Tuesday, January 11, 2011

monologue

A monologue (or monolog) The character may be speaking his or her thoughts aloud, directly addressing another character, or speaking to the audience, especially the former. Monologues are common across the range of dramatic media (plays, films, animation, etc.). It is distinct from a soliloquy, which is where a character relates his or her thoughts and feelings to him/herself and to the audience without addressing any of the other characters.[1]

Comic monologue
The term "monologue" was actually used to describe a form of popular narrative verse, sometimes comic, often dramatic or sentimental, which was performed in music halls or in domestic entertainments in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Famous examples include Idylls of the King, The Green Eye of the Yellow God and Christmas Day in the Workhouse.
The comic monologue has evolved into a regular feature of stand-up and television comedy. An "opening monologue" of a humorous subject is a typical segment of stand-up comedy and often forms a regular feature of television programmes (such as Friday Night with Jonathan Ross).
Famous comic monologists include Mort Sahl, Chris Rock, Dave Chappelle, George Carlin, Jack Parr, Billy Connolly, Bill Cosby, Lord Buckley, Johnny Carson, Craig Ferguson, Jimmy Fallon, David Letterman, Jay Leno, Rove McManus, Bob Hope, Stanley Holloway, Julius Tannen, George Robert Sims, Ellen DeGeneres, John Leguizamo, Sam Kinison, Jerry Seinfeld, Don Rickles, Jimmy Kimmel, Dane Cook, George Lopez, Conan O'Brien, Sam Waller, Some of the aforementioned performers often perform what is referred to as a "solo show", and some practitioners of this format wrestle with stories and themes which mix the comic and the dramatic, namely Spalding Gray, Garrison Keillor and Eric Bogosian

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