One-minute monologues are essential for any actor serious about their acting career to have under their belt.
But finding a good monologue for you within the right genre and age range can be tricky. So I’m here to help.
In this article, you will find original monologues from various genres of material to use for audition purposes in everything from film and TV to community theater.
If something connects with you, that’s a good sign to use it.
Table of Contents
1 Minute Comedic Monologues for Women
Below are three great one-minute comedy monologues for females.
Regina, Mean Girls: the Musical
“I’m going to forgive you. Because I’m on a lot of pain medication right now. You know I died for fifteen seconds, right? Spoiler alert: heaven looks like a really nice hotel in Miami. When I woke up in the street, all I could see was my mom’s face and Gretchen’s big face looking down at me. And they looked so surprised. Not even sad, just like, surprised that I could be bleeding. Like they forgot I was a human person. I’ve actually been a human person this whole time. I know I was harsh. And people say I’m a b—. But you know what they would call me if I was a boy? “Reginald”. That’s what my mom was gonna name me if I was a boy, so honestly I’d rather be ‘b—’.”
Janice, Friends (TV show)
“That’s fine. Because I know that this isn’t the end. It isn’t, because you wont let that happen. Don’t you know it yet? You love me, Chandler Bing. No? Well then ask yourself this. Why do you think we keep ending up together? New Year’s? Who invited who? Valentine’s? Who asked who into whose bed? You seek me out. Something deep in your soul calls out to me like a foghorn. JANICE, JANICE. You want me. You need me. You can’t live without me. And you know it. You just don’t know you know it. See ya!”
Nicky, Orange is the New Black (TV show)
“Hey, you know that thing that happens to lesbians in high school? How we strike up a really intense best-friendship with a straight girl who’s really into it. And we can convince ourselves that friends is good, right? Until she gets a boyfriend. We hate that poor asshole with the white-hot heat of a thousand suns, a ‘he’s not worthy of you’ or whatever when he’s probably a decent-enough person, I mean, as guys go. Because what’s really happening is that we’re in love with our friend. You think you’re not in love with her? Sure. Let’s go with that. But in the event that you were having the feels for her? Yeah, it turns out that by hating her boyfriend, you’re just gonna drive her away. I mean, you gotta suck it up and make him like you. Take up poker. Watch the Godfather 10 times or whatever. Anyway, it’s your life. I mean, spend it how you want, all right?”
1 Minute Dramatic Monologues for Females
Below are four good one-minute drama monologues for women.
Jo March, Little Women (film)
“If I was a girl in a book this would all be so easy. Just give up the world happily. I’ve always been quite content with my family, I don’t understand it. Perhaps I was too quick in turning him down, Laurie. If he asked me again I think I would say yes. Do you think he’ll ask me again? I care more to be loved, I want to be loved. I just feel like women, they have minds and they have souls as well as just hearts. And they’ve got ambition and talent as well as just beauty, and I’m so sick of people saying love is all a woman is fit for. I’m so sick of it, but I’m so lonely.”
Max, Stranger Things (TV show)
“It’s kind of awesome, the fog I mean, it looks like the ocean. The waves, California, I miss it but, no, that’s not it, my Dad’s still there. You see, there’s this legal term called divorce when two married people don’t love each other anymore, yeah. My mom and my stepdad, they wanted a fresh start away from him. As if, as if he was the problem, which is total bull, and things are just worse now. My stepbrother’s always been a jerk, but now he’s just, angry all the time and he can’t take it out on my mom so he takes it out on me. I don’t even know why I’m telling you this.”
Catherine, Proof by David Auburn (play)
“I lived with him. I spent my life with him. I fed him. Talked to him. Tried to listen when he talked. Talked to people who weren’t there… Watched him shuffling around like a ghost. A very smelly ghost. He was filthy. I had to make sure he bathed. My own father…
After my mother died it was just me here. I tried to keep him happy no matter what idiotic project he was doing. He used to read all day. He kept demanding more and more books. I took them out of the library by the carload. We had hundreds upstairs. Then I realized he wasn’t reading: he believed aliens were sending him messages through the Dewey decimal numbers on the library books. He was trying to work out the code…
Beautiful mathematics. The most elegant proofs, perfect proofs, proofs like music… Plus fashion tips, knock-knock jokes – I mean it was nuts, OK? Later the writing phase: scribbling nineteen, twenty hours a day… I ordered him a case of notebooks and he used every one. I dropped out of school… I’m glad he’s dead.”
Zelda, The Shape of Water (movie)
“When I was a little girl- I found a turtle sitting out in the middle of the road. Crossing it slowly. Car could run it over any minute. So, I picked it up, took it to a pond way back behind my house… and I laid it down under a big camphor tree, and I thought… “Mmmh- It’s gonna be so happy here”. And I left it there. (beat) But that night I figured out I had no idea where it was going… Far as I know it was bringing food to its nest or- looking to procreate- or escaping an owl. And maybe the worst place to keep it- maybe the place it was running from was that pond under that camphor tree. (looks at the fish) I didn’t care. I just did what I wanted with it…”
1 Minute Monologues for Teens
Below are three great one-minute monologues for young people (young adult genre).
Anna Coleman, Freaky Friday (film) – females
“Mr. Bates, may I please speak with you? By what stretch of the imagination… I mean, like, how could I, like, get an ‘F’? I mean, what mistakes did I make? That was a college-level analysis. In a matter of fact I most certainly am qualified of making that point. ‘As in Hamlet, “what’s done is done”’? That’s Macbeth, you know-nothing twit. Bates. Elton Bates. Griffith High School. Well, you asked me, I mean, my mom to the prom, but she turned you down. And now you’re taking it out on her daughter, aren’t you? Aren’t you?! Oh come on, it was high school dance. I mean, you’ve got to let go and move on, man. And if you don’t, I’m sure the school board would love to hear about your pathetic vendetta against an innocent student. Oh, and by the way Elton, she had a boyfriend, and you were weird.”
Paul, Election (movie) – males
“Yeah. Oh, one more thing. Tammy. You know, all this election stuff. ‘Cause, you know, everyone is saying it’s so weird that you’re running against me, and, well, it is kind of weird, and you haven’t really told me why you’re doing it and didn’t tell me in advance or anything. But that’s okay, you know. l respect your privacy. I just want you to know that no matter who wins, if it’s you or me, there’s no hard feelings. We’re still brother and sister. Okay? Cause… and I hope you feel the same.
Okay. Great. I feel good.
Oh. Oh. Yeah. Right. One other thing. Since you know Lisa so well, could you give me some advice? I want to get her something for helping me with the election. You know something really special — like flowers or candy or flowers and candy. Or is that too typical? I mean, can you think of something? Something really special? You know something she’d really like?”
Ren, Footloose: The Musical – males
“We both are. You and me. We’ve both lost somebody. And even though people say they understand, they don’t really. I bet you stop a hundred times a day and wonder “why?” I do. I wonder why’d my Dad leave? Was it something I did? Something I didn’t do? Could I have made him stay? Maybe I could bring him back? But I can’t. But I don’t have to tell you. You know what that’s like. So, I guess I came to town frustrated and angry, and it felt really good to kick up a fuss. And I know it got people upset, and I’m sorry for that. But I’m just trying to move on. Cuz I’m so tired of looking back. (Shrugs.) And I can’t stand still. Okay, look, I’m gonna go. I know you’re gonna do what you’ve gotta do – about the dance and all – but thanks for listening.”
1 Minute Comedic Monologues for Males
Below are three great monologues for males in the comedy genre.
Man, Laughing Wild by Christopher Durang (play)
“The other night I dreamt my father was inside a baked potato. Isn’t that strange? I was very startled to see him there, and I started to be afraid other people would see where my father was, and how small he was, so I kept trying to close the baked potato, but I guess the potato was hot, cause he’d start to cry when I’d shut the baked potato, so then I didn’t know what to do. I thought of sending the whole plate back to the kitchen — tell the cook there’s a person in my baked potato — but then I felt such guilt at deserting my father that I just sat there at the table and cried. He cried too. Then the waiter brought dessert, which was devil’s food cake with mocha icing, and I ate that. Then I woke up, very hungry. I told my therapist about the dream, and he said that the baked potato represented either the womb or where I tried to put my father during the Oedipal conflict — “what Oedipal conflict?”, I always say to him, “I won, hands down.” And then my therapist said my father cried because he was unhappy, and that I dreamt about the cake because I was hungry. I think my therapist is an idiot. Maybe I should just have gurus. Or find a nutritionist. But what I’m doing now isn’t working.”
Johnny, Frankie and Johnny in the Clair De Lune
“I’ll tell you why I was laughing. All of a sudden — just like that! — I remembered this time back in high school when I was making out with this really beautiful girl and was feeling incredibly suave and sophisticated and wondering if anybody would believe my good fortune and worrying if she was going to let me go all the way — I think it would have been her first time too — when all of a sudden I let out this incredibly loud fart. Like that. Only louder. It was awful. (He laughs again.) And there was no pretending it wasn’t me. You couldn’t say something like “Boy, did you hear that thunder?” or “Jesus, Peggy, was that you?” The best I could come up with was “May I use your bathroom?” which only made it worse. And there in the bathroom was her mother taking a bath at ten o’clock at night. She had one arm up, washing her armpit. I said something real cool like, “Hello, Mrs. Roberts.” She screamed and I ran out of the house. I tripped over the garbage cans and tore my pants climbing over the backyard fence. I must’ve run twenty blocks, most of them with dogs chasing me. I thought my life was over. We never mentioned what happened and I never dated her again and I lost my virginity with someone else. But that fart banged that back into my consciousness just then…!”
Lon, The Notebook (movie)
“You know, I’ve been thinking a lot about why we shouldn’t get married. At first, I couldn’t think of any reasons. But then it dawned on me. The one dark secret that will absolutely be the wedge that keeps us apart. Your parents. Dear old Mom and Dad. You see, here’s the problem. They love me. I am exactly the type of man your parents want you to marry. From the south, have a good job… And an absolutely wonderful dancer, if I do say so myself. If you marry me, your parents will be ecstatic, and you will have lost a lifelong battle of defiance against them. See what I’m saying? I think you have to marry me. Because if you do, your parents will always know the unhappiness you feel for not being able to disappoint them. Imagine the guilt they would feel for not allowing you to choose your husband unwisely. They’d be racked with guilt. They’d be miserable. So even though you’ve technically lost, you’ve really won.”
1 Minute Dramatic Monologues for Males
Below are three excellent monologues for males in the drama genre from both plays and movies.
Pony, SubUrbia by Eric Bogosian (play)
“Awesome! (Pony puts down his beer, stretches and stands.) You know something? I feel good. I feel good out with you guys again. I forgot what it was like to just hang out. And you know why it feels so right? Because you guys are real, you guys have a sense of humor, you live your lives. The guys on the road, the band, all they talk about is scoring chicks. And Danny, all he thinks about is money.
No, I mean, when we were driving out here, I told George, the driver, to roll the windows down, just so I could smell the air. The aroma of freshly cut grass… great! The houses were flashing by and I could see into the picture windows. Families watching TV, eating dinner, a guy drinking a beer. The suburbs! They don’t call it “The American Dream” for nothing.
(Pony receives blank stares)
This afternoon I went by the mall and just walked around by myself. I just wanted to be alone and get, you know, that old mall feeling.
(Strumming his guitar idly) You know, order, safety, security. I’ve been trying to write something about it. But it’s new… nah… never mind.”
Romeo, Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare (play)
“But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief,
That thou her maid art far more fair than she:
Be not her maid, since she is envious;
Her vestal livery is but sick and green
And none but fools do wear it; cast it off.
It is my lady, O, it is my love!
O, that she knew she were!
She speaks yet she says nothing: what of that?
Her eye discourses; I will answer it.
I am too bold, ’tis not to me she speaks:
Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres till they return.
What if her eyes were there, they in her head?
The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars,
As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright
That birds would sing and think it were not night.
See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand!
O, that I were a glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek!”
Max, Network (movie)
“It’s too late, Diana! There’s nothing left in you that I can live with! You’re one of Howard’s humanoids, and, if I stay with you, I’ll be destroyed! Like Howard Beale was destroyed! Like Laureen Hobbs was destroyed! Like everything you and the institution of television touch is destroyed! You are television incarnate, Diana, indifferent to suffering, insensitive to joy. All of life is reduced to the common rubble of banality. War, murder, death are all the same to you as bottles of beer. The daily business of life is a corrupt comedy. You even shatter the sensations of time and space into split-seconds and instant replays. You are madness, Diana, virulent madness, and everything you touch dies with you. Well, not me! Not while I can still feel pleasure and pain and love!”
1 Minute Monologues for Any Gender
Below are three excellent monologues useful for all genders from plays.
Rendall Age, Headbaby by Joseph Arnone (play)
“I’ve repeatedly told you that society has changed. The world isn’t as you remember it. Your kind is no longer in control. Today, when humans are born, they are born inside a center and in this center they are designed according to the new laws of the realm. Basically, you are a rare breed that has gone extinct and no one cares. They stopped caring a very long time ago. Humanity had so much potential, but you’ve all seemed to get in your own way all too often and when it came down to it, a series of poor decisions were made and it was too late to ever go back. You are the last batch that was left behind on a whim. You aren’t even good enough for spare parts…oh, don’t feel so bad. Really. Each of us has our own reality and this is simply your own reality. I needed to map you and surprisingly everything successfully uploaded into my database. There is an entire copy of your brain in digital form, so you can live on.”
Puck, A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare (play)
“Through the forest have I gone.
But Athenian found I none,
On whose eyes I might approve
This flower’s force in stirring love.
Night and silence..Who is here?
Weeds of Athens he doth wear:
This is he, my master said,
Despised the Athenian maid;
And here the maiden, sleeping sound,
On the dank and dirty ground.
Pretty soul! she durst not lie
Near this lack-love, this kill-courtesy.
Churl, upon thy eyes I throw
All the power this charm doth owe.
When thou wakest, let love forbid
Sleep his seat on thy eyelid:
So awake when I am gone;
For I must now to Oberon.”
Dee, The Littlefield Gazette Does Not End Today by Don Zolidis (play)
“Hey. I see you. That means I see you. And I really like what I see. But that’s not with my eyes, okay? I see you with everything. And I think you’re glorious, and so unique— —but that just means you’re you and you’re not trying to be anyone else. And that is the rarest thing in the world. I’ve spent so much of my life trying to figure who I am, and I look at you, and you are so magnificently perfectly uniquely you—effortlessly—it’s like everyone is in black and white and you’re in like high-definition 4D eight billion pixels clarity. And that’s why I want you to be my girlfriend, and I want to be your sweetheart.”
1 Minute Monologues for Kids
Lucy, You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown (musical) – girls
“Do you know what I intend? I intend to be a queen. When I grow up I’m going to be the biggest queen there ever was, and I’ll live in a big palace and when I go out in my coach, all the people will wave and I will shout at them, and… and… in the summertime I will go to my summer palace and I’ll wear my crown in swimming and everything, and all the people will cheer and I will shout at them… What do you mean I can’t be queen? Nobody should be kept from being a queen if she wants to be one. It’s usually just a matter of knowing the right people….well…. if I can’t be a queen, then I’ll be very rich then I will buy myself a queendom. Yes, I will buy myself a queendom and then I’ll kick out the old queen and take over the whole operation myself. I will be head queen.”
Bruce, Matilda, The Musical (musical) – boys
“Okay, look, alright, I stole the cake. And honestly I was really, definitely, sort of almost thinking about owning up… maybe? But the thing was I was having a lot of trouble with my belly. You see, the Trunchbull’s cake was so good that I’d scoffed it down too quick and now it was beginning to fight back.
His belly rumbles.
Ooops. See?
Rumble. Bruce lets out a truly enormous burp, but really, really enormous, it goes on forever. It hovers above him.
It was the biggest burp I had ever done. It was the biggest burp I had ever heard, the biggest burp I had ever heard about. It was like the entire world went silent for that burp to exist, as a huge cloud of chocolaty gas wafted from my mouth and drifted… across the class…
It drifts across the class.
Past Lavender… Past Alice… Past Matilda…
Drifts past Matilda
…and then, my great big beautiful chocolaty burp, which now seemed to have a mind of its own, wafted full into the face of the Trunchbull.”
Jack, Room (movie) – boys
“I’ve been in the world nineteen hours. I’ve seen pancakes and stairs and a cat and windows and hundreds of cars and birds and police and doctors and Grandma and Grandpa, and persons with different faces and bigness and smells talking all at the same time. The world’s like all TV planets on at the same time, so I don’t know which what to look and listen. Doors and doors, and behind all the doors, there’s another inside and another outside and things happen-happen-happening, it never stops. Plus, the world’s always changing brightness and hotness, and there’s invisible germs floating everywhere. When I was small I only knew small things but now I’m five I know everything.”
Closing Thoughts
You can expect everyone from directors, talent agents, casting directors, and even your drama teacher to ask you to perform a short monologue.
The one-minute monologues in this article can be used for auditions for agencies, theatre, film, or work you put on your acting website and social media for recognition.
These monologues are a great place to start, but there are many resources to find one that truly resonates with you.
Make sure not to do a monologue only because it’s material you’re familiar with or something you know is famous.
Not only does that take the passion out of your performance, but it is annoying for casting directors to hear monologues considered “popular” by modern standards all the time.
Also, looking through physical scripts and new plays at your local library is something I recommend – you might find a wonderful monologue unavailable online.
If you want to go the internet route, there are various sites with free monologues. Some of these include:
- https://www.dailyactor.com
- https://www.cosmopolitan.com
- https://www.stagemilk.com
- https://www.monologuedb.com
- https://www.nycastings.com
Keep looking for great material, and find something that sticks in your head and heart!
If you enjoyed this article, check out Cinematic Masterpieces: 25 Monologues That Shaped Film and see some examples of established actors delivering wonderful monologues.
Free PDF Download
Here’s a free PDF with all these monologues you can download and print.
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