died the death of a salesman, in his green velvet slippers in the smoker of the New York, New Haven and Hartford, going into Boston, when he died, hundreds of salesman and buyers were at his funeral. Things were sad on a lotta trains for months after that. See in those days there was personality in it, Howard. There was respect, and comradeship, and gratitude in it. Today, it’s all cut and dried and there’s no chance for bringing friendship to bear or personality. You see what I mean? They don’t know me anymore!

LINDA: Then make Charley your father, Biff. You can’t do that, can you? I don’t say he’s a great man. Willy Loman never made a lot of money. His name was never in the paper. He’s not the finest character that ever lived. But he’s a human being, and a terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid. He’s not to be allowed to fall into his grave like an old dog. Attention, attention must finally be paid to such a person. You called him crazy, no, a lot of people think he’s lost his balance. But you don’t have to be very smart to know what his trouble is. The man is exhausted. A small man can be just as exhausted as a great man. He works for a company thirty six years this March, opens up unheard-of territories to their trademark, and now in his old age they take his salary away. Are they any worse than his sons? When he brought them business, when he was young, they were glad to see him. But now his old friends, the old buyers that loved him so and always found some order to hand him in a pinch, they’re all dead, retired. He used to be able to make six, seven calls a day in Boston. Now he takes his valises out of the car and puts them back and takes them out again and he’s exhausted. Instead of walking he talks now. He drives seven hundred miles, and when he gets there no one knows him anymore, no one welcomes him. And what goes through a man’s mind, driving seven hundred miles home without having earned a cent? Why shouldn’t he talk to himself? Why? When he has to go to Charley and borrow fifty dollars a week and pretend to me that it’s his pay? How long can that go on? How long? You see what I’m sitting here and waiting for? And you tell me he has no character? The man who never worked a day but for your benefit? When does he get the medal for that?

All My Sons Monologues

Chris Keller is a good son and has never revolted against his father until now. He went to war with his brother, Larry, but only Chris came back. His father, Joe Keller, owns a factory that made cylinder heads for airplanes during the war. Joe shipped disabled parts out of his factory, which ended up killing many American pilots, but he blamed it on another worker. Chris has finally found out after many years that his father is responsible for the incident, and his father is not who Chris thinks he is.

CHRIS: Dad…you did it? (Shocked but keeping voice down) You did it to the others? You sent out a hundred and twenty cracked engine- heads and let those boys die! How could you do that? How? (Voice rises with anger) Dad, you killed twenty-one men! You killed them, you murdered them. (Becomes more furious) Explain it to me. What did you do? (Pause) Explain it to me or I will tear you to pieces! You had a hundred and twenty cracked engine-heads. Why’d you ship them out in the first place? If you knew they were cracked, then why didn’t you tell them? (Relatively long pause, becomes more disgusted) You knew they wouldn’t hold up in the air. You knew that those planes would come crashing down. Were you going to warn them not to use them? Why did you let them out of the factory? (Pause) What kind of a man are you? Kids were hanging in the air by those heads. You knew that, and yet you did nothing about it! (Startled) You did it for me? You wanted to save the business for me? (With burning fury) Is that as far as your mind can see, the business? Don’t you have a country? Don’t you live in the world? What are you? You’re not even an animal, no animal kills his own, what are you? I ought to tear the tongue out of your mouth! What must I do? (Begins to weep) What must I do?

KATE KELLER: I was fast asleep, and — Remember the way he used to fly low past the house when he was intraining? When we used to see his face in the cockpit going by? That’s the way I saw him.
Only high up. Way, way up, where the clouds are. He was so real I could reach out and touch
him. And suddenly he started to fall. And crying, crying to me…Mom, Mom! I could hear him
like he was in the room. Mom! … it was his voice! If I could touch him I knew I could stop him, if
I could only – I woke up and it was so funny – The wind … it was like the roaring of his engine. I
came out here. I must’ve still been half asleep. I could hear that roaring like he was going by.
The tree snapped right in front of me – and I like – came awake. See?
We should never have planted that tree. I said so in the first place; it was too soon to plant a
tree for him.

The Crucible Monologues

MARY WARREN (18-year-old girl, accusing a woman of witchcraft, near hysterical)
I never knew it before. I never knew anything before. When she come into the court I say to myself, I must not accuse this woman, for she sleep in ditches, and so very old and poor….But then….then she sit there, denying and denying, and I feel a misty coldness climbin’ up my back, and the skin on my skull begin to creep, and I feel a clamp around my neck and I cannot breath air, and then………I hear a voice, a screamin’ voice, and it were my voice…..and all at once I remembered everything she done to me!!! So many time, Mister Proctor, she come to this very door beggin’ bread and cider…and mark this…whenever I turned her away empty…..she mumbled!!! You must remember Goody Proctor—last month—a Monday I think…she walked away and I though my guts would burst for two days after. Do you remember it?

ELIZABETH PROCTOR (a somewhat reserved woman, deeply worried about her husband’s affair and what the girl may do to her)
Spoke or silent, a promise is surely made. And she may dote on it now—I am sure she does—and thinks to kill me, then to take my place. It is her dearest hope, John, I know it. There be a thousand names, why does she call mine? There be a certain danger in calling such a name—I am no Goody Good that sleeps in ditches, nor Osburn drunk and half-witted. She’s dare not call out such a farmer’s wife but there be monstrous profit in it. She thinks to take my place, John. John, have you ever shown her somewhat of contempt? She cannot pass you in the church but you will blush…and I think she sees another meaning in that blush. I think you be somewhat ashamed, for I am there, and she so close. Go and tell her she’s a whore. Whatever promise she may sense break it John!! Break it!!!!!

ABIGAIL WILLIAMS (17, trying to coax the man she had an affair with to stop rejecting her)
Why, you taught me goodness, therefore you are good. It were a fire you walked me through, and all my ignorance was burned away. It were a fire, John, we lay in fire. And from that night no woman dare call me wicked any more but I knew my answer. I used to weep for my sins when the wind lifted up my skirts; and blushed for shame because some old Rebecca called me loose. And then you burned my ignorance away. As bare as some December tree I saw them all—walking like saints to church, running to feed the sick, and hypocrites in their hearts! And God gave me strength to call them liars, and God made men to listen to me, and by God I will scrub the world clean for the love of God. Oh John, I will make you such a wife when the world is white again! You will be amazed to see me every day, a light of heaven in your house, a…..Why are you cold?!

TITUBA (a slave from Barbados, trying to save her life after being accused of working with Satan) Bless Him. Bless Him. Eternal glory. Bless Him – bless God… Oh, bless the Lord. Was – was woman. It was black dark, and…Well, they was always talking; they was always runnin’ round and carryin’ on. I believe so, yes, sir. Oh, God bless you, Mr. Hale! Oh, God, protect Tituba! There was four. There was four. Oh, how many times he bid me kill you, Mr. Parris. He say, Mr. Parris must be kill! Mr. Parris no goodly man, Mr. Parris mean man and no gentle man, and he bid me rise out of my bed and cut your throat! But I tell him know. I don’t hate that man. I don’t want kill that man. But he say, you work for me, Tituba, and I make you free! I give you pretty dress to wear, and put you way high up in the air, and you gone fly back to Barbados! And I say, you lie, Devil, you lie! And then he come one stormy night to me, and he say, Look! I have white people belong to me. And I look – and there was Goody Good.

JUDGE DANFORTH (stern judge, defending his court proceedings)
Mister Hale, believe me; for a man of such terrible learning you are most bewildered—I hope you will forgive me. I have been thirty-two year at the bar, sire, and I should be confounded were I called upon to defend these people. Let you consider, now, and I bid you all do likewise:– in an ordinary crime, how does one defend these people? Let you consider, now— and I bid you all do likewise — -in an ordinary crime, how does one defend the accused? One calls up witnesses to prove his innocence. But witchcraft is ipso facto, on its face and by its nature, an invisible crime. Therefore, we must rely upon her victims—–and they do testify, the children certainly do testify. As for the witches, none will deny that we are most eager for their confessions. Therefore, what is left for a lawyer to bring out? I think I have made my point. Have I not?

REV. SAMUEL PARRIS (self-absorbed minister, horrified that his reputation is in danger)
I cannot blink what I saw, Abigail, for my enemies will not blink it. I saw a dress lying in the grass and I thought I saw someone naked running through the trees. I saw it! Now tell me true, Abigail. Now my ministry’s at stake; my ministry and perhaps your cousin’s life….Whatever abomination you have done, give me all of it now, for I dare not be taken unaware when I go before them down there. Abigail, I have fought here three long years to bend these stiff-necked people to me, and now, just now when there must be some good respect for me in the parish, you compromise my very character. I have given you a home, child, I have put clothes upon your back—now give me upright answer:— your name in the town—–it is entirely white, is it not? Abigail, is there any other cause than you have told me, for Goody Proctor discharging you? It has troubled me that you are now seven months out of their house, and in all this time no other family has ever called for your service.

JOHN PROCTOR (a flawed man admitting to having an affair with 17-year-old Abigail to the courts in order to save his wife’s life)
In what time and place? In the proper place, where my beasts are bedded. Eight months now, sir, it is eight months. She used to serve me in my house, sir. A man may think God sleeps, but God sees everything. I know it now. I beg you, sir, I beg you—see her what she is. My wife, my dear good wife took this girl soon after, sir, and put her out on the high road. And being what she is, a lump of vanity, sir (he starts to weep) Excellency, forgive me, forgive me. She thinks to dance with me on my wife’s grave! And well she might! For I thought of her softly. God help me, I lusted, and there is a promise in such sweat! But it is a whore’s vengeance, and you must see it; I set myself entirely in your hands, I know you must see it now. My wife is innocent, except she know a harlot when she see one!!!

A View From The Bridge Monologues

CATHERINE: Don’t, don’t laugh at me! I’ve been here all my life. Every day I saw him when he left in the morning and when he came home at night. You think it’s so easy to turn around and say to a man he’s nothing to you no more? You don’t know – nobody knows! I’m not a baby, I know a lot more than people think I know. 

Beatrice says to be a woman but – then, why don’t she be a woman! If I was a wife I would make a man happy instead of going at him all the time! I can tell from a block away when he’s blue in the mind and just needs to talk to somebody quiet and nice. I can tell when he’s hungry or wants a beer before he even says anything. I know when his feet hurt him – I mean, I know him, and now I’m supposed to turn around and make a stranger out of him? I don’t know why I have to do that, I mean.

ALFIERI: You wouldn’t have known it, but something amusing has just happened. You see how uneasily they nod to me? That’s because I am a lawyer. In this neighborhood to meet a lawyer or a priest on the street is unlucky. We’re only thought of in connection with disasters, and they’d rather not get too close.
I often think that behind that suspicious little nod of theirs lie three thousand years of distrust. A lawyer means the law, and in Sicily, from where their fathers came, the law has not been a friendly idea since the Greeks were beaten.
I am inclined to notice the ruins in things, perhaps because I was born in Italy . . . I only came here when I was twenty-five. In those days, Al Capone, the greatest Carthaginian of all, was learning his trade on these pavements, and Frankie Yale himself was cut precisely in half by a machine gun on the corner of Union Street, two blocks away. Oh, there were many here who were justly shot by unjust men. Justice is very important here.
But this is Red Hook, not Sicily. This is the slum that faces the bay on the seaward side of Brooklyn Bridge. This is the gullet of New York swallowing the tonnage of the world. And now we are quite civilized, quite American. Now we settle for half, and I like it better. I no longer keep a pistol in my filing cabinet.

And my practice is entirely unromantic.

My wife has warned me, so have my friends; they tell me the people in this neighborhood lack elegance, glamour. After all, who have I dealt with in my life? Longshoremen and their wives, and fathers and grandfathers, compensation cases, evictions, family squabbles – the petty troubles of the poor – and yet . . . every few years there is still a case, and as the parties tell me what the trouble is, the flat air in my office suddenly washes in with the green scent of the sea, the dust in this air is blown away and the thought comes that in some Caesar’s year, in Calabria perhaps or on the cliff at Syracuse, another lawyer, quite differently dressed, heard the same complaint and sat there as powerless as I, and watched it run its bloody course.

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