Contemporary dramatic monologue for men under 2 minutes.  Man can be 20's to 40's.  Character's name is Mike from the play "Hero Dad" by Laura Jacqmin from Humana Festival 2012: The Complete Plays

The character, Mike, envisions what it would like to be a father.  He addresses a character "Seated Female" who he has got pregnant.  She sits in a waiting room.  He's on the phone with her.  He pleads with her to give him a chance to be a father.

Start the monologue with "I mean, the vision I have of myself?  As a dad?" on page 209 and close the monologue with "we can figure it out" on page 210.

Per Monologue Writing 101, this monologue is notable for:

• Strong want - he has a strong desire to be a father.  
• High stakes - if he doesn't convince her, he may not get the chance.
• Discovery - he's sharing a vision of himself as a father with "Seated Female" likely for the first time.
• Tactics - for a short piece, he tries two tactics: shared with her a positive vision of how he'll be a good father and that he's open to trying to make the relationship work with her.
• Internal Obstacles - he's definitely pushing past some internal obstacles here that he had about commitment to this woman and to having a family.  But he's blasting past them, actually, because there's the real present danger in this dramatic moment of him losing both.

This seriocomic monologue for men is under a minute. You're playing the father of a toddler, a daughter. You're divorced. You only get her two weeks a year. And your upstairs neighbor, who is trying to study for the bar exam is bothered by "the sound of little footsteps." She has come to your door to discuss, This monologue is what you might say to her.

Realistic monologue that will let you play a father who clearly loves his daughter and who is frustrated at his situation in life and his upstairs neighbor.

Find this monologue on page 205 of Actor's Theatre of Louisville Humana Festival 2012 The Complete Plays. Starts with the line "Ok, yes, I got your note."

Monologues for kids.  This is a monologue for a young boy and the character's name is Jack.   Genre is drama.  Falls into the contemporary monologues from movies and film category.

This is from the movie "Room" based on the novel of the same name by Emma Donoghue.  You can find it at 1:47 (one hour forty seven minutes) into the movie.   When I saw it, I was floored.   So poetic, beautiful and simply written which made it all the more powerful.  Imagine being a child who grew up in a room the size of a garden shed, who never saw the outside world.  Based on events in the news where women and their children were held captive for years but a fictionalized account.  The screenplay was nominated for an Academy Award for best writing, adapted screenplay and for a Golden Globe best screenplay - motion picture category.  It's star Brie Larson won best actress at the Oscars and Golden Globes. The movie is straight up moving; if you don't get teary eyed watching it you're clearly an android sent fro the future to destroy us, hehe.  The monologue I'm recommending from this film is an amazing snippet that could be a very moving performance for a young actor auditioning for a drama.  Vulnerable, sweet, innocent, yet wise.  The child actor should be able to play approximately five years old, though I think you could have an older child perform it and it would still be very moving and effective up to about 10 years old.  You watch it and see, the film is available streaming on the various video services or you can get it here.

Start the monologue at 1:47 in the movie (right toward the end of the film) with the line "When I was 4, I didn't even know about the world ... and now me and ma are going to live in it forever and ever until we're dead."  and you can end it just under one minute long with the line "Because it's still just you and me."  Alternately, you can extend it a little longer and end with "Bye Bye Skylight ... Ma, say bye bye to room" at 1:52.

Comedic contemporary monologue for a young woman. Character is 16, named Patricia.

Patricia opens up to a boy she likes. She begins by talking about herself; how accomplished she is. She ends up going deep, talking about her mother's new boyfriend and the loss of her father. By the end, vulnerable, she asks the boy she!s sharing all this with to kiss her.

Piece gives a young woman in her teens plenty of solid comedic and dramatic beats to play. Great journey from funny (she brags about herself) to raw and vulnerable and tragic (she talks about her father's loss, seeing his ghost), to her struggle dealing with her mother having moved on, now in a new romantic relationship, and to curiosity about adult relationships and sex.

• Great hook opening "I have the highest grade point average in my class. I make my own clothes and could play the flute professionally."
• Good balancing past and present action. Recollection reveals her character while being used as a means to get close with a boy she likes.
• Healthy stakes as she's taking a risk she'll reveal who she really is and he'll reject her.
• Strong want to connect, to be kissed.
• Effectively reveals strong emotion under the surface of the storytelling. Here is a young woman who could break down and cry when she thinks about her late father. However se does not, she tells the story of seeing his ghost and how the family dog kept waiting by the door for him to arrive home from work every night. Heartbreaking stuff but she doesn't allow herself to break.

Comedic contemporary monologue for a woman, age range 40's from the play "Cuthbert's Last Stand" by Andrew Biss.

A mother is saddened that her son has turned out straight.  Mrs. Pennington-South, tells her son how she had hoped he would turn out gay like "your cousin Vivian, with his penchant for strolling in the park after dark, and his overall lack of interest in the feminine gender."  She goes over moments from his childhood that shaped the man he grew up to be and blames his father for buying him "some sort of action combat doll" which she believes contributed to his unfortunate straightness.  She just feels life would have been easier for him gay.

Find the monologue on page 31 of 222 Comedy Monologues 2 Minutes and Under Volume 4.   Get the one act play "Cuthbert's Last Stand" by Andrew Biss here.  ​

Comedic monologue for a woman in her 40's from the one-act play "Cuthbert's Last Stand" by Andrew Biss, which won the 5th Annual National One-Act Play Competition in Los Angeles.   Character is a woman in her 40's named Mrs. Pennington-South.

You can find this funny female monologue, highest scoring this week on the laugh-o-meter, on page 33 of 222 Comedy Monologues 2 Minutes and Under Volume 4.

Few reasons I luuuurrrve this one per my Monologue Writing 101:

• Hook opener immediately made me like Andrew Biss' style:  "Thirty years of my life I've squandered on that anonymous hotel guest legally defined as my husband and your father."   Best hook this week (so far).
• The monologue effectively connects past action recalled to the present action.  As Mrs. Pennington-South bemoans in great, vivid rib tickling detail the exasperating soul sucking experience that has been her marriage, she connects these past recollections to her life's current mission, which is to ensure that her son - to whom she's currently speaking - escapes a similar fate.
• Finally, insult comedy is funny.  This monologue is chock full

However, as the great LeVar Burton said "You don't have to take my word for it, read it for yourself."  Get the one act play "Cuthbert's Last Stand" by Andrew Biss here.  

Comedic monologue under 2 minutes for woman in her 20's.  Character's name is Jill.  The monologue is contemporary and can be cut to a one minute monologue if needed and still work well.

The monologue opens "I can't talk about him.  No, I will talk about him."   Decent hook in that immediately we're wondering who "him" is.   Clearly he's not easy for her to talk about.

The monologue gives a young actress a great build of intensity as she rhapsodizes about how wonderful the relationship was with "him" at first describing it as "the kind of passion that made every day seem like the Fourth of July."   Great vehicle to show you can exude passion and excitement. 

However, as the character you'll get so carried away with passion that before you knows it you find yourself at a Justice of the Peace hearing the words "Do you Jack, take Jill, to be your lawfully wedded wife."  Name reveal that the "him" referenced throughout is "Jack."  Not good; you can't imagine going through life as "Jack and Jill."   These moments will allow you to play fear and that OMG, what have I got myself into type feeling.  Put another way in the second major beat of the piece you get carried away by euphoric blissful love and in the third major beat you suddenly put the breaks on and try to screech to a halt before you go too far with the feeling ...

As you apply the brakes hard you see the edge of the cliff drawing closer.  Will you stop in time?  You "wanted to scream, to go running out into the night" however "It was 10 o'clock in the morning and well, you can't go running out into 10 o'clock in the morning."

And then quite a great button closing which also serves as a punchline to the setup above "So instead I passed out.  If only I'd fainted, before I said, I do."   So yeah, you go right over that cliff, too late!  You're married!   

It's quite a fun ride with varied levels of energy and emotion, taking you from reluctance to elation to panic to dismay.

Get this 1 to 2 minute comedic contemporary monologue for a young woman from the play Butterflies are Free here.

You'll find this two minute audition monologue for a woman in her 30's to 40's on page 21 of "Bad Dates" the comic play by Theresa Rebeck.  The monologue starts with the semi-hook "So I'm like, OK, this is just a date that's not going to work out."  Instantly we the audience are a close friend hearing about the character's dating misadventures.  The monologist goes on to tell us how as the guy on this hopeless date talks to her she realizes they're sort of kindred spirits and she feels sort of bad for him.  They've both just recently been through breakups from long term relationships and are getting back out there.  

But just as she's starting to have real sympathy for his situation he begins explaining that it was actually HE who did the breaking up even though he's all sad it had to end.  Our monologist tries to figure out why he ended the relationship and all he can say is he couldn't see "the end of the movie" with the person. After "going around in circles" trying to understand what he means, she concludes that he ended a good relationship because he got an insane metaphor stuck in his head.

​In terms of the ten elements of great audition monologues, this one gets solid marks for elements 1, 4 and 5.  The monologist has a strong desire to make a connection, the piece has a decent hook opening that grabs our attention partly because of how relatable and natural the dialogue sounds, and it has a very good button closing because the monologue's frustration level sort of blows comically on the last line "is it possible you broke up with the woman you loved because of some insane metaphor?"

The monologue gives you varied emotions to play, a journey to go on from feeling defeated (date is going nowhere) to sympathetic (poor guy he's also recovering from a long term relationship like me) to frustrated (this idiot ended a good relationship for NO reason!). 

Preview the monologue on google books here.    Get the play here.

I saw this contemporary dramatic monologue for men while watching Breaking Bad and it blew me away. You'll find the monologue within Breaking Bad Season 4, Episode 10 at 23 minutes into the episode. The monologue is spoken by the character Walt who is in his forties.

The monologue is short under two minutes and exemplifies elements 1-6 and 8 of Monologue Writing 101. The night prior to the monologue Walt's son, Walt Jr., had come to his father's condo to check if everything was alright, because Walt had missed Walt Jr.'s 16th birthday celebration. Walt Jr. finds his father looking beat up, Walt's been in a fight, and drunk. In his drunken weakened state Walt had spoken briefly to his son and then passed out. The monologue takes place the next morning.

In the monologue Walt shares the story of his one real memory of his own father, who died of Huntington's disease when Walt was very young. Walt's memory is of a father who was very sick, barely hanging onto life, who could no longer speak, and who may no longer even have fully recognized him. Walt's only real memory of his father is of a shell of a man. Walt wants his own son, Walt Jr., to remember him at his best. Walt does not want Walt Jr. to remember him the way he was the night before; drunk, beaten, incoherent.

For actors auditioning for a dramatic role, who want to demonstrate they can achieve a layered, nuanced performance - this monologue delivers.

Per Monologue Writing 101, this monologue exemplifies the following elements:

Element 1: Walt has a strong desire for his son to have a positive memory of him. He wants his son to forget what he saw last night.

Element 2: Walt has at stake how his son sees and esteems him. As a father, Walt cares deeply how he will be remembered by his son when he is gone.

Element 3: Walt tries a few tactics to get his son to forget about his lapse in character. He apologizes to his son, he shows his son he feels ashamed, he uses self-deprecation, and finally he opens up about his own father. The memory he shares is something very personal that he has never told his son before.

Element 4: The opening of the monologue serves as an effective hook. It sets up the current state of the relationship dynamic and the want that the speaker has in that relationship. It pulls us in. We want to see if Walt will win over his son. "I wish I could take back last night. It was your birthday, this shouldn’t be on your mind. No it’s not okay, I’m your father and I don’t want last night to be…. I mean you, you really … you can’t think of me like …"

Element 5: The close of the monologue has a solid "button" ending. It effectively connects the past action from Walt's childhood back to the present action between Walt and Walt Jr. and to the strong character want established at the start of the monologue. By the end of the monologue, Walt's want has more weight and has engaged the empathy of Walt Jr. "That is the only real memory that I have of my father. I don’t want you to think of me the way I was last night. I don’t want that to be the memory you have of me when I’m gone."

Element 6: This is an excellent example of a monologue that engages the senses. Walt remembers the smell in hospital where he visited his father, the "stench of Lysol and bleach." He remembers seeing his father lying in bed "all twisted up." And he remembers the sound of his father breathing like "this rattling sound. Like if you were shaking an empty spray paint can. Like there was nothing in him."

Element 8: Past action is used to drive home the present want of the monologist. Walt uses his memory as a tactic to engage his son's empathy, to persuade his son. The author does a good job keeping past action tied to present action.

Here is one example from the monologue where Walt uses a specific detail from the past as a means to connect to his son in the present: "My mother would tell me so many stories about my father. I mean she would talk about him all the time. I knew about his personality, how he treated people, I even knew how he liked his steaks cooked. Medium rare, just like you."