WOMAN - MONOLOGUES
WOMAN
ANNETTE - God of Carnage - Yasmina Reza
Well, if you ask me everyone’s feeling fine. If you ask me everyone’s feeling better. (Hiatus.)
…Everyone’s much calmer, don’t you think?... Men are so wedded to their gadgets… It belittles
them… It takes away all their authority… A man needs to keep his hands free… If you ask me.
Even an attaché case is enough to put me off. There was a man, once, I found really attractive,
then I saw him with a square shoulder-bag, but that was it. There’s nothing worse than a
shoulder-bag. Although there’s also nothing worse than a cell phone. A man out to give the
impression that he’s not alone… If you ask me. I mean, that he’s capable of being aline…! I also
have a John Wayne-ish idea of virility. And what was it he had? A colt 45. A device for creating
a vacuum… A man who can’t give the impression that he’s a loner has no texture… So,
Michael, are you happy? It is somewhat fractured, our little… What was it you said?... I’ve
forgotten the word… but in the end…everyone’s feeling more or less all right… if you ask me.
WOMAN
LISA - Key Exchange - Kevin Wade
When I was very young, my mother got cancer, and it had spread too far by the time they
diagnosed it to do anything but let her die. For about six months she lay in the terminal ward at
Sloan-Kettering. When she first went in, she told my father that her only wish was to see her
family grow up, but that that was impossible, so to kiss her goodbye and leave and don't hang
on for this bumpy ride, as she put it. But the most important thing in the world to my father was
that she have her last wish, so he left his job, sold the house, moved us into the city, went
through miles of red tape, and arranged for a permit to build a sandbox and a swing next to the
parking lot outside her window, where she could see us. And every day that Summer, and after
school and on weekends that fall, he would take me and brother there, and we would play, and
when my brother asked 'Why here?' my father said that Mom was in heaven, but she had a
good view of that particular sandbox. My aunt told me that story when I first started going out
with boys. She said "What your father did for your mother, Lisa, that is love. Be smart, Lisa.
Save your honor for the man who loves you." It was a long time before I could even give a
decent kiss without somewhere asking myself whether or not this guy would stand outside my
window for six months while I died.
WOMAN
GRACE - Appearances - Tina Howe
Of course Kenny's no slouch in the looks department either, he's as handsome as the day is
long. He's been after Donna for years. He comes from a nice family, simple people,
hardworking. He's one of eleven. Can you imagine having eleven kids? Boy, I could no more
deal with eleven kids than fly to the moon! It was all I could do to raise Donna, but to have ten
more as well... all those lives to worry about... I'd be a total nervous wreck! I don't know how
Kenny's mother does it. That woman is a saint, an utter saint! You see there are some problems
in their blood.... well, I guess you'd call them more than "problems" they're more like disabilities,
severe disabilities.. It's so tragic, They're such a darling family, and then to have all that.... that...
One of Kenny's sisters was born without legs and another one has extra fingers. I could never
handle that. Having handicapped children who break my heart every time I look at them. No
thank you.
WOMAN
GIRL - A Boy's Life - Howard Korder
I have visions. I close my eyes and see things. There's noting I can do about it. Once I closed
my eyes and I saw a plane going down in a jungle. Inside a boy and girl were sucking on an
orange. Their bodies were eaten by monkeys. (Pause) I don't work in a record store. I was only
pretending to work there. I do that sometimes, go into a place and pretend I work there. I'm
mentally ill. I used to be a lot worse. When I was fourteen I weighed eighty pounds. I didn't eat. I
was trying to make myself disappear. Getting rid of my flesh seemed easy. But I couldn't figure
out how to get rid of my bones. That's the hardest part. You don't believe me do you? What
would you think if I told you my father tried to run me over with a steam roller. I had thirty
seconds to escape. What you have to do is totally relax your muscles. Then the cords slip right
off. But my father would tie double knots. He wanted to kill me. Because he wasn't allowed to
fuck me.
WOMAN
NINA - Passion Fish - John Sayles
Nina: "I didn't ask for the anal probe." Hmm. Four years starving in New York, doing showcases
I had to pay for myself. That was my first big break. My first feature -- this, like, zero-budget
movie about people who were taken up into alien spaceships and given physicals against their
will -- I go in for the audition and the director is really intense and mysterious, and he has me sit
with my eyes closed and free associate, right? We do these improvs about the aliens
representing our most primal fears and...it's great! Finally, some real acting! And they tell me
before I leave that I've got the part! Only I don't know what it is yet, but I'm so thrilled because
it's this feature, you know? It's not a student film or anything. So the agent gives me my script
and I go through it looking for Margaret, the part that they say I have, and I've got my yellow
underliner marker in my hand, only it's drying out, and finally I find only one page with the corner
folded over, and I'm in this therapy group of these people who have had these alien physicals,
and I've got only one line: "I didn't ask for the anal probe." But I'm a professional, right? I
prepared! I had backstory on this woman! I knew that she had been to the hairdresser before
she came to the therapy group. I knew that she didn't trust that guy who sat next to the fuchsia. I
knew that she turned the TV set on the minute she got back to her apartment, just for the sound
of it. And I even had my boyfriend, my boyfriend at the time...with a thermometer, you know, um,
for the sense memory, right? I was loaded for fucking bear! So finally it comes time to shoot the
scene. And they do one take of the wide shot and they stop before my line! I was terrified that
they were gonna cut it. They move in for reaction shots, close-ups, mostly things that mean that
I have to go and sit outside because the camera is set up where my chair is. Well, by the time
they get to me, the crew is grumpy because it's late and they're non-union and they don't get
paid extra for overtime. The lead actor is gone. He's got his shrink appointment and...I'm alone!
And I'm staring at this piece of tape stuck to a stand next to the camera and the director says,
"Okay. Let's try it a few times without cutting and, uh, show me a few different colors."
(Nina pauses dramatically)
"I didn't ask for the anal probe."
(pauses again)
"I didn't ask for the anal probe!"
(Pauses again, makes an angry face)
"I didn't ask for the anal probe!"
(Pauses, looks sad)
"I didn't ask for the anal probe."
(She breaks character.)
That was it.
WOMAN
VAL - A Chorus Line - The Musical
VAL - That was my plan. New York, New York. Except I had one minor problem. See, I was ugly
as sin. I was ugly, skinny, homely, unattractive and flat as a pancake. Get the picture? Anyway,
I got off this bus in my little white shoes, my little white tights, little white dress, my little ugly
face, and my long blonde hair - which was natural then. I looked like a fucking nurse! I had 87
dollars in my pocket and seven years of tap and acrobatics. I could do a hundred and eighty
degree split and come up tapping the Morse Code. Well, with that kind of talent I figured the
Mayor would be waiting for me at Port Authority. Wrong! I had to wait 6 months for an audition.
Well, finally the big day came. I showed up at the Music Hall with my red patent leather tap
shoes. And I did my little tap routine. And this man said to me: Can you do fankicks? - Well,
sure I could do terrific fankicks. But they weren't good enough. Of course, what he was trying to
tell me was...it was the way I looked, not the fankicks. So I said: Fuck you, Radio City and the
Rockettes! I'm gonna make it on Broadway!
Well, Broadway, same story. Every audition. I mean I'd dance rings around the other girls and
find myself in the alley with the other rejects. But after a while I caught on. I mean I had eyes. I
saw what they were hiring. I also swiped my dance card once after an audition. And on a scale
of 10....they gave me for dance 10. For looks: 3.
WOMAN
HEAVENLY - Sweet Bird of Youth -Tennessee Williams
HEAVENLY: Don't give me your "Voice of God" speech. Papa, there was a time when you
could have saved me, by letting me marry a boy that was still young and
clean, but instead you drove him away, drove him out of St. Cloud. And
when he came back, you took me out of St. Cloud, and tried to force me to
marry a fifty-year-old money bag that you wanted something out of - and
then another, another, all of them ones you wanted something out of. I'd
gone, so Chance went away. Tried to compete, make himself big as these
big-shots you wanted to use me for a bond with. He went. He tried. The
right doors wouldn't open, and so he went in the wrong ones, and - Papa,
you married for love, why wouldn't you let me do it, while I was alive, inside,
and the boy was still clean, still decent? You married for love, but you
wouldn't let me do it, and even though you'd done it, you broke Mama's
heart. Miss Lucy was your mistress long before Mama died. And Mama
was just in front of you.
WOMAN
ELIZABETH BARRY - The Libertine - Stephen Jeffries
ELIZABETH: You have no understanding, do you? You have comprehended – just – that I am
tired of being your mistress and your solution is to conscript me into becoming
your wife. It is not being a mistress I am tired of, John. I am tired of you. I do not
wish to be your wife. I do not wish to be anyone’s wife. I wish to continue being the
creature I am. I am no Nell Gwyn, I will not give up the stage as soon as a King or a
Lord has seen me on it and, wishing me to be his and his alone, will then pay a
fortune to keep me off it. I am not the sparrow you picked up in the roadside, my
love. London walks into this theatre to see me – not George’s play nor Mr.
Betterton. They want me and they want me over and over again. And when people
desire you in such a manner, then you can envisage a steady river of gold lapping
at your doorstep, not five pound here or there for pity or bed favours, not a noble’s
ransom for holding you hostage from the thing you love, but a lifetime of money
amassed through your own endeavours. That is riches. ‘Leave this gaudy, gilded
stage’. You’re right, this stage is gilded. It is gilded with my future earnings. And I
will not trade those for a dependency on you. I will not swap my certain glory for
your undependable love.
WOMAN
Luciana - Comedy of Errors - William Shakespeare
And may it be that you have quite forgot
A husband's office? shall, Antipholus.
Even in the spring of love, thy love-springs rot?
Shall love, in building, grow so ruinous?
If you did wed my sister for her wealth,
Then for her wealth's sake use her with more kindness:
Or if you like elsewhere, do it by stealth;
Muffle your false love with some show of blindness:
Let not my sister read it in your eye;
Be not thy tongue thy own shame's orator;
Look sweet, be fair, become disloyalty;
Apparel vice like virtue's harbinger;
Bear a fair presence, though your heart be tainted;
Teach sin the carriage of a holy saint;
Be secret-false: what need she be acquainted?
What simple thief brags of his own attaint?
'Tis double wrong, to truant with your bed
And let her read it in thy looks at board:
Shame hath a bastard fame, well managed;
Ill d eeds are doubled with an evil word.
Alas, poor women! make us but believe,
Being compact of credit, that you love us;
Though others have the arm, show us the sleeve;
We in your motion turn and you may move us.
Then, gentle brother, get you in again;
Comfort my sister, cheer her, call her wife:
'Tis holy sport to be a little vain,
When the sweet breath of flattery conquers strife.
ANTIPHOLUS
WOMAN
BEATRICE - Much Ado About Nothing - William Shakespeare
You kill me to deny it. Farewell. I am gone, though I am
here: there is no love in you: nay, I pray you, let me go. In faith, I will go. You
dare easier be friends with me than fight with my enemy. Is Claudio not
approved in the height a villain, that hath slandered, scorned, dishonoured
my kinswoman? O that I were a man! What, bear her in hand until they
come to take hands; and then, with public accusation, uncovered slander,
unmitigated rancour, - O, God that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the
market-place. Talk with a man out at window! A proper saying! Sweet Hero!
She is wronged, she is slandered, she is undone. Princes and counties!
Surely, a princely testimony, a goodly count, Count Comfect; a sweet
gallant surely! O that I were a man for his sake! Or that I had any friend
would be a man for my sake! But manhood is melted into courtesies, valour
into compliment, and men are only turned into tongue, and trim ones too
he is now as valiant as Hercules that only tells a lie and swears it.