Top 10 Movie Monologues That Stole The Show

If you’re gonna title your movie “Diary of a Mad Black Woman,” then the titular angry black woman better steal the show. And oh boy does Kimberly Elise’s Helen do just that. After having her husband cheat on her for years and then leave her for another woman, Helen is shocked and broken. Eventually, she gets back on her feet, finding her strength, power, and voice! A voice she uses to its full potential in this angry, yet pointed monologue directed at her good-for-nothing, soon-to-be ex-husband Charles.

“Magnolia” runs at just over three hours long and Tom Cruise is only on screen for 27 minutes. But for a portion of those 27 minutes, Cruise’s Frank T.J. Mackey is in the spotlight - literally. Mackey is a master pick-up artist, teaching his angry and misogynistic “Search and Destroy” techniques to a room of desperate men willing to do whatever he says. What he says isn’t always easy to hear, but there’s no way we could turn away. We weren't the only ones. In a film filled with some of the best actors around, Cruise was the only one nominated for an Oscar.

Sometimes, family is the only one that can say something. The only ones who don’t have to tell us what we want to hear, but rather, the hard truth that we can’t, or don’t want, to see. In “Birdman,” Riggan Thomson used to be famous for playing a superhero, but now wants to put on an artistic and intellectual play. Why? Well, according to his daughter Sam - played by Emma Stone - he’s doing it because he’s scared that he doesn’t matter! With the unflinching camera set on her, Stone’s monologue of anger and truth hits her father at his core, as it does to all who watch it.

Watching “Scent of a Woman” for the first time, you might have thought Al Pacino stole the show when he did the blind man tango in a New York restaurant. However, Pacino hadn’t yet delivered his loud, impassioned speech in defense of Chris O'Donnell to the prep school disciplinary committee. While the dance moves were certainly impressive, an actor as great as Pacino can just simply stand in one place and move an audience. That is exactly what he does here, showing the court what being “out of order” looks like.

You don’t have to be a genius to recognize the show-stealing power of this monologue by Robin Williams in “Good Will Hunting.” What does it mean to truly love? What does it mean to truly feel? To tear down your walls and truly open up who you are to another person. This monologue stands tall not just for its universal and human themes, but for Williams’ performance as well. Without raising his voice, Williams calmly grabs our attention from the beginning and never lets go.

“Network” was nominated for nine Academy Awards, winning Best Original Screenplay. In 2005, the Writers Guilds of America voted the script by Paddy Chayefsky as one of the 10 greatest screenplays in cinematic history. So ya, the writing was great. But it also takes a great performance to make a show-stealing monologue. That is precisely what Peter Finch gives as angry newscaster Howard Beale implores the nation to stand up, go to their windows, and yell, “I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!” Even decades later, his words still ring true.

It’s one of the most iconic lines in the history of the movies. “You can’t handle the truth” has become such a part of our popular culture that some folks might have even forgotten that it was just the beginning of a pretty great monologue. Well, we sure didn’t forget about Jack Nicholson, the world of walls, and the men with guns who guard those walls. So, we will say “thank you” to Nicholson - not for the awful things his character did, but for the amazing monologue he gave us all.

More important than any monologue are the real-life figures on which “Hidden Figures” is based. They stole the show at NASA, becoming the first African-American women to reach various positions inside the agency. But if we’re talking about the movie, the one monologue that always stands out belongs to Janelle Monáe as Mary Jackson - asking a local judge in Virginia to grant her permission to be the first Black woman to attend the all-white Hampton High School. The speech by Mrs. Jackson is one we’ll remember forever - for ever ever.

When it comes to daytime television, Oprah Winfrey stole the show for 25 years. However, in 1985, one year prior to starting her now-historic run on television, Winfrey stole the show in Steven Spielberg’s “The Color Purple.” The scene in question features an angry monologue by Winfrey in which she admits to her history with abusive men - from her father to her uncles and even her brothers - and how she will not accept treatment like that anymore. Her performance earned Winfrey a much-deserved Best Supporting Actress nomination at the Oscars.

In addition to winning an Emmy, Tony, Grammy, and Oscar, the New York Times ranked Viola Davis the 9th greatest actor of the 21st century! A well-earned ranking due, in part, to performances like the one she gave in 2016’s “Fences.” Exemplified in this monologue in which she lays herself emotionally bare - revealing to her husband how her dedication to him for the past 18 years was at the expense of her own life’s dreams. Five years earlier in “The Help,” Davis, as Aibileen Clark, also stole the show with a much quieter - yet just as crushing - monologue about the death of her son. Yet, it was her work in “Fences” that earned Davis the aforementioned Academy Award.

Leave us a short monologue of your own in the comments below.