Dramatic Monologues

[Trivun]

Coming up soon at my university are a small number of play auditions that I may or may not decide to go to. But that isn't important. Those, plus the BBC1 show to find a new Dorothy for The Wizard Of Oz, have recently gotten me interested more in acting, something I enjoy but can never get any decent parts in at auditions.

What does this have to do with anything, you ask? Well, I've decided to spend a bit of time practising a few monologues to help me for the next auditions I go to. So what I want now is for people to post their favourite monologues from anything, be it a game, book, film, play, musical, TV show, album or whatever, and see what everyone comes up with. Preferably monologues or dialogues where at least one character is crazy, or romantic, or where the scene is suitably either very comedic or very dramatic.

And for discussion purposes, are any of you interested in theatre or musical theatre? And if so, what plays have you recently seen?

I'm actually very eager to see the muscial Love Never Dies in the West End, ideally during the current initial run (mostly because it would be great to see the original cast performance, and partly also due to a slight immature crush I have on one of the actresses, Niamh Perry, who was a runner-up in Andrew Lloyd-Webber's last TV series, I'd Do Anything). I saw We Will Rock You in the West End as well a few years ago, and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang last summer at the Wolverhampton Grand Theatre . Pretty good performance, plus you can never get tired of Hushabye Mountain. Which kind of defeats the purpose of a lullaby...

 

[Spaghetti]

Probably the "Saint Crispin's Day/Band of Brothers" speech from Shakespeare's Henry V, particularly the Kenneth Branagh version. It's inspirational and always gives me goose bumps.

But old Shaky can always knock out a good monologue...

The last thing I went to the theatre to see was...Spamalot (which happens to be my favorite musical), but I've seen a few of the traditional west end plays like "Mary Poppins" + "The Lion King" for the benefit of my Sister.

I am desperate to see "Enron - The Play" and numerous pieces of Shakespeare like Macbeth and Henry V. (Yes I like Shakespeare, wanna fight about it?)

 

[Acier]

Good luck with your auditions. If you can't find anything interesting, Shakespeare is always a good fall back. As far as my favorite monologues, I tend to like the ones the narrator spins off into during the film True Stories, [sub]favorite film[/sub]. But they tend to be pretty spacey and strange to people who haven't seen the film, and are pretty deadpan, so probably aren't what you're looking for. I'll see if I dig a goodie up from youtube


Not my favorite, but it's the opening exposition and sets the tone for the film.

 

[Hazy]

Any length requirements?

Can't go wrong with Max Payne's cold, collected monologues:

They were all dead. The final gunshot was an exclamation mark to everything that had lead to this point. I released my finger from the trigger.
And then it was all over - the storm seemed to lose it's frenzy, the ragged clouds gave way to the stars above. A bit closer to heaven. The cop's voices were distant and muted. My ghosts released me from their haunting - down below, New York City glittered like diamonds on black velvet. Woden was there in the crowd - standing on the sidelines. It wouldn't be over til' the man with the patch would say so. He'd say the right words, I know he would. He better.
Woden grinned smugly, it was the grin of a winner.
...
That made two of us.

And yes, I'm a fan of theatre. The last play I've seen was our school's rendition of Seussical.

 

[Trivun]

I am desperate to see "Enron - The Play" and numerous pieces of Shakespeare like Macbeth and Henry V. (Yes I like Shakespeare, wanna fight about it?)

Hmmm, not really, I like him too .

Studied Romeo and Juliet for GCSE, then also Macbeth, Henry V and Antony and Cleopatra for GCSE and AS-Level. Managed to see Antony and Cleopatra done by the RSC in the Globe Theatre, South Bank, on a school trip, but it was surprisingly crap. Not what I'd have expected from an RSC production. They basically took the bawdy bits and sex references and played them up to the exclusion of the rest of the subtext. And in the death scene for Antony at the end, the actor hammed it up as much as he could. It was meant to be a historical tragedy with a few comedic bits, but they played it more like a comedy to the exclusion of all drama.

Dropped English Literature for A2, but still managed to get a lucky place on the English department trip to Stratford the following year to see Twelfth Night in the Courtyard Theatre. Someone else dropped out and I was able to plead with my former teachers for his place on the trip . Anyway, that production was amazing, I absolutely loved it.

I'm still quite pissed off I never had a chance to see David Tennant in Hamlet though, my friend went and she said it was bloody brilliant...