Finding the ideal monologue is a crucial component of audition preparation. You want to make sure it highlights your best qualities and skills.
I have some monologues that I really enjoy performing, but am I cut out to play the role? Both the actor and the monologue must be a good fit for the role.
And the monologue must be the right fit for the audition.
So here is a free list of audition monologues for women of different ages in the contemporary comedy style.
Please note: No copyright infringement is intended and we fully acknowledge the source of all scripts.
5 CONTEMPORARY COMEDY MONOLOGUES FOR WOMEN
1 – How Was Your Day Darling Face? (Comedy) – Joseph Arnone
Beverly’s husband comes home from work and asks her how her day was and the following comedic monologue is Beverly’s response.
When I got into your old ass, run down, rathole of a truck, I turned on the ignition and noticed a little red gas light that caught my attention. In fact, there was also a yellow light that looked like a wrench and an orange light that looked like an oil can but I said to myself, “Screw it! I’m sure my man maintains his ride.”
Besides, I needed to get the hell out of all that claustrophobic air I’ve been breathing anyway, so I drove out the driveway and drove on up to the top of the hill when suddenly, there was a cough, a jump and a kick, which turned your truck completely off and forced me to ride back down the hill, in reverse mind you and after panic, sweat and screams I magically parked your ride back to its original resting place and parked…backwards.
(sarcastically) Right back where I started.
To think that I actually thought I could figure out how to start your truck again, I opened up the hood and peered all the way in but guess what happened next…wanna guess? (beat) A bear decided to greet me with its presence. Yep. A bear. I’m not talking some cute little fuzzy wuzzy come pet me bear. I’m talking a ten foot panting I’m gonna bite your head off bear.
I ran. I ran like a mofo and got my a** back inside this house, screaming on top of my lungs yet again and crying for dear life but no worries, I’m here and I survived.
So no, I didn’t get far. I stayed home all day listening to absolutely nothing but bugs crawling and mating and taking turns observing either the human eating bear outside or the wonderful flickering light we have in our kitchen.
No bulbs! We are out of freaking bulbs. Ha!
Cooking you dinner made me feel like I was under some form of interrogation. Flicker! Flicker! Flicker! Flicker! But I am a trooper and you are home and (pointing) there-is-your-din-din.
How was your day darling face?
2 – Chewing Gum Dreams (Comedy) – Michaela Coel
Tracey is a boisterous teenager who mocks those around her. She’s young, naïve, and hungry for full adulthood.
His lips are thin, and soft, and very pink and one time we kissed for eight minutes, I know coz we started kissing when Craig David’s album was on, and it was like Walking Away, which is three minutes 27 seconds and then we kept kissing after that when Time to Party came on which is like four minutes and six seconds so all together that’s like eight minutes. Eight minutes.
If I look at him for more than like six seconds he starts squinting – he’s not going blind or anything coz they sort of get bigger at the same time, sort of like – I think it’s coz he really likes the way my face is. He says I’m like a little firecracker and he’s like… I dunno, someone smart.
He’s not like those boys that take you cinema just so they can kiss you in the dark, we walk outside holding hands. And he likes the way my face is.
Right now I am looking at the sea for the first time in my life. He blindfolded me and took me all the way to a beach.
I’ve never seen so much water before, and it’s not the water it’s just, I’ve never seen anything like this in the whole course of my life.
“Where are we?”
“Margate”
“Mah… Gate…”
I don’t actually know where Margate is but I’m guessing it must be like… past Enfield coz we ain’t got anything like this in my borough or in any of the neighbouring boroughs I’m sure.
“Gosh, it goes back for ages. It goes so far, it joins with the sky.”
I feel like crying, but not from sadness. “Thank you.”
3 – Good People (Comedy) – David Lindsay-Abaire
Margaret is on a cigarette break at work, talking to her younger boss who also happens to be the son of her dead friend, Suzie.
Did I ever tell you the turkey story? Up at Flanagan’s? When I worked up there and she came in? She never told you that turkey story? Huh. She was pregnant with you. No, Jimmy actually – she was pregnant with Jimmy – because it was near Christmas, and your father was locked up in Walpole again, so she didn’t have any money for anything. She had nothing.
So your mother comes into Flanagan’s, and she’s out to here. (Indicates belly.) When’s Jimmy’s birthday? January. Right, so she’s out to here, and in this big coat. Remember that blue coat she always wore? And she’s walking up and down the aisles, slipping things in the pockets – potatoes, and cans of cranberry sauce, cookies, because you guys gotta eat, right?
So she comes waddling up to my register. And I’m like, “Hey Suzie, how are the kids?” And she doesn’t wanna talk obviously, she’s just trying to push through the line, “Oh they’re good, I was just looking for something, but you don’t have it, so I’m gonna try someplace else.”
And then there turkey falls out of her coat. It hits the floor right between her legs. A turkey. Boom. And I swear to god, she didn’t miss a beat. She looks up, real mad, and yells, “Who threw that bird at me?!” (Really laughing now).
Oh we died. Everybody there. Ya had to laugh. “Who threw that bird at me?!” She was a funny sonofabitch. Pardon my French. God she was funny.
I think about her all the time. Your mother was a good lady. It’s a lesson though. You’re lucky you don’t smoke. Too young, your mother.
4 – Last of the Red Hot Lovers (Comedy) – Neil Simon
Jeanette is a staunch moralist considering an affair.
Do you know Charlotte Korman, big, red-headed, buxom woman, her husband is the Mercedes-Benz dealer in Wantagh? Mel doesn’t like her. He doesn’t want me to see her.
He doesn’t want her to be my friend, doesn’t want her to come to our house; he can’t stand Charlotte Korman. He’s been having an affair with her for eight months!
I had to stop seeing her three times a week so he could see her four times a week. These are the times we live in, Barney. You know what my proof is? He told me.
Two o’clock in the morning, he leans over, taps me on the shoulder and says, “I’ve had an affair with Charlotte Korman.” Who asked him?
When he tapped me on the shoulder in the middle of the night I thought he wanted me! You know what it is to wake up from a sound sleep with no eyelashes and a dry mouth and hear that your husband is getting it from a woman you’re not allowed to see for lunch?
And you know why he told me, Barney? He explained it to me. We’re living in a new guiltless society. You can do anything you want as long as you’re honest about it.
Aren’t we lucky to be living in such a civilised age? In the old days I would have gone to my grave ignorant of the wonderful and beautiful knowledge that my husband was spending his afternoons humping Charlotte Korman!…
When he told me, I didn’t say a word. I went down to the kitchen and made myself a cream cheese and jelly sandwich on date-nut bread.
And that was the last time in eight months that I tasted food… I estimate, going four times a week, I should be through with Doctor Margolies in another year.
And then, when we both think I’m ready, I’m going to get in my car and drive off the Verrazano Bridge. In the meantime, I’m very depressed.
Excuse me, Barney. Nothing personal, but I don’t think we’re going to have our affair.
5 – Painting Churches (Comedy) – Tina Howe
Mags is an adult artist visiting her parents, who sees her role as daughter changing.
It was wintertime, because I noticed I’d left some crayons on top of my radiator and they’d melted down into these beautiful shimmering globs, like spilled jello, trembling and pulsing.
Naturally, I wanted to try it myself, so I grabbed a red one and pressed it down against the hissing lid. It oozed and bubbled like raspberry jam! I mean, that radiator was really hot!
It took incredible will power not to let go, but I held on, whispering, “Mags, if you let go of this crayon, you’ll be run over by a truck on Newberry Street, so help you God!” . . .
So I pressed down harder, my fingers steaming and blistering. Once I’d melted one, I was hooked! I finished off my entire supply in one night, mixing color over color until my head swam!
. . . The heat, the smell, the brilliance that sank and rose . . . I’d never felt such exhilaration! . . . Every week I spent my allowance on crayons. I must have cleared out every box of Crayolas in the city!
AFTER THREE MONTHS THAT RADIATOR WAS . . . SPECTACULAR! I MEAN, IT LOOKED LIKE SOME COLOSSAL FRUITCAKE, FIVE FEET TALL . . .!
It was a knockout; shimmering with pinks and blues, lavenders and maroons, turquoise and golds, oranges and creams. . . . For every color, I imagined a taste . . .
YELLOW: lemon curls dipped in sugar . . . RED: glazed cherries laced with rum . . . GREEN: tiny peppermint leaves veined with chocolate . . . PURPLE:— And then the frosting . .
ahhhh, the frosting! A satiny mix of white and silver . . . I kept it hidden under blankets during the day. . . . My huge . . . (She starts laughing) looming . . . teetering sweet—
I was so . . . hungry. . . losing weight every week. I looked like a scarecrow what with the bags under my eyes and bits of crayon wrapper leaking out of my clothes.
It’s a wonder you didn’t notice. But finally you came to my rescue . . . if you could call what happened a rescue. It was more like a rout! The winter was almost over. . . .
It was very late at night. . . . I must have been having a nightmare because suddenly you and Daddy were at my bed, shaking me. . . . I quickly glanced towards the radiator to see if it was covered. . . .
It wasn’t! It glittered and towered in the moonlight like some . . . gigantic Viennese pastry! You followed my gaze and saw it. Mummy screamed . . . “WHAT HAVE YOU GOT IN HERE? . . .
MAGS, WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOING?” . . . She crept forward and touched it, and then jumped back. “IT’S FOOD!” she cried. . . “IT’S ALL THE FOOD SHE’S BEEN SPITTING OUT!
OH, GARDNER, IT’S A MOUNTAIN OF ROTTING GARBAGE!” Of course in a sense you were right. It was a monument of my castoff dinners, only I hadn’t built it with food. . . .
I found my own materials. I was languishing with hunger, but oh, dear Mother . . . I FOUND MY OWN MATERIALS . . . !
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SOURCES
How Was Your Day Darling Face?
Published on monologueblogger.com
Sourced here
Chewing Gum Dreams
Published by Oberon Modern Plays
Sourced here
Good People
Published by Theatre Communications Group
Sourced here
Last of the Red Hot Lovers
Published by Samuel French
Sourced here
Painting Churches
Published by Samuel French
Sourced here
Did you find something in this list that resonates or excites you to perform? Let us know in the comments. Or if you’re a parent helping your teenager choose a monologue, try narrowing it down to two or three options that suit their personality and let them make the final decision.
To search hundreds of monologues for teens, be sure to check out Opening Monologue here
