FREE MONOLOGUES

Though gender is a spectrum, monologues are divided into male-identifying/female-identifying as they appeared in the original text.
Most can be read by any gender, as the monologue texts themselves don't contain gender identifying language.

MONOLOGUES FOR FOR FEMALE-IDENTIFYING PERFORMERS

(view MONOLOGUES FOR MALE-IDENTIFYING PERFORMERS)

Beth is frustrated at being unable to help others–or herself.

Age: 16
from Little Women...NOW

Everybody just talks. Nobody does anything. I sign thirty petitions a day, I write letters. I don’t march, and I should march but the crowds—oh my god, I can’t with the crowds. And I feel guilty for not marching. So I write more letters, and I force myself out of the house to the soup kitchen because those people need food, and it makes them happy, for a minute at least, just to eat! There are people there, whole families, they don’t have anything, and they still smile all the time. They know how to find joy in... in a bowl of soup. Don’t you admire that? Don’t you want to be like that? To find joy in a bowl of soup. In such a small thing? I don’t know how to do that, but I can do it for them.
BETH starts to have a panic attack—trembling, short of breath, dizzy.
I can make people happy for a minute. But it’s never enough, because then I put on the TV and— 
BETH grabs a chair and sits down, tries to calm her breathing.
But what can one person really do?
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Emerson talks about attraction to a teacher.

Age: 17
from Teach

You see that? I watch Teach with other kids, and I don’t see any touchin’. Maybe once when Mary Angela bled onto her chair, but that was just gross and I think Teach felt sorry because Mary Angela was cryin’ so hard. Kids were laughin’, but Teach knew just what to do, and somehow made it natural. Beautiful almost. I wrote a poem about it. “No Bad Thing.” When Teach hugged Mary Angela’s shoulder, it was like the touch I get from my mom. Reassuring. Benign. That means harmless. But when Teach touches me, it’s like—like the way Teach talks to me, only all in one soft brush on the shoulder, or one squeeze of my hand. Chris—that’ the name I use in private—understands exactly what’s goin’ on inside of me and not just sees it but likes it. Nobody else does. So when Chris reads a poem to me, it’s so... powerful, I forget me. It’s just us. And Chris likes it, likes to feel like I’m happy.
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Emerson talks about a teacher.

Age: 17
from Teach

Chris is lyin’. ’Cause man, I know what sexual appetite looks like and I know what it feels like and Chris isn’t hidin’ anything—leastways not from me. Such valiant attempts though. I like that word: valiant. Valiant attempts make failure more exciting and I live for failure. It’s a way of life. “The most valiant men are the best believers in the tension of...” Somethin’. That’s Ralph Waldo. I like him, and he’s cooler than being named for New Jersey. Chris is valiant. Teachin’ the important stuff you can’t find in Wikipedia is valiant. Genuine stuff people my age need to know about the way the world works. Like lookin’ me in the eye and smilin’ when I talk. But not about what sexual appetite feels like. Shit, I already knew that.
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Anne tells her best friend about her speaking experience.

Age: 17
from Anne of Green Gables

The night before commencement, there was a variety show at the fancy White Sands Hotel. Josie played the violin and Moody sang a ballad, things like that. So imagine this: I'm wearing the pearls Matthew gave me before I left and I'm feeling confident until I walk into that hotel! Everyone is so elegant, dressed in silk and lace and diamonds. Diamonds! What are my pearls compared to that? The minute I think that, I feel bad because they are from Matthew and mean so much to me. Where do people get all that money why do they spend it on those things?

There's one woman in pink silk who keeps squinting at me like she wants to ask me a question but she never asks it. And this girl in white lace keeps talking to her friends about how there are so many country bumpkins at this affair. I think she means to say that I am one of the country bumpkins and I have never felt like a country bumpkin until this minute and now I feel like it's not a good thing to be!

My confidence is slipping away... I'm standing in a corner wishing I was sitting with Ruby and Charlie who are not performing, wishing I'd never come at all, wishing I was home. I hear my name. Somehow I move dizzily toward that big stage with those big lights. The audience is row after row of fancy critical faces. The white lace girl is just waiting to mock me.

My knees are trembling, my heart is fluttering. I'm about to faint. I feel hopeless, helpless, ashamed, and miserable, and Diana, I swear—the kind that means promise—I am about to run from the stage when what should I see out of my frightened eyes? Can you guess?

Gilbert. Blythe.

He's standing at the back of the room with a smile on his face and I don't know if he's triumphant or taunting or just happy to be here. I take a big breath and I feel courage come over me like an electric shock because I will not fail in front of Gilbert Blythe!
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Paulette still loves her best friend’s brother.

Age: 18
from Four Doors Down

Me and Jared broke up because I wouldn’t have sex with him. Like seriously, we couldn’t even watch, like Planet of the Apes, without him rubbing on me every second. He kept saying “You would if you loved me,” which is such a cliche, and I kept thinking “I would if I loved him," which is a worse cliche, but I just couldn’t. And he got sick of jerking off when he went home especially after he figured out Caitlyn Prince would be happy to oblige and he didn’t even have to be her boyfriend. When I met Ricky, I wanted it to be different. The first time we did it was in his basement. His parents were upstairs and we were trying to be quieter than SpongeBob The second time was in the same place. The third time, I pretended it was Jared. I didn’t mean to but suddenly I saw his face and when I closed my eyes, his eyes were still there and it was him... I couldn’t help it. Remember Ricky was so happy when I—you know—the first time? He was so happy, so happy and I couldn’t believe that was why I let Jared get away.
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Beth accepts her imminent death.

Age: 20
from Little Women...NOW

Sometimes Mom makes me eat and then she feels guilty for doing it. And I feel guilty so I make myself sick and waste all that food. That’s wrong. All those years Mom homeschooled me, she could have been going to school herself! All the money we didn’t have went to stupid doctors! They can’t make me a future I don’t see myself. I’m the only one who has to fight for it, Jo! Everything unfolds for everyone else and you just ride the waves and smile! Like “Okay, so this is a wave. No big deal”! So I tell myself, “Just do what they do. Just ride the waves. It’s not so hard.” But it is. When I try to ride the waves, they knock me down. And they keep getting bigger. Coming here, I figured it out. Listen to the waves. The rhythm. The calm. That never stops. I don’t need to ride them. The story will happen even if I don’t. And I’ll be here even if I don’t. I’ll go on and on like the ocean, and in the end, it’s all the same. When I was little, I thought people at Disney really were happy. I thought if I could make people look like that, maybe I’d feel it too. But it’s so hard, Jo. And it never works for long. The world is such a sad place.
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Abby lies about how she started her sugar relationship.

Age: 24
from Brilliant Works of Art

He used to hang out in the coffee shop, you know the one where I like to study, and one day we were in line getting refills and we started talking. Because the line was long, I guess. After that if we were both there, we’d end up talking. Like about my classes or wine or his kids. Harmless. Then one day it was kind of late, so he asks, “Do you want to have dinner?” and I say sure, I’ll have a bagel, because I was hungry, but he says he was thinking somewhere else, like leave the coffee shop, so I’m like “If you know somewhere that serves cheap ramen, sure,” and I’m just joking, but he says he knows a Japanese place, and that he would never make me pay if he was the one asking, and he was a little old, but I figured a free meal is a free meal, right? And this was before that day in our old place... with us, you know, when we... I couldn’t know that we would ever... how could I know?

So we had some sushi, because I didn’t want to be rude if he was buying sushi, so I just pretended like I ate it all the time, which was kind of embarrassing, because did you know you don’t put the whole edamame shell in your mouth?

And then we had dinner a few times—like after the coffee shop, and then you know, there was too much sake one time and it just kind of happened. There was no you, James, I mean not like we are now—And then once… it was my birthday and he gives me a card, and says he knows it’s lame, but he didn’t know what to get me, so he just gives me money and tells me to pick out something for myself. I guess I told him that I didn’t need shoes or jewelry, and that I hoped he wouldn’t mind if I used the money toward school. And he says no, it’s your money; you do what you want with it. And then, sometimes, he’d just give me another birthday card with money in it.

It just didn’t seem like a big deal.

I want you to trust me! If we’re going to mean anything to each other, we have to trust each other. And even if you didn’t have any proof, you would always wonder, and that is no way to start our new life. I would have ended it, I was trying to end it, but then you left. You left me. And I was devastated, James, because I didn’t think you were coming back. So I said fuck it, because why not? You were gone and I just wanted to wallow in misery and feel bad about myself because I wasn’t enough for you to stay.
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Ava remembers how she met the husband she now might want to divorce.

Age: 29
from Lost At Sea

I met Steve at Elken's Pub. He was hard to miss in a place like that, with all those locals who are so familiar they're like wallpaper. But not him. I noticed him right away, there with his friends, leaning against the wall, laughing like tourists who want to get away from the imported bikinis on the beach and imbibe the year-round experience. He noticed me, too. I saw one of his friends whisper to him, and he nodded and walked over to me. I don't know what I expected him to say, but I wanted it to be something smooth, something that set him apart from the guys at the dartboard with their two-dollar beers and black T-shirts. But it wasn’t. He said, “Honey, you must be a parking ticket because you've got fine written all over you.” I can't imagine what my face looked like, but his friends in the corner let out the loudest whoop. Turns out they dared him to use the corniest pick-up line he could think of, and they were all over there waving their money for him to collect. I felt like a fool, but Steve smiled at me... that smile. And he said, "I'm sorry. I know that's a bad line, but that doesn't mean it isn't true." That's Steve.
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Puzzlemaker observes something discomfiting when “spying” on their ex with a new partner.

Age: early 30s
from The Crossword Play (or Ezmeranda's Gift)

I saw them on a date once. Getting ice cream. I'm at a gas station and I look across the street and there they are: sitting at a picnic table. She's wearing this cute little yellow sundress. You have to admire her for that because not a lot of people can pull off yellow, which is so unfair because yellow is such a happy color, but she looks pretty in it. She has an ice cream cone and so does he, but she never licks hers. Not even when it starts dripping onto her hand and it's because he's talking with his serious, pay-attention face. Like maybe because the kid behind the ice cream counter was staring at her cleavage. Or too many scoops will make her fat. Who knows. Point is nobody should look sad wearing a really cute yellow sundress with an ice cream cone in her hand.
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Puzzlemaker comes clean about their ex.

Age: early 30s
from The Crossword Play (or Ezmeranda's Gift)

I should tell you something. I was at the bus station, not the airport. I keep going up to the desk to get change for cookies from the vending machine, which is a little embarrassing but when your bus is delayed, you get a free pass. Even though nine bags aren’t that big a deal when your bus is late. Or even at home. They just go so fast; you don't even realize they're gone. You can't really help it.

And my bus wasn't delayed. I didn't even have a ticket. I thought about buying one, though, I really did. I was going to get on a bus and go somewhere far away. I just didn't know what I'd do when I got to the other end of the ticket, so—

Every time I go up to get change, the girl behind the window stares at me and asks if I'm gonna buy a ticket and I have to pretend I'm waiting for a phone call to tell me where to go. Like someone else had to tell me. Like there's a magic voice that could do that. She gives me change like it pains her to look at me and I get my cookies. One of the bags had nine cookies in it. I felt like I won the lottery except—

The police show up. I guess the girl behind the window didn't believe my phone call story. It's been nearly three hours now. It didn't seem that long but I guess loiterers aren't welcome at the bus station.

"Do you have somewhere you can go?"
It was a nice woman officer. She speaks so kindly.
"I can call someone for you."
"I'm fine. I thought I was going to leave, but I guess I'll just go home."
"Is that a good idea?"
"Yeah, my car's right outside."
"I mean in your condition."
"My—oh, I'm not pregnant! A little cookie bloated, maybe, that's all.” [If the protagonist is male, just "Condition?"]
"Miss [Sir]... have you—"
"Have I what?"
"Seen your— Come with me."
"Are you arresting me for not buying a ticket?"
She shakes her head and leads me into the bathroom, to the mirror. I see my face. I see why the ticket girl kept staring at me.

"Is there someone I can call for you?"
"No, no. I think I'll just go home."
"But your face--"
"It's okay. I shouldn't have eaten all the cookies."
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Cha-Cha explains the difficulty of finding her path.

Age: 30-45
from Finding Neil Patrick Harris

Who all here went to college? [improv if desired] Higher education, yasss. It wasn't for me. I know, I know, crippling debt is not for everybody. And the world needs electricians and plumbers and people to clean up roadkill. People use those examples because electricians and plumbers make good money so it sounds like a decent argument. But I'm not wired for electricity and I don't want to deal with anybody's shit.

No good? My dad told me never to explain if something is a joke.

I went to college anyway just like all of you even though I didn't have a PASSION for anything. Everyone is supposed to have a Passion. With a capital P. Do you hear me bringing that capital P energy? What's your Passion? My child has a Passion. My dog has a Passion. "You don't have a passion? I'm so sorry--that you're a loser."

You might as well define that as something you can't make a fucking living at. Nobody's Passion is electricity but it can still get you a nice car and a trip to the Bahamas.

So because I didn't have a PASSION, I went into education because how hard can that be? Pretty fucking hard if you don't like kids. If kids aren't your Passion. Lesson plans were due, but I'd be at the coffee house trying to make people laugh. And then I failed out of college because

They say it's not supposed to be fun.
They say "You need to get serious."
They say joking your way out of a DWI is not a useful life skill.
And I say, "Mom, Dad, lighten up and give me another chance."

But they wouldn't, so I got a beauty license and bam. A decade [or 15 years depending on actress age] goes by. And all those people I made laugh? I guess they're off pursuing their passions.
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Cha-Cha debunks the myth that funny people are always likable.

Age: 30-45
from Finding Neil Patrick Harris

"He's hilarious." That's the first thing anybody ever said about my dad. My mother says he laughed her right into bed on their first date. Which she thinks is more respectable than saying "I was drunk." Humor is right up there with using lots of hand gestures when it comes to scoring. Google it and try your luck. Just don't use this one [fuck you arms or finger] My dad didn't just attract my mom. He attracted everyone. Women, men, Labradoodles, mimes. Mimes don't laugh.

You get used to "Is he like this at home?" "Oh my, how do you live with him?" "You must be laughing all the time!" You learn how to smile and say, "Oh yeah! All the fucking time. You oughta try it."

It's what they want to hear. Not that twenty years of sending scripts and chasing validation for your Passion is about as unfunny as it gets. "Hey Marvin, did you hear the one about the failed sitcom writer? He was a joke." Not that one good joke means a lotta bad ones, and that's how you go from "You're so funny, I want to fuck you" to "Can't you ever be serious?"

Like my sister Me-lin-DUH, the lawyer. I mean, nobody wants to fuck her. Kidding. Everybody wants to fuck lawyers.

Some comedy is instinct, but mostly it's practice, timing, and brutal humliation. My dad told me, "First, a comic has to believe he's funny. You gotta believe that to put yourself out there."

I believe I'm funny. And beautiful? Who said that? Stop it.

He also said, "You have to take all the shots with confidence knowing some might not land."

I hope he wasn't talking about fucking life.
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Cha-Cha recalls a brief moment of connection.

Age: 30-45
from Finding Neil Patrick Harris

About two years ago, my perfect lawyer sister calls me and said I need to come over right away. Like I don't have a life and can just drop everything! I mean, I don't have a life but she better not think I'm fucking babysitting. She says no, but she sounds scared and nothing scares my sister except like, spiders, heights, and a surprise witness. And if she is scared, why the fuck is she calling me?

But you hear that and you go, right? I get there and she tells me to feel her tit, and I'm like, "Ew! If you're trying to live bicuriously through me, that's a hard no." She grabs my hand anyway and makes me feel her up. And there's this lump the size of a fucking golf ball. Like how do you never notice that? How does your husband never notice that? I think you're lying about your amazing sex life, sis. You need more action in this area [motions to her chest]. For your health.

A fucking golf ball. That clearly got shot from the tee a while ago, but I'm the first to know. Me. I ask for her doctor's number, because he's gorgeous, but I also make an appointment. And I go with her. She holds my hand.

Turns out it's benign and she goes back to being perfect.

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Yasmine realizes men have all the relationship power.

Age: early to late 30s
from The Way It Is

You know, for one day, I want to be a man. I’d take my car to the shop and not be treated like a fucking idiot, and I’d bench press a couple hundred pounds, and pee standing up to prove it’s really not that hard to hit the bowl, and eat whatever I want, and walk around without a shirt and catcall at some bitches, jerk off in the shower. I might even want to get hit in the balls just to see what all the fucking wah-wah-wah is about. But mostly, I’d want to see how it feels to be so fucking obtuse about having all the power.

Do you know, if you Google “why won’t he marry me,” there are scads of women crying to the anonymous cloud about long-term stalemates. They’re not very good company on nights when you’re trying to convince yourself that your boyfriend really is working late. They want to know if they should give their boyfriends ultimatums, or not bother and just leave. Some cheery Mary Poppins always pipes in to say she knows how hard it is, she appreciates their pain, but she walked away and now she’s married and happy and appreciated and life is fuckall great.

But I was different. I had the ring. I was one step ahead of all those pathetic fucktards. You weren’t ready yet, but you made the promise, Cane. You gave me your mother’s ring, and you promised, so I thought meant something, that it was more than a fucking eight-year placeholder until you found someone better.

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Yasmine explains why it’s not so easy to just "find someone else.”

Age: early to late 30s
from The Way It Is

Okay, let’s say against all odds, a guy who’s got all his teeth, a steady job, and no murder victims or snot collections hidden in his closet, spots me in the latte line and decides he can’t live without me. And I say beggars can’t be fucking choosers, so we date for a year and he takes me to McDonald’s and pops the question. We have a year engagement--I know compared to our four-year engagement, that seems quick, but this is a fucking fantasy--and we get hitched. We wait the customary year before trying to get pregnant, and how old am I then? And that’s if I settle for a sketchy prison reject tomorrow.

Guys run like hell from women like me. We tick so loud, their ears are fucking clanging before we’ve finished our first drink. We reek of desperation—desperation that smells like crazy. Desperation that you sprayed me with. And unlike you, I don’t get to push a reset button with someone younger. I should not have to be starting over! I should not have to worry I’ll end up like that bitter bitch next door.

Don’t you see? More men would date me with a baby than without. Oh my god, I hate myself for being so desperate I don’t even recognize myself. Fuck biology. Just fuck it. Why did it all turn out like this, Cane? Why?
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Marjorie is sick and tired of fertility treatment.

Age: 33
from Seeds

You want me to think about it? I’ve done nothing but think about it! After a year of trying, and then all the tests, I thought “What if I never get pregnant?” When the inseminations failed, I thought, “Why can’t I do this?” After every IVF and every miscarriage, I thought, “If we never have children, it’s going to kill Aidan.” But then I started to think, if I keep this up, it’s going to kill me. And us. For five years, it’s been all about this. We can’t even make love without you hoping some miracle might come out of it. We loved so many things about our lives before this became our lives. I want that back. You never want to discuss what happens if. You never wanted to believe we’d fail at this, that we could fail. And I let you do that, but I can’t anymore. There are no new procedures to try, no new alternatives around the corner, just an empty road. A dusty, barren road.
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Josephine talks to the baby she’s carrying for her identical twin.

Age: 33
from Seeds

Ooh! That was a hard one! I don’t know how Kay survived with two of us in there battling over territory. That never stopped, you know. When we shared a crib, Kay says that Marjie used to steal all the blankets and force me into a corner. Once we had big girl beds, sometimes she’d still find me asleep in the corner of the living room when it was close to nap time. When we got older, Marjie decorated the room in black and white with red pillows and picture frames even though I wanted pink. But it wasn’t worth arguing about and Kay always sided with her anyway.

(Another kick)

Oh, you don’t have anything to worry about. I’m sure she’ll spoil you rotten and let you have anything you want. But if you get lonely, you know, you can always come and see your mommy—aunt—and brothers and your sister. Cousins, I guess. Any time you want. We can have sleepovers, and we’ll show you how we all make a tent in the living room and sleep in there and play flashlight games. One time Hendrick scared us all half to death... well. We have fun. After homework and chores, of course. There are definitely rules and everybody has to follow them. All the same. No favorites.
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Josephine talks to the son who biologically belongs to her and her sister's husband.

Age: 33
from Seeds

You gave us quite a scare, Joseph. I don’t like having to reprimand you when you’re only a day old, but you just can’t do that anymore... your daddy can’t take it. I can’t take it. I wish your eyes were open. It’s so strange that they’ve never been open, like you’re just not ready to see everything that’s waiting for you... I’m waiting. You’re going to be in here a long time, but I’m going to be here with you. Because as long as you’re here, I can see you whenever I want. And when you open your eyes... Well, the first thing a baby should see after he’s born is his mother, right? So you keep fighting, and I’ll be here when you open your eyes.
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Angie talks to her friend who just got promoted at Donut Delite.

Age: 30s-50s
from Four Doors Down

Six months! Shit! You’re a boss so you get the skim, girl! A ham tonight, a bricka cheese tomorrow. Why do you think I wanted to get bumped up so bad? It puts food on the table chickatita and I’m every bit as hungry as they are. I once saw Fat Tom shove a whole box of shake mix under his coat. Don’t know how the hell he thought he’d make shakes at home but he’s probably sloppin’ right outta the box. Me, I’d try to find something that looks like a vegetable, for my kids, you know? That’s the most expensive stuff at the store, the outside aisles. I been watchin’ those beefeaters two years waitin’ for my chance. And now you got it you little bitch, so you doncha wanna stick a happy meal up your cunt and show ’em how it’s done? And if you and your fancy shit don't want it, then do it for me.
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Mabel Normand gives Charlie Chaplin his start, then gets left behind.

Age: 37
from Mabel Talks

Life was one long riot of laughter for Charlie and me in those glorious days. I’m proud that Charlie held my hand while he found his way through the swamp. He’s the greatest love I never had We did everything together: work, play, make liberty bond short films... Once at a rally, I kissed any man--or woman--who promised to buy a bond and I kissed for two hours’ straight.
I kissed Charlie once. Well, I kissed him back when he chose to kiss me at a San Francisco charity function where I was looking particularly radiant. [shrugs] I was curious.
When he leans in again, I have to set him straight. "No, Charlie. I’m not your type. Neither are you mine."
We still do everything together. Except drink. Charlie doesn’t and I do. A lot.
Things change after we make Tillie’s Punctured Romance. It’s based on the Broadway show, Tillie’s Nightmare, and Marie Dressler comes in to do the film with Charlie and me because apparently my being this town’s only established female comedienne isn’t quite star enough.
"$2500 a week! She’s never even made a movie! I demand $2500 a week! You sonofabitch, you gave her my dressing room? I don’t give a Staten Island fuck about what’s in her contract! That plain fat fuck does not get my dressing room!"
Tillie’s Punctured Romance is a huge hit and proves that audiences will sit for something longer than a toilet break. But it also proves something much more important: women rarely need to watch out for each other as much as they need to watch out for men. Because while Marie and I duked it out, Charlie’s opening segment got longer. His bits got highlighted. I see the final cut and I see the future because Charlie has stolen the show.
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Mabel Normand wonders why her luck has been so bad.

Age: 37
from Mabel Talks

I believe in God. I go to church every Sunday at Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills. I want to believe that God has a plan for all of us, that he’s taking care of us, that he put the caul on me at birth and promised me luck.
There’s a turning point in all our lives, a moment, a series of moments, we can point to and say “If I’d made this choice instead of this one, it would all be different.” If I made this choice I’d have a house by the sea next to Roscoe and Minta, I’d watch a dark-haired child splash in the waves, teach him to swim and dive, take him to Staten Island to meet his grandparents. I’d be a pioneering modern career woman, raising a child, making the occasional picture, consulting with my husband as an equal partner.

There are so many ways it might have gone, including some I’ll grant may have been quite unpleasant but when you’re spinning alternate realities, the mind tends not to dwell on those. If you believe in God, wonder why he didn’t lead you to the right choice. If you believe in God, you also wonder if he did.

MABEL looks up to address God.

And if you did, holy fucking hell, I can’t imagine what was down the other road.
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Mabel Normand realizes Mack Sennett doesn't really love her.

Age: 37
from Mabel Talks

It’s the kind of thing that would have been funny if it were in one of mine and Roscoe’s pictures. And in fact, that’s the story Mack gives the press, that I was hit in the head while filming a wedding scene with Fatty. By a shoe.
It was not a shoe that put me in a coma and nearly killed me. It was a vase thrown by my “friend” Mae Busch who was hiding behind the couch while Mack stumbled over his words in his boxer shorts.

I have private nursing care at home for months.

I wake up in the middle of the night, not sure if I’m alive or dead, and pray for the sun to rise quickly so I can ask someone. I convince myself it will be an angel I’m asking. I hope it is. I want to be dead because surely, surely if I am alive, he would have come. Sent a card. Or flowers.
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Nancy, a mother whose son’s bullying led to a suicide, visits the grave of the victim.

Age: 42
from Safe

I really don’t even know you. I saw your picture in the paper, a school picture it looked like. They ask you to smile, don’t they, for those school pictures? So you just do it, even if it’s not a real, true happy smile. But it reminded me of... someone I used to know and then I felt like I should come. Even though I know you and Rex aren’t—weren’t... friends. I’m sorry. He’s a good—I swear, I thought he was. I thought I was a good person. I go to church. Rex, too. I don’t even have to force him most times. And he was a Boy Scout. Solid. I don’t know what I’m trying to say.

I just feel like... like there are these buildings I read about, and some people just think they’re so ugly that they want to tear them down. Even though that... it’s called... I can’t remember, but even though that architecture is part of history, they just don’t want to look at it. I don’t know how I feel about that, but it just seems like there should be better reason for tearing it down than they don’t want to look at it.
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Brittany talks to her former best friend.

Age: 40s
from Four Doors Down

We were like family. I thought we’d be widows together. John would go first because he drinks too much. Maybe Alan would take care of his own self soon after. I was gonna call us the Elk Meadow Widows. We’d spend our days shopping and talking and eating Thai and drinking wine. We’d water each other’s plants when one of us ended up in the hospital with some old person thing or other but we’d always come back because Paulie and Lenna and Jared would bring our grandbabies over. Eventually we’d just move into my house—I just have more space—and we could have just one big garden with okra, whatever you wanted. I could paint and nobody would care and maybe I’d even paint something that somebody would buy someday when I’m dead. You'd need a hobby though... you could learn to cook the okra... or just watch me paint. We could even find Paulie’s baby, who might even be married herself, and we’d all be a family again. We’da been happy, Janelle.
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Katie explains why it’s important to be funny.

Age: 40s
from Finding Neil Patrick Harris

In eighth grade, my best friend Marti convinced me to do the variety show. She said we were almost in high school and we needed to get noticed. Lily's in eighth grade. Did you see her picture?
KATIE shows Lily's picture, taken at the salon.

Cha-Cha actually took that. She was into photography for a minute. She said she was gonna open a studio.

Marti wanted to do Who's On First, which was cool because girls never do Who's On First. I was Abbott and Marti was Costello. That's what she wanted and I said okay because it was her idea in the first place. We practiced every day so we sounded just like them and we killed it. Everybody stood and cheered and applauded and it was embarrassing but in that good way? But after, in the hallway, nobody came up to me and said congratulations. Only her. Lucio was right, about funny winning more friends? She got super popular. And I really... didn't.

KATIE reacts to audience laughter, has realization.

There's something hilarious about that.
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Katie admits her job is important to her, if not others.

Age: 40s
from Finding Neil Patrick Harris

When I was little, my mom took me for a mani/pedi on my birthday. And when the lady said, "Can we give her flowers, Mom?" I held my breath 'til she said yes. The lady used a teeny tiny brush to paint these perfect special little flowers on my birthday toes. Every night before bed, I stared at my special toes. It was so sad when the flowers started to chip.

When those little girls come in, I love this job, love painting their special flowers. I have a really steady hand, which is good for the tiniest toes. They make up for the entitlement parties. Engage-Meant To Be--that's a silvery bridal color, a real one. I hear them talking and it's all about the day. I just want to scream, "Get off your fairy tale horse and look at me." This is life. And maybe the joke's on me because I never really thought there was anything wrong with it.

How do I make that joke on me the funny kind?
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Katie discovers laughter is healing.

Age: 40s
from Finding Neil Patrick Harris

The day Lily was born was the happiest day of my life. I smile just thinking about her. She's the best part of me and she's out in the world. Her dad leaves, and Lily's the only thing that makes me smile. If she's napping or in bed for the night, I'm parked in front of the TV waiting 'til she wakes up. It doesn't matter what's on. I just want voices. Shapes and colors. Movement. Companionship. But one night, I'm watching this show and it's so dumb. This girl has this ant on her arm. She feels it but every time she touches her arm, she misses it. I laugh. And the more she doesn't see it and the more it bothers her, the harder I laugh. I can't stop. I feel better. Like scientifically we need to laugh. It's necessary. Those shows are necessary. That's why I wrote down my ideas. I don't care if it can actually be made. I just want to see if I can be necessary like that.
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Laughter makes Katie feel worthy of love.

Age: 40s
from Finding Neil Patrick Harris

I'm watching Survivor and this one poor castaway is on the outs. You know she is because they show her looking all sad and then cut to all the other people on her tribe yukking it up on the beach. That's how it works on TV: sad person alone, cut to other people laughing. Other people connecting.

Pete says women can't be funny. I say what about Ellen and he says she doesn't count. He likes Jeff Dunham but I kind of like Taylor Tomlinson. That's a woman. I don't only like women. I like John Mulaney, too. Humor is personal. Making someone laugh is personal.

Once I saw Pete and this woman at a McDonald's counter when I was with Lily getting McNuggets and fries after school. I see them through the drive-through window. He's probably ordering a Big Mac and a chocolate shake—that’s what he always orders—and the woman says something to him. He turns to her and laughs. I can actually hear it from the drive-through. Then he kisses her and pays for the Big Mac and shake. When I check our order, I say to Lily, "Well, I ordered large fries but it looks like there's a bunch of small ones in here."

And my daughter laughs.
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Britt explains why she needs her ex.

Age: 42
from Flowers In The Desert

Ten years. There were days, weeks sometimes, when I really didn't think about it. It was there, nagging like, like a chore you keep meaning to get to. Cleaning out the garage or updating your resume. Some days, I'd look in the mirror, and I'd see someone with a future. I thought having children had healed me. I felt strong.
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They're not going to remember me. I haven't finished my work with them yet. And I don't want them to grow up thinking it's wrong to have a sensitive side, or it's okay to just get by. And I don't want them to be Republicans, or think that real men don't clean bathrooms. And Matt does want to quit baseball and try gymnastics, but he's afraid to tell you. And Zane... he likes to play with dolls— lots of boys do it. It’s normal, Joe.

Can you do something for me? If you can take care of them, yourself, maybe you won't be in a hurry to find some woman to melt over your sob story, and want to take over...and be their— Bobby McBain moved another woman in in six months!

I couldn't bear that. Please. They'll need time to mourn me. You'll need time to do it together. I start chemo Monday.
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Kay talks about the "romance" of keeping a child you can't possibly care for

Age: 50
from Seeds

Don't be romantic like a woman who discovers she’s dying and breaks up with her lover so he never has to bear the burden. Like a war bride who vows to stand by her mutilated husband. That's for the movies, honey. And keeping two babies? Forget romance. Try getting anybody to date you when you have two babies. Let me tell you, even being a mediocre mother is hard. You don't know what it’s like to rush your children to get on the school bus, half the time shoving bags of cereal in their pockets because you overslept. You don’t know what it's like to be doing the best you can and still know that it's not good enough. What’s it going to be like when you have some drooling vegetable that you have to take care of day and night? What kind of life is that going to be? Your life will be over. Babies don’t give you an identity, Mary Jo. How many are you going to have before you realize that the only person who can complete you is you?
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Ellen tells her son why it was hard to have “the conversation.”

Age: 50
from Sons & Lovers

I just want things to be easy for you, Billy. That’s all I want. I don’t want to seem stupid, Billy, but there’s so much I don’t understand. It's a whole new world. Why do they love Julianne Moore? And bowties? And appetizers wrapped in prosciutto? Why do they act like they have long hair? What’s with all the bracelets? What are wolves and otters and bears? What if two tops fall in love? And you, Billy... will you want me to go to a parade? Would you date a drag queen? How many Cher CDs do you own? Do you want children?...... Do you get tested? Are you happy? If your child isn’t happy, you feel guilty for even bringing him into the world. You’re my son! I love you! And I wanted to...But I didn’t—and after a while... I... it got so much easier to leave it unsaid.
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Vivien Leigh explains to Laurence Olivier that he didn’t drive her to madness”

Age: 53
from Past Midnight: A Visit With Larry and Viv

Oh, darling. People say Blanche took hold of me; that doesn't make it true. I hear people say it's because my mother abandoned me in a convent as a child. Or because I was filming in Ceylon! Ceylon is beautiful! I love Ceylon! Nobody loses her fucking mind because she's in Ceylon! Everybody needs an explanation when it's just me! I know what your friends say. Feminine ego. Feminine ego! My inferiority drives me mad, nothing--what did Noel say?—nothing a "good clip in the chops" can't cure.

I am defective, it's as simple as that, Larry. Sick. It is none of those things and I know that, always have. I was losing you because I was driving you away and I couldn't stop it! The idea that I can just turn it off—don’t you think I would if I could? To make it seem as if I am no longer me but a willful Scarlett and crazy Blanche all rolled into one, as if I have chosen that! You worship the sufferers! The men! Shakespeare, Chekhov, Wellington, Churchill, they are worthy of your worship. Why can't I suffer enough to be worshipped? I am sick! But you can't call it that because that means you abandoned a sick woman!
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Lyn decides to sell the bar she promised to keep open in her late husband's memory

Age: mid-50s
from Once In My Lifetime

So says you. But you know what? I didn't hear his last wish! I wasn't there! I don't blame you for survivin' Al, at least nowhere near the amount you blame yourself. But I blame you for being the one who heard his final words. And if I don't do something, I'm going to start blaming him. Maybe he only said he needed a Miracle, because he was on his way to a game. Or because he was hallucinating. Maybe he just meant he needed a damn good EMT! Whatever he meant, I blame you for reminding me of it every damn day, because I have this offer... Howard was the love of my life, but you make me feel like leaving means I don't love him enough. I thought by now, he’d be done with his road crew, and we’d be somewhere warm, with a beach, building... sandcastles. If he was alive, I don't know if we’d have gone, but you can't go through your life being afraid of a heart attack, because in the end what gets you is a broken traffic light and a semi. I know what Howard meant to me. Win or lose. (Lyn signs the contract)
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MONOLOGUES FOR MALE-IDENTIFYING PERFORMERS

(view MONOLOGUES FOR FOR FEMALE-IDENTIFYING PERFORMERS)

Alejandro recalls the shooting at his school.

Age: young boy
from I Lived, In Rancho Tehama

Sometimes I think about how we did math. We were adding lots of numbers, like if you have 17 people in Florida, and 28 in Connecticut, and 10 in Oregon, and two in South Carolina and they all got together, how many would that be? And then we just kept adding more numbers. It's hard. I always forgot where I was and how many numbers I added up. It's not easy, like two plus two. That's so easy that my mom sometimes says, "Well, two plus two is not making four here so something must be wrong." That makes her sound like she's good at math. I wish I was, because I see numbers all the time.

There are one thousand four hundred eighty-five people who live in Rancho Tehama. That's the biggest number I know of. Five hundred eighty-seven families. Two hundred ninety-five kids. If babies are born, it goes up, and if old people die, it goes down, but everybody still says four thousand eighty-five. When someone we know has a baby, my mom says, "Now there are one thousand four hundred eighty-six people." But that's a joke because my teacher also had a baby, and so did my friend's mom. That's too much math. Especially subtraction. After November 14, everybody still said one thousand four hundred eighty-five, even though five babies weren't born. It didn't change.

They heard three shots down in the office. There were about a hundred kids in the yard. They locked everything up in eight or ten seconds. That was really fast but it felt slow. There were a hundred bullets—or bunches of bullets—shot at our school. Two of them hit me—right here (points to chest), even though I was under my desk. Just me.

Thanksgiving break was thirteen days. I was in the hospital for fifteen days. I have not been in school. I don't want to go back. My chest still hurts sometimes and I miss my friends. Maybe it's the bullet.

There are still 295 kids. I do math at home with my mom, and I'm happy on days when I don't have to do subtraction. Adding is hard, but I can do it mostly. Sometimes my head hurts from adding all the numbers though. Sometimes my head hurts so hard that two and two doesn't even make four.

(smiles proudly at that)

I'll get better. Probably then I won't need to add anymore because I'll be a grown-up. One more number: I am six. And adding is hard.
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Emerson talks about attraction to a teacher.

Age: 17
from Teach

You see that? I watch Teach with other kids, and I don’t see any touchin’. Maybe once when Mary Angela bled onto her chair, but that was just gross and I think Teach felt sorry because Mary Angela was cryin’ so hard. Kids were laughin’, but Teach knew just what to do, and somehow made it natural. Beautiful almost. I wrote a poem about it. “No Bad Thing.” When Teach hugged Mary Angela’s shoulder, it was like the touch I get from my mom. Reassuring. Benign. That means harmless. But when Teach touches me, it’s like—like the way Teach talks to me, only all in one soft brush on the shoulder, or one squeeze of my hand. Chris—that’ the name I use in private—understands exactly what’s goin’ on inside of me and not just sees it but likes it. Nobody else does. So when Chris reads a poem to me, it’s so... powerful, I forget me. It’s just us. And Chris likes it, likes to feel like I’m happy.
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Emerson talks about a teacher.

Age: 17
from Teach

Chris is lyin’. ’Cause man, I know what sexual appetite looks like and I know what it feels like and Chris isn’t hidin’ anything—leastways not from me. Such valiant attempts though. I like that word: valiant. Valiant attempts make failure more exciting and I live for failure. It’s a way of life. “The most valiant men are the best believers in the tension of...” Somethin’. That’s Ralph Waldo. I like him, and he’s cooler than being named for New Jersey. Chris is valiant. Teachin’ the important stuff you can’t find in Wikipedia is valiant. Genuine stuff people my age need to know about the way the world works. Like lookin’ me in the eye and smilin’ when I talk. But not about what sexual appetite feels like. Shit, I already knew that.
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Marcus James explains to his boyfriend why you can’t be too careful.

Age: 18
from Meet Me At The Gates, Marcus James

I been in the south, and there, if you see a pick-up with two big ol' rebel flags flyin', you stay away from it. And in Kansas, if you see a guy in a cowboy hat takin' his family to the Holy Church of Jesus Christ, he probably don't wanna hear how good his buttocks look in his jeans. Probably. And here, you walkin' to the store, and a cop pulls up alongside, you put your hands up. You learn that early.

You could be wrong. The guy in the pickup might actually believe that the Civil War was fought over economy. Or the guy in the cowboy hat might be headed to church to tell his pastor one of his kids just came out. The cop might ask if you're lost and need help.

All that could be. But you learn never to assume, especially when some family has a Confederate flag painted all up one side of their barn, and the man of the house wears a different color T-shirt every day that says "One man, one woman, one marriage under God."

The news isn't just for other places, Johnny. That stuff happens all the time. All I know is it feels less safe around here than it did a week ago, and even that ain't sayin' much.
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After being beaten by bullies, Marcus James gives his valedictory address.

Age: 18
from Meet Me At The Gates, Marcus James

Mr. S says you have to choose when to make your stand: I choose now. I’m headed to Stanford in the fall—hold your applause—which is kinda funny, ’cause it sounds like “stand for,” and I’m takin’ that as a sign, because I know that even if you tell me I’m safe, even with laws against hate, or laws that say I can get married, I’m not safe. Not when twenty percent of hate crimes in this country are because of somebody’s sexual preference and another fifty percent are be-cause of race. I’m kinda screwed, huh? So my stand starts here and it ain’t gonna stop. It isn’t enough to say “I would never.” You gotta make a Stanford like Matt, and like Aaron, for Jesus, or somebody you love, or how about to do what’s right? Because nobody’s safe until everybody’s safe. When I get to the gates of Heaven, I’d rather be the hated than the hater. We all have that choice. So this is me making my stand. I almost died tryin’, and I still might, but I’ll tell you this: if I do, and by some miracle, a hater finds a way to meet me at the gates, I’ll walk ’em through.
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Bill practices talking to his partner about opening their relationship while sorting laundry; the last item has the smell of guilt.

Age: 24
from Sons & Lovers

So, it’s like this, Marq: maybe I do want to have that talk. I don’t know. It’s just so intense... I mean, I’ve never had this kind—I’ve always had—you are special to me. And important. But I’m doing your laundry. That’s—I just never saw myself, you know, settling down. With one person. I always thought I’d keep adding links to the chain... I like adding links to the chain... I never wanted to think about attaching a ball, you know? But now you’re saying that marriage doesn’t have to be a ball? I mean my parents have been together thirty years, day in, day out, the same routine. That’s hard to imagine. And I certainly never thought it could mean considering... options. We don’t have to make any rash moves. Just talk about what you had in mind. Maybe. I just want— you to explain this.
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James explains how he discovered his place in his family.

Age: 25
from Brilliant Works of Art

Uh, okay. It's summer. My brother is at some sports camp, my parents want to take a vacation. The most dangerous thing my father thinks I might do is hit my head coming out of the closet, so they leave me home. Alone. Uninterrupted alone. All I want to do is draw—the couch, my knee, the trees outside, this basket of flowers on the mantle. They're silk, but they look real, blooming eternally in shades of russet, wee bits of orange, gold. Suddenly, I notice the wallpaper has the thinnest of gold stripes. I'd never noticed them before. It's the flowers that have made them emerge. Pop. The more I look around the room, the more I notice things like this. I'm fucking--excuse me--gobsmacked! My mother had designed this room. With very little money. I... I lit up. I wasn't alone in this family. Not a freak. Not even an accident. My father might never understand me, but I belonged to my mother.
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James digests the news that his girlfriend has a sugar daddy.

Age: 25
from Brilliant Works of Art

I asked you what your secret was, remember? I know I'm not good at this stuff, Abz, but I can see. I saw visions of us in a park with our little girl pushing her swing and sneaking kisses while she squealed, "Higher, Daddy!" I saw visions of that garden we talked about. You can't be a visual artist and not see. A hair out of place. A strange bracelet. Is that new? A vague calendar appointment. Knowing just what wine to buy. A familiar sense of style in an expensive apartment. It would be so simple to ask, just ask. Why don't I ask? Because I don't want to know. I still don't want to know. Because I don't want to stop feeling the way you made me feel. Because I want things, too. Because what I don't know can't hurt me. But it does, Abz. It hurts so bad.
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Ty explains why he gave up on the Buffalo Bills.

Age: late 20s-early 30s
from Once In My Lifetime

1995. My dad is still hopeful. And we're still sittin' in the parking lot every home game, but October 2, it's hot. Indian summer and breezy. "We're all the way out here, your mama ain't expectin' us home yet, let's go to the beach." My dad's a strong swimmer, and proud of it, too. No grown man should ever say, "I can't swim," he says, so he takes me to the public pool every week in the summer, and while other kids splash around just tryin' to get cool, he works my strokes. If I get tired and wanna play with my friends, he says, "That givin' up place is where the strong part ways with the weak."

So I never get to splash. But that day—that day, he wants me to come in the water, and I'm scared. It's not smooth like a pool. It's noisy. The water smashes into the shore, in this rhythm: smash, smash, smash, smash. My givin' up place is sticking my feet in the sand while he goes in. His givin' up place...it's in the water. After that, givin' up on the Bills was easy. Dallas took home the trophy the next year, and I ain't been swimmin' since.
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Aidan gets his wife to imagine life with a child.

Age: 34
from Seeds

Close your eyes. Picture our lake house. It’s early morning in late August. We’re in bed, and the lake breeze is coming through the window, cool enough so that we’ve found our way into each other’s arms in our sleep just to be a little warmer. We’re sleeping, our breath is joined, and then there’s a weight on the bed, like the cat jumped up, only it’s not sudden. It’s quiet and soft, and so seamlessly that we didn’t even feel it happen, we’re conscious of another person breathing, right in sync with us, so quiet. We all know we’re awake, but it’s not time to say anything just yet, and the three of us just lie still for a bit, breathing together. And then there’s a little voice: “Mommy?” And this little hand reaches up and takes hold of ours. “Mommy? Daddy? You have to come see.” And I say “Honey, it’s so warm in here; can’t we just stay in bed a little longer?” But the little voice says “No, you have to come see.” And you say “Come on, Aidan. It sounds important.” It’s chilly, but we’re pulled out to the porch, and there, there is the most spectacular sunrise we have ever seen in all the years we’ve had this house.

And it’s so stunning that even though in my mind, I can see it perfectly, I can’t even begin to describe to you the vibrant colors made crisp by the cool air, or the way the light on the lake shimmers toward us like it’s going to swallow us up, or the warmth. The sudden heat. It’s just astonishing. But as beautiful as it is, I am so aware that the three of us, our little family, standing together in the sunlight, is even more astonishing and more awe-inspiring than this miraculous sight that is taking our breath away. And you know it, too, because you smile at me, bathed in that warm, sunny light, and your eyes are bright. And then she looks at up at us and says, “See? You would have missed it.”
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Clive falls off the wagon.

Age: 30s
from American Deal

Happiness can close in. It can be a cage of no choices, no opportunity, a rejection letter... empty pen after empty pen. And the ever-present memory of demons—like my Derek and Mona—and how they make you feel. Suddenly, you can’t catch your breath. They sense I’m weak. And they circle. With memories and promises. I’m sweating. My heart is pounding. I’m breathing. Breathing. Always breathe. Deep breaths. I’ve been here before. I know what to do.

I’m doing jumping jacks. I’m jerking off. I’m going back to the store, because if one can of formula is good, two is better. One times eight is eight. I’m in a strange neighborhood. Two times eight is sixteen. I’m not even sure what I’m looking for, but I recognize the place to find it. Three times eight is twenty-four. I’ve never been choosy. Four times eight is thirty-two. I have my favorites but Derek and Mona have taken many forms... Five times eight—I’m sweating. My heart is pounding. But I’m at the beach. At the library. At a baseball game. On the mattress in the fort with Connie Sliwinsky and she’s introducing me to the pleasures of oral sex. I’m coming. I’m breathing. My heart is pounding. But I’m breathing. Inhaling. Exhaling. Inhaling. Exhaling. Inhaling.

CLIVE looks down at this hand, which is holding a crack pipe that he has just inhaled. CLIVE exhales
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Bennett comes to terms with his abusive relationship.

Age: mid-30s
from Best Laid Plan(t)s

Last night, I couldn’t spin it. I couldn’t tell a crazy Nina story. I couldn’t say, “Ha. Ha. Ha. Nina threw a lamp at me” and make it like some funny Three Stooges story that ends in a really hot orgy. I mean it wasn’t really an orgy because it was just us and not actually three stooges or three anybody—but it was hot. I get it, that’s not good enough. Last night... last night...last night... People saw. Wendy saw. Jason saw. You saw. Wendy’s right. What our parents do to us really fucks us up. Because I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t ask to love her. You can’t dictate love or when it shows up. You can’t make it conditional or give it codes or rules or shouldn’ts. It just is and it’s fucked up. But last night... last night... last night was the first time I saw what it maybe looks like through someone else’s eyes. I know, I know, you’ve been seeing it for years. You tried to tell me. I’m listening now.
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Bennett practices his break-up speech.

Age: mid-30s
from Best Laid Plan(t)s

Nina...It’s been...swell but I don’t think this is working. Last night...last night...last night I was angry, no I felt...frustrated, no I felt...embarrassed, no, I felt... small. You made me feel small. Wendy says cut if you check three boxes and maybe she cuts too soon and she’s denying herself happiness or love, but maybe I’m worse because I’m not just checking those boxes—three four five six boxes Jesus all the boxes—I’m filling them in with my blood and fear and hurt and they’re filled in. They’re black and I know it and every time I fill one in, there’s a little less of me left. So yeah, I think we need to—just for a little while maybe, take a break, because I think I need to figure out why—why I feel small, you know, because I don’t think that’s a good thing. I don’t think it is. I think I need to be my size, whatever that is, just grow into it even if I take over a room, for a minute. I need to try that because I think, I think I’m not breathing sometimes so that I don’t fill with air and take up more space. I’m starting to keep myself... small and—and that’s not good.
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Bennett breaks up with his abusive girlfriend.

Age: mid-30s
from Best Laid Plan(t)s

I didn’t make the choice the first time, Nina. You did. You chose to walk out. You made every choice. You chose the food and the wine and the position and the location and the reasons I should forgive you and when I tried to choose something, I chose one thing. I chose this couch and I think—I think this couch, this choice, might be—is—the best choice I ever made in my life. You chose to walk out and now you think you can choose to walk back in. It’s not a choice, Nina, but if it were, I don’t choose you. I choose my friend. I choose myself. I choose my life. Most of all I choose this fucking couch. Again. And if you burn it down, AND IF YOU BURN IT DOWN AGAIN, I will choose it again and again and again and again and again. Forever. I love this couch!
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Vance talks to his wife about their first swinging experience.

Age: mid-30s
from The Couple Next Door

We have great sex, we're not afraid to have fun, and I thought we could share this great fantasy and it would bring us closer, like all those things I read online. So we go over there, and all night, there’s just this anticipation, this tension. ... it’s like I’m back in college, talking up some girl in a bar, not knowing how it’s going to end, but hoping—and excitement, adrenaline from knowing we’re about to do something forbidden, rebellious. And I have the coolest wife in the world for doing this with me. So when the clothes start coming off, I go with it. It feels like an amped up strip poker game where we won’t just end up naked wondering why we even played. Then Janet starts—put her mouth on me and I was like, "Holy fuck!" this is really happening. She’s going at it, and I’m oblivious to everything else... How much wine did we have? ...And Janet gets me to the brink and she flips over on her stomach and tells me to take her hard from behind. So I do. I put it in, I’m lying on her, and she arches up and her hair is in my face, and... and I realize that she doesn’t smell like you. And she doesn’t make those little noises you make, and her hips don’t fit in my...hands...right, and… I want you, Sadie. I don't want to be in this strange woman, I want to be making love to you. Looking in your eyes, feeling you. But my dick has a mind of its own. I start to... to come, and I look over, and I see you and Rich, and you’re so far away. And fuck, I almost throw up while I’m coming. I never felt anything like that before. Ever.
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Lucio shares thoughts about dying with his two favorite nail technicians.

Age: 40-60
from Finding Neil Patrick Harris

I think about death all the time. I want to die sitting up so that nobody even suspects I'm dead until they notice that I haven't laughed at their joke, because isn't that really the only way anybody ever notices anything? When it's about them? Because up to that point, they will think I've just been perfectly attentive, in peaceful suspended animation, and refraining from sarcastically commenting on their story because for some inexplicable reason I am deciding this time to be polite, and they will be convinced it's because their story is so intriguing, so fascinating, that I am positively rapt over it, rapt to the point of speechlessness. They will not consider for a moment that I am never speechless, and when their story is over, and when I have not laughed, they will realize I am not rapt at all. I am dead. And looking positively serene. And if I'm lucky, they will realize it was their story that killed me.
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Kirk practices a eulogy for his mother’s funeral.

Age: 40s
from Safe

I’d like to say a few words about my mother, Marcie Bednarz. Who died. Yeah, a course, or you wouldn’t all be here. Sorry. Anyway... There really isn’t anything bad you can say about my mother. Not that this would be the time to do that. But there’s nothin’. Like she always useta tell me “If you can’t say anything good about someone, don’t say anything at all” but... okay wait, if I only have good things to say, that doesn’t make sense. Aargh... My mother was a great cook. Her perogis would melt in your mouth like... chocolate you leave in the car. Yeah, that’s good. And none of that frozen shit—stuff—neither. Every bit from scratch. Every Sunday after church. ‘Cause she was a good Christian. Ya know God told her ta never stop believing in me, and she didn’t. And I got her ta thank... I mean, who’s gonna believe in me now?
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Grant explains his success as a financial consultant.

Age: late 40s-early 50s
from Brilliant Works Of Art

Sweetheart, I could blindfold myself and throw darts at the stock listings to make my selections, and it would not diminish my success. My stock is trust and discretion. Do my clients trust me with their multi-million-dollar fortunes? Yes, they do. Do they trust me even when the market is bad, when they sit tearful in my office, fearful that women will no longer make love to them if it’s all gone tomorrow? Indubitably. Because I reassure them that we are in this together, that I am every bit as invested in securing their financial futures as they are, that we are the same. And then I pour them a very expensive scotch from what I assure them is a very rare and reserved bottle, so that they are confident about their value and the size of their cocks. That is what keeps me in Petrus.
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Grant explains where he got his nerve.

Age: late 40s-early 50s
from Brilliant Works Of Art

Somewhere around age eleven, I started to wonder what was achieved by sitting on an unforgiving pew every Sunday, opening to page 120, and reciting with the masses as if all those words really meant something to me. I was going along, the way so many people go along in so many ways, doing what’s expected. And as I sat there, I started to think about the myriad possibilities we’d have in life if we didn’t impose those limits on ourselves. And being a pubescent boy, my thoughts immediately turned to all manners of sex, and right there in that hard oak pew, I became tumescent. It felt so sinfully wrong in the most delicious way that I told my mother I needed to use the restroom, where I proceeded to have the most commanding orgasm. And it freed me. If I could do that in the face of God, I could do anything, and who would really stop me?
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Paroled author Clive addresses a bookstore audience.

Age: 48
from American Deal

Every story in this book, everything I write, is about who I am and how I got here. More precisely, trying to figure out how I created the insurmountable grief and sadness that got me here. I’ll stop being coy: how I killed someone. In cold blood.

The first time I read all these stories together, I realized something. I’d spent a lifetime creating prisons before my destiny was fulfilled. But the how? It’s a blur that after sixteen years remains like a Polaroid trapped forever in bad focus, each story one flash of color or amorphous shape. They add up to the one blank I can’t fill. I’ve heard—you’ve heard, we’ve all heard, anybody who’s ever sought deeper meaning has heard—that in life, to get through life, we need a purpose. I never had one. I went to school. I got married. I had kids. No need has ever burned so hot as trying to figure out how I got here. This might be the only way I get out, burning through one page at a time. That’s the prologue.
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Prisoner Clive counsels fellow addicts on the danger of drugs as an escape.

Age: 48
from American Deal

I met Derek and Mona when I was thirteen years old, in a fort made of tall weeds, a tarp, and old blankets in the fields behind my house. My friends and I used to sneak back there with some pilfered long butts that we found in our parents’ ashtrays, sit on the stained mattress none of us had been lucky enough to use yet—at least not with another person—and talk about life. But when you’re thirteen, you haven’t had much life yet, which is probably why Davey made the introductions in the first place. Derek was a bottle of bourbon, Mona some weed.

Stage manager enters, hands CLIVE a bottle; CLIVE drinks from it deeply. Stops. Drinks from it again. And again. He drains it. CLIVE assumes lecture stance, part of his certification to become an addiction counselor. To class:

After that, when the boredom—the emptiness—came, when everything seemed mundane and lifeless, I could count on Derek and Mona to chase it away, make things come alive. For a long time, they were my best friends. Now think about how empty it is in prison, and how I’ve managed to stay clean the entire time I’ve been here. Sixteen years clean.
Twice as long as last time. You can do it, too. I wouldn’t be committing the hours to this training if I didn’t believe that.
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Prisoner Clive explains to fellow addicts the difference between pleasure and happiness.

Age: 48
from American Deal

The antidote to boredom is pleasure. And the antidote to pleasure is happiness. Part of my job here is to get you to understand the difference. Sex feels like happiness, but it’s pleasure. Drugs feel like happiness, but they’re pleasure. Winning the lottery feels like happiness, but it’s pleasure. If you’re ever unsure, ask yourself: “In order to feel the same way I feel right this minute, will I have to do it again? Have another orgasm, do another line, buy 1,000 more tickets? Get another tattoo? Of course, there’s also pleasure in smelling a rose, but that never translates to anybody walking around with a flower up his nose 24/7. That’s because it’s such a small pleasure. Less extreme. It’s the small pleasures like that add up to happiness. Is this boring? You want more sex? Are you ready to put the book down and seek diversion if I give my wife one more perfect red rose and call it happiness? Now you get it. How I could be happy and still let the emptiness crush my mind.
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Paroled author Clive challenges a bookstore audience.

Age: 48
from American Deal

What do you see when you look at me? Not all addicts commit murder. Not all murderers are addicts. All human beings are on a continuum, tragedy on one end, resilience, triumph on the other. It’s the trajectory of movies, and fables, and novels, and life. If we didn’t believe it, we couldn’t go on. Anyone can have a bad day. A bad minute. If we’re honest, it’s the tragedy that makes the triumph worthwhile. The difference between you and me? You know where I turned the wheel. How about you? Anybody? I promise I’ll still sign your books—as long as you don’t have a shitty pen.

I’m kidding. I always bring my own. The Diabolo. It’s mine now. But for real, did you ever give yourself a bad day? It changes your life, affects who you are as a person. And no matter what happens from here, you take that with you. I understand.
No, really. I’m up here, I’m vulnerable. An open book (haha). You look at me and you know everything. Almost everything. I hope you still think I’m human. I’ll still think you are, I promise.
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Paroled author Clive seeks forgiveness.

Age: 48
from American Deal

I know it’s hard. Nobody wants to open the wounds. Nobody wants to put on a sign.

CLIVE picks up a cardboard sign and puts it around his neck: MURDERER.

I wear this everywhere I go. I know, I know... not everybody I meet can see it, but if I imagine they do, it’s all the same. At least when it’s on, I know that people know what they’re getting. That’s why you’re here, right? To be close to a convicted murderer in a safe environment. Do you want the sign on or off? Show of hands.

CLIVE removes the sign.

It’s easier to pretend that way, isn’t it? Like pretending we don’t know where steak comes from. Whatever the reason, I’m humbled you’ve come. Some of you are here because you can’t look away, that’s human. And some are here because you looked into your hearts. That’s humanity. Your letters. Nice letters. Letters of forgiveness. A second chance. Letters from young boys who are making different choices. Because of me. I can’t tell you what that does to me. Who among us can’t say that there was a time when if they’d made choice A instead of choice B, life might have landed a bad way? A very bad way. If you think I deserve a chance, thank you. If you feel better thinking I don’t, I understand. But I want to be worthy. At my parole hearing, they asked if I believed I was suitable. I told them the whole story, how I’m getting certified to counsel addicts so I’ll have a solid job to go to, and about Eva and my kids—my daughter hugged me when I got out, I got to hug my daughter who was only two when I went in—and I made bad choices but I’ve learned how to breathe.
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P.T. confesses to his friends how he got rich.

Age: 50s
from Once In My Lifetime

It just sort of... happened. A little at a time. It started out as a kind of reverse jinx... you know, bet against the team and maybe I lose a little money, but they win. It seemed like a good trade, helped me not care as much, kind of win-win. But I kept winning! So I thought, maybe I'm just not betting enough against them, so I'd double or nothing and... that didn't help. Losing's always part of winning, but like I say, it's a long game. You stick to the system, keep raising the stakes. A little more and a little more... a year ago, I thought I’d teach myself a lesson, bet a boatload of money I didn’t even have. Next thing you know... I'm stinkin' loaded.
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Laurence Olivier explains to Vivien Leigh why he left her.

Age: 60
from Past Midnight: A Visit With Larry and Viv

You are noble and brave and beautiful and deserve more than I am able to give.

You reach a point where it's like a life raft that can only hold so many. You cast away the hand grasping it. You let it go. You do not take it because if you do, it's two instead of one. Then you go on living and there you are with it, with the memory of every detail.

You lifted me higher than I'd ever dared to go and showed me lows I never knew existed. I didn't just drop the reins with you, I willingly cast them aside because your spirit drives me, makes my brass blare and my cymbals crash in my throat, my heart, my gut. But it's too deep. Too much.

You are the love my life but I couldn't hold on.
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