Monologue – The Fiction Makers

In the latest issue of NYLON magazine, actress Angourie Rice (The Nice Guys, Spider Man : Homecoming) remembers “reciting an entire monologue from a production called The Fiction Makers” that she’d overheard at rehearsals for one of her parents’ theatre productions.

The Fiction Makers is a play written by Kate Rice. In 1962, a young man from a country town tries to impress a city girl by claiming he’s pen-friends with Natalie Wood. In the original production for Hayman Theatre, Charles Wu played DONALD the country boy, Louise Cox played BEVERLY the city girl and Kirsty Marillier played NATALIE WOOD.

The play begins in a country town cinema, showing a Natalie Wood movie. The monologue is from the fictional Natalie Wood movie, a melodrama in the style of All The Fine Young Cannibals or Splendor In The Grass. The full script will be available soon on Australian Plays. Monologue here:

Film monologue: A Summer Place

In A Summer Place – Delmar Daves’ 1959 film version of Sloan Wilson’s potboiler of young and middle-aged love affairs, Richard Egan plays Ken Jorgenson, father of budding adolescent Molly (Sandra Dee), married to uptight Helen (Constance Ford). Helen has seen Molly kissing Johnny Hunter (Troy Donahue) and fears that this will lead to pregnancy or even dancing. She blames her husband’s Swedish blood, provoking him to deliver a stinging rebuke against her narrow-mindedness and prejudices.

monologue preparation

Here are two readings to help you prepare for performing your audition monologue.

Readings:

Acting Up Monologues

Here are the full-length audition monologues from the workshop. Every actor should have a set of prepared monologues, to be ready for auditions at any time. Each of you could learn the full-length version of the monologue you chose at the workshop and perform it for acting auditions and school assessments.

Improvised Theatre

An article which may be of interest. It’s long and a bit dense: read the overview of the history of Theatresports at the beginning.

‘Alive and present’: Theatresports and contemporary live performance. Engelberts, M

Monologues from films / movies / TV

Here is an interview with an American director about auditioning and selected movie monologues for auditions.

I identify three challenges for actors performing monologues from films for auditions of assessment:

Choosing your audition piece

Three optional readings to help you prepare monologues:

Theatre of Cruelty

I have attached three related articles:

Monologues for male performers

This is a list of monologues for male performers:

Monologues for female performers

This is a list of individual monologues for female performers:

Monologue Books

Three monologue books. I have posted a PDF of select monologues from each book below:

Audition monologues

In this post, you will find download links to booklets of “Audition Monologues” issued last year by the three major tertiary actor-training schools in Australia:

• The National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) in Sydney, NSW
• The Victorian College of the Arts (VCA), Melbourne Victoria
• The Western Australian Academy of the Performing Arts (WAAPA) in Perth, WA

Here are the links to the booklets:

Stage Fright

Method madness meditation: advice and insights on what actors go through before they go on.
Publication: Back Stage
Author: Elias Stimac.
Date: March 7, 2003; pages 32 – 35 (5202 words).

Back Stage: Method, Madness, Meditation

Stage Fright & Performance Anxiety: Dancing With the Butterflies
Author: Chantale Lussier-Ley
Abstract: How often do you hear these reactions to dancing in front of others: “I get Jello legs,” “My hands shake,” “I know someone who sweats a lot!” “My neck and shoulders get tense,” “It feels like I can’t breathe,” “I’m going to be sick,” “Butterflies go crazy in my stomach”?
Publication Title: Physical & Health Education Journal
Date: 12/2009

Dancing with the Butterflies

Virtuoso Acting: Naomi Watts in Mulholland Drive

This is a link to “Betty’s audition scene” from the film Mulholland Drive, starring Naomi Watts.

Theory of Directing 2

As promised, the introduction from the following book:

Handbook of Acting Techniques edited by Arthur Bartow.
London : Nick Hern, 2008.
Edith Cowan University library, call number 792.028 HAN

Artistic Journals

I found this article which is comprised of excerpts from the journal of an American director working at the Globe Theatre in London. I thought it was amusing and interesting. You might find it useful as an example of a professional artistic journal:

 

Title: A summer of directing dangerously
Author: Gerald Freedman
Abstract: Freedman is the first American director to stage a production at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre. Excerpts from the journal Freedman kept during his time at the Globe are presented.
Publication Title: American Theatre Volume 18 Date: 12/2001

A Summer of Directing Dangerously

End of post.

Theory of Directing 1

I have three documents for you to download (right-click, save-as). Two are scenes for directing workshops.

Monologues for Student Actors

Here are the PDF files, right-click to download:

Playwriting

1. Where’s Kate?

Kate: National Play Festival, ‘Must Sees’ (link)

Women: 50% of the world’s population; not 50% of produced playwrights in Australia. Read Kate’s research here: The State of Plays

2. ‘Short Circuit’, a collection of 14 short plays

Griffin Theatre in Sydney produced the plays (link).
Currency Press published the collection (link).

3. ‘Short + Sweet’

Australian ten-minute play festival (link)
Alex Broun, prolific author of ten-minute plays (link)

4. The short plays

Action words

A guide to “transitive action verbs” and how to use them in rehearsals.

ACTION_WORDS