(A 53 year old man greyed with age but with brilliant posture and designer clothes stands there in handcuffs outside his plush office)
(Turns his head to his work colleagues)
Marge, Beatrice, Marcy this is nothing but a big mistake don’t worry I’ll be back in an hour, hour and a half at a push; hold the fort (lets out a nervous laugh).
(He turns and looks at the audience everyone else gets blacked out as the spotlight stops on him)
Women, the most unintelligent, useless, disgusting creatures God ever made, but still society today expects me to work with them and socialise with them like they are some how equal! Thirty-three years I’ve had to work with women and even work under them. I’ve had to act as though I appreciate their presence and think that they are a key part of our society. But I couldn’t do it anymore, I got tired of being the second best species, so I decided to help the city, help the country and even take it as far as helping the world. I decided to take it into my own hands and help make them distinct.
I decided to start off with the worst type of women, prostitutes. I only wanted to kill ten just to get the ball rolling; but I got a bit carried away and couldn’t stop I got it inside my head that if I somehow got rid of all the prostitutes there wouldn’t be much women left considering they only have one key purpose in life: sex, but they just kept popping up out of nowhere, I needed them gone. We needed them gone.
(He bows his head)
But then I started to make mistakes, I didn’t tidy up good enough I didn’t burn the clothes and the weapons I just thought that if people were normal they would see it as I saw it helping the struggling community.
(Lifts head up)
As you can probably guess the police started to piece the evidence together and link it to me (no help of the women). They started to ask around of what I was like and how I behaved around females, of course my community stood by my side and tried to save me from the four walled cell they were bound to put me in if they found out I was the culprit. But of course as we all no there always has to be the nosey parker who ends up being the snitch in my case guess who it was, a woman; but not any woman, my mother.
(He drops to the floor head bowed)
How could she, why could she never see that all I ever had was a dream, just like any other person, Martin Luther King had a dream, she didn’t argue with his. My dream was simple and easy to fulfil.
I just wanted…
(Raises his head)
To be the new and improved Jack the Ripper.
(Stands up and holds hands above his head)
And don’t think that this little hiccup will change that.
I’m going to be a hero!
Hey
ReplyDeleteI really liked your monologue!
I loved the use of language and the overall idea of it!
However, I think it could have been even more interesting if it was Jack The Ripper himself talking. Because, who he was and why he murdered was a complete mystery.
I really liked this though! :]
Hi,
ReplyDeleteGood stuff. I like that you've shown an awareness of this fitting into a bigger play with that first section - one of the great things with monologues is showing a side that is kept hidden in normal interactions, so that little flash of how he is to other people was well thought through.
Your tone, when he is speaking his thoughts, is consistant and engaging. To say he's an interesting character would sell him short.
I do have some general points about the form, which are picky, but really handy for any kind of staged writing:
-Be careful with semi-colons and colons. An actor is going to be speaking these lines, and actors, in my experience, are terrified of complex punctuation - deal in full stops and commas only.
-As a follow up to this, anything in brackets is a stage direction, so here 'no help of the women' would again cause mass actorly panic. If you need to show that he's saying it as an aside use '(aside) no help of the women' or if you need to use a dash '- no help of the women.'
Good use of his actions though - bowing his head in shame, then returning triumphant, and the whole collapsing to the floor thing, makes for some great atmosphere. Ace stuff.
If you wanted to play around with it any more it would be interesting to see how you could gradually reveal what he's done. For example the section where he talks about saving the world and being a hero is really interesting - you have a chance there to make the audience think he's doing something noble, then reveal that he's a murderer later.
I know that's cruel to your audience, but they let themselves in for it :) Well done with this. My points on play writing are really general; just to talk about your piece on it's own - you've created a great scene. It's intiguing and dramatic, and you should be proud.
Thanks for that, and take care,
Andy
I agree it is impressive you have tried to locate this within a longer play, and your script is dark and engaging. However, I fear you are trying to cover too much narrative ground - or, in other words, you are trying to tell too long a story. A short monologue like this will always work best if it is more about CHARACTER, with narrative plot kept to a minimum. Think more about the style of the piece, and how you will use language which seems as idiosyncratic, individual and colloquial as possible...
ReplyDeleteHi Shani,
ReplyDeleteWow! Dark, topical stuff indeed. I think it's great that you chose to write your monologue from the perspective of an older guy, not to mention a killer. I'm always impressed when people are willing to make that kind of imaginative leap.
You've really made an effort to get inside this guy's head. I'd love to hear the full story of his relationship with his mother! I do think that it belongs in a larger piece, but that's because you've given the character a depth that kind really be explored fully in such a short monologue.
Good job!
Helen