Charlie

from Techies by Don Goodrum

Genre: Comedy

Request this monologue

High school student Charlie Porter is the fragile star of Jezebel’s Last Chance and has just found out that Bonnie, his long-time friend and co-star, is not going to make that night’s performance.  To make things worse, she is being replaced by Camille Curry, an unforgiving actress who has no patience with Charlie’s sensitive nature.

(Warning: Using this monologue without permission is illegal, as is reproducing it on a website or in print in any way.)

CHARLIE

(Almost hysterical, crosses to Tony and grabs him by the shoulders.)
Anthony, you have to help me!  What am I going to do?  Bonnie, my dear sweet Bonnie who would never hurt a fly has abandoned me, cast me aside like an old doll
!  My lines, Anthony! You know how I am in a play, flying along one moment, focused with the razor-sharp intensity of a laser and then poof!  One errant down draft and I’m cast out of the nest, falling into a spiral ofBonnie used to help me, Anthony!  She knew that my mind could betray me like snow on a hot sidewalk, and so, with that phenomenal memory of hers, she would memorize my lines as well as her own and feed mine to me under her breath whenever tragedy would strike!  Not that I would need it often, of course-but the idea of her, the security of her, waiting there, ready to lift me up and help me to fly
(He pauses as the horror of what he’s up against sinks in again.)
But Camille Curry, Anthony!  The Diva of Death!  The Eater of Actors, who devours her fellow performers as if they were served on crackers with cheese…do you remember what she did to Will Hooper two years ago, in As You Like It?  He went blank in the middle of a beautiful little soliloquy, but did Camille feed him a line?  Did she help him find his way back on track? No.  She just smiled.  And waited for him.  For.  Ten.  Minutes.  She held everyone else off the stage by the sheer force of her Machiavellian will and just waited,
(Softer.)
watching as his psyche slowly crumbled, as his confidence broke down and his spark just...went...out.
(He sniffs loudly, on the verge of tears.)
Heartbroken and shattered, William never returned to the stage.  I heard he was working at Chuck E. Cheese.
(Huge sob.)
As the squirrel...  Anthony, don’t let Camille eat my soul!  Please!  You have to save me!