Men's Comedic Monologues That Are Actually Funny
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Contributors
These monologues were written by actually funny people.
Here is their business of funny:
ALISHA GADDIS is Latin Grammy Award–winning performer, humorist, writer, producer, and performer based in Los Angeles. She is a graduate of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts and University of Sydney, Australia. Hal Leonard/Applause Books published her first book, Women’s Comedic Monologues That Are Actually Funny, in 2014. Subsequently, she signed on with them to release five more books in this series, including the book you are currently holding in your hands. Her columns have appeared in College Candy, Comediva, GOOD magazine, and Thought Catalog. She is the founder and head writer of Say Something Funny . . .B*tch!—the nationally acclaimed all-female online magazine. The highly irreverent Messenger Card line that she cofounded and writes for is sold in boutiques nationally. Gaddis currently stars in the TV show she cocreated and produced Lishy Lou and Lucky Too as part of the Emmy Award–winning children’s series The Friday Zone on PBS/PBS KIDS.
Alongside her husband, Lucky Diaz, she is the cofounder and performer for Latin Grammy Award–winning Lucky Diaz and the Family Jam Band. Their children’s music has topped the charts at Sirius XM and is People magazine’s No. 1 album of the year—playing Los Angeles Festival of Books, Target Stage, the Smithsonian, the Getty Museum, Madison Square Park, Legoland, New York City’s Symphony Space, and more. Their song “Falling” has been used in Coca-Cola’s national ad campaign.
As a stand-up comic and improviser, Gaddis has headlined the nation at the World Famous Comedy Store, New York Comedy Club—and has been named one of the funniest upcoming female comics by Entertainment Weekly. As a performer, Alisha has appeared on Broadway, and at the Sydney Opera House, Second City Hollywood, Improv Olympic West, Upright Citizens Brigade, and the Comedy Central Stage, as well as touring with her acclaimed solo shows Step-Parenting: The Last Four-Letter Word, and The Search for Something Grand. She has appeared on MTV, CBS, CNN, Univision, NBC, and A&E, and has voiced many national campaigns. Gaddis is a proud SAG/AFTRA, NARAS, LARAS, and AEA member.
She loves her husband the most.
www.alishagaddis.com
JEFF BOGLE abandoned his cushy corporate gig in 2008 for the far more rewarding career of Dad and to attempt to be funny-ish whilst writing and podcasting about fatherhood, travel, and All Things Childhood on his site, Out With The Kids (OWTK). He thinks it’s rad that his work frequently appears on the Huffington Post and PBS, among other digital sites and paper rags, but he’s still anxiously awaiting his debutant role as Deadbeat Dad in a Law & Order episode. He’s married to an adorable redheaded gal who’s been laughing at his jokes and believing in his ability to pull off one hair-brained idea after the next since the moment they met. Together, they’ve spawned a pair of hilarious, strange, and lovely young ladies. Jeff considers himself one of the most fortunate guys in the world, although he often needs to be reminded of this fact.
OWTK.com
MERYL BRANCH-McTIERNAN is a comedic novelist, screenwriter, and blogger for the Huffington Post. She has great admiration for those who perform monologues, but was told by her high school acting teachers that she was much better at writing than acting. A native New Yorker, she traveled West in pursuit of her dream of writing for the small screen. She has trained at Second City Hollywood and received a BS at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. She is still trying to prove that BS wasn’t an acronym for bullshit.
www.huffingtonpost.com/meryl-branchmctiernan
STEVE BRIAN I am an actor, writer, theater artist, and filmmaker currently living in Portland, OR. After receiving my MFA from the Theatre School at DePaul in Chicago and calling Los Angeles home over the past three years, I have moved back to Oregon to grow roots, raise a kid, and drink more coffee than my adrenal glands can handle. Above all things, I believe that you need to be comfortable with the words you are speaking during an audition. So feel free to change a few words here and there and know that you have my blessing . . . but don’t go crazy. If you want to get in touch, you can reach me through my website.
www.stevebrian.com
CARLA CACKOWSKI is a person who does things. She toured the world performing comedy (on a boat!) with comedy troupe the Second City, and she currently teaches improvisation to wonderful dreamers at the Second City in Los Angeles. Carla has written and performed five comedic solo shows that have played in superfun places like Los Angeles, New York City, San Diego, and Austin. She’s a member of the Solo Collective, a theater company currently in residence at VS. Theater in Los Angeles. Several of her monologues were published in Women’s Comedic Monologues That Are Actually Funny (Applause Books, 2014). She is a member of SAG-AFTRA and, as a voice-over artist, has been featured on television shows such as iCarly, Pretty Little Liars, and Cougar Town. Carla was a writer on Lishy Lou and Lucky Too, an adorably hilarious children’s show that aired on PBS KIDS. Carla really loves her family and friends and hopes that even if she never procreates, two hundred years from now someone will think of her when they read her monologues in this book.
www.carlacackowski.com
TAMMY JO DEAREN is a Los Angeles–based comic and show producer. She has been called a “comedic jackhammer.” She entertains the audience with her high-energy, surprising edge and unique perspective. Having the special opportunity of performing weekly at the World Famous Comedy Store on the Sunset Strip, she has performed side by side with Judd Apatow, Bill Burr, Sarah Silverman, Bret Ernst, and more. Tony Joey is Tammy Jo’s alter ego, best summed up as a chauvinistic douchebag. Tony’s strong East Coast accent, goatee, and slicked-back hair is his signature winning combination. Fist pumps and leg kicks punctuate his social commentary shout-outs and declarations. He is a disgusting pig that speaks louder than his elevated voice. So wrong and so funny . . . it’s Tony Joey!
@tammyjodearen
BRANDON ECON studied Magic: The Gathering and theater at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. He has a cat named Katan, and you may have seen him shouting on stages all across Los Angeles. He is currently writing a trashy novel set in a sugar shack in Quebec, and a comedy horror film about a werewolf who writes other people’s biographies. He voiced a Swedish paper bag puppet in a Fandango commercial and recently built a spice rack which he is very proud of. If you dive really deep into Google, you’d be able to see when and where he is performing next—but be warned, he typically pretends to be an alpha male or a Velociraptor so it might not be worth it in the end. He was born in Ohio but doesn’t like to talk about that. A werewolf wrote this.
TANNER EFINGER is primarily an improv comedian. He has worked with ComedySportz (NYC), Bruised Fruits (NYC), Proletarian Improv (L.A.), Oxford Imps (UK), and many others. He has taught improv at schools including Phillips Academy Andover, Phillips Exeter Academy, Princeton University, Golden Performing Arts (L.A.), and Charterhouse School (UK). As he types this, he is hungry and wondering if he should have lunch. He has written for many blogs and magazines, has written two screenplays and one stage play, and is now working on his first novel.
HANNAH GANSEN is a Los Angeles–based comedian, writer, and singer-songwriter. She has performed at numerous festivals (Fringe, Women in Comedy, Hollywood, L.A. Comedy), clubs (Laugh Factory, Comedy Central Stage, Comedy Store, the Apollo, Zanie’s, the Improv, IO West, IO Chicago, Flappers, Icehouse), and many underground, alternative comedy venues. Her music/comedy album, Al the Bum, is available on iTunes and Amazon.
www.hannahgansen.com
JESSICA GLASSBERG is a comedy writer and stand-up comedian. For ten years, she was the head writer on The Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon and performed stand-up on the nationally syndicated show five times. She has also written for Disney XD, “A Hollywood Christmas at The Grove” for Extra, and the Screen Actors Guild Awards (where her jokes were highlighted on E!’s The Soup, EntertainmentWeekly.com, and Hollywood.com). Ad
ditionally, Glassberg was a featured performer on The History of the Joke with Lewis Black on the History Channel. Her monologue “Always Awkward” was published in the book Women’s Comedic Monologues That Are Actually Funny (Applause Books, 2014). She currently produces and hosts a stand-up comedy showcase in Los Angeles called “Laugh, Drink, Repeat.” Jessica is also a prolific digital writer, with her work featured on HelloGiggles.com, Reductress .com, Kveller.com, AbsrdCOMEDY.com, and Torquemag.io. For upcoming shows, clips, and writings samples, check out her website. Follow her on Twitter at twitter.com/Glassberg.
www.jessicaglassberg.com
ANDY GOLDENBERG grew up in Florida and graduated from the University of Miami with a BFA in theater, but considers himself a triple-threat Angeleno. With several commercials and TV roles under his belt, his big break came as Adam Sandler’s acting double and scene partner in Jack and Jill (2011): when Adam played Jack, Andy played Jill. His Goldentusk YouTube channel has more than 50 million views, with Time Out New York film critic Keith Uhlich nicknaming him the Theme Song Sondheim. He was a coverboy of the Nice Jewish Guys Calendar, wrote and performed sketch comedy with National Lampoon, and recently published a children’s book called Peter, the Paranoid Pumpkin. He regularly performs with the record-breaking improv team, Freedom Snatch. For the bravest of actors, Andy challenges you to perform his bio for your next audition.
www.youtube.com/goldentusk
DEBORAH GROSS is a playwright/producer/performer based in New York City and Los Angeles. She is a graduate of the Roy H. Park School of Communications-Ithaca College. Deb studied improv and sketch writing at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in L.A. and New York, and is a graduate of the Los Angeles Second City Conservatory Program. Her sketches have been performed at the L.A. Fest of Sketch, the L.A. Improv Festival, and the San Francisco Sketch Fest. Her blog Conversations with Deb won the Other Network Comedy Contest and ran as a stage show at UCB in New York and L.A. Her one-act The Third Date was named Best in Fest at the 2013 Hollywood Fringe Festival. She is currently a contributing writer on Someecards.com.
www.conversationswithdeb.com
JP KARLIAK Voice-over artist, writer, solo performer, and snappy dresser, JP hails from the “Electric City” Scranton, Pennsylvania. His voice has fallen out of the mouths of Marvel heroes and villains, a werewolf nemesis of the Skylanders, and a college kid buzzed on Red Bull, among others. On screen, he planned a fancy party for Sarah Michelle Gellar and delivered singing telegrams to the Real Husbands of Hollywood. A graduate of the USC School of Theatre, iO West, and Second City Training Center, he has written numerous short films and plays produced in locales around the country. His full-length solo show, Donna/Madonna, has garnered awards at the United Solo, New York International Fringe, and San Francisco Fringe Festivals. He can always be found at fancy chocolate boutiques or on his website.
jpkarliak.com
MARK HARVEY LEVINE has had over 1,100 productions of his plays all over the world from New York to Bucharest to Jakarta to London. His work has been seen at such theaters as the Actors Theatre of Louisville, City Theatre of Miami, and the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. Evenings of his short plays have been produced at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, as well as in Amsterdam, Sao Paulo, Seoul, Sydney, New York, Los Angeles, Boston, Indianapolis, Columbus, Providence, and other cities. An evening of his plays had a National Tour of Brazil from 2007 through 2010. His work has been translated and performed in eight languages. His plays have won numerous awards and been performed at numerous festivals, such as the Alan Minieri Award at New York’s 15-Minute Play Festival, and the In A New York Minute one-page play festival (five times in a row!). He currently lives in Pasadena, California, with his lovely wife and son.
www.markharveylevine.com
EITAN LOEWENSTEIN is a writer/actor/director in Los Angeles. Yes, one of those. After graduating from the University of California, Santa Barbara, with a degree in electrical engineering, Eitan decided to forgo the exciting, uncertain world of engineering for a humdrum, predictable career in the entertainment industry. Eitan has written various short films, features, and a web series. Some have been filmed, most have not. Eitan recently won the first ever WGA Mighty Pen Commendation. As an actor Eitan has appeared in a respectable number of commercials and a few TV shows. Eitan has also directed a few short films, some of which are funny. Eitan’s most popular piece of writing is ironically a piece on “How to Write a Biography.” It is ironic because this biography is pretty “meh.”
eitanthewriter.com
KENNY MADRID draws most of his inspiration from a troubled upbringing as a white, upper-middle class, cisgender male. Why is he a writer? Well, if you can find another profession that pays him to make dick jokes all day, he’s all ears. Kenny attended San Diego State University before moving to Los Angeles to sell out and get rich. He has hosted a radio show, worked at multiple political offices, an elementary school, a movie studio, and a number of<
LEAH MANN grew up in Washington, DC, and graduated with a degree in theater from Brown University in 2003. Since moving to Los Angeles in 2004, she has written several screenplays, television specs, short stories, and one novel than no one will ever see. Her short story “Going Solo” was published alongside work by prominent authors such as Neil Gaiman and Ray Bradbury in the horror anthology Psychos: Serial Killers, Depraved Madmen, and the Criminally Insane. Leah currently works as a production designer, property master, and set decorator. She digs crosswords, hikes, and art projects, reads a lot of fiction, and doesn’t own a dog—even though it seems like she ought to.
leahmann.com
KELLY MOLL was most recently published in the hilarious first book of monologues compiled by Alisha Gaddis, Women’s Comedic Monologues That Are Actually Funny (Applause Books, 2014). By day she is a corporate event planner and is required to wear a suit and respectable heels regularly. By night, she is a writer with visible tattoos and an affinity for swearing and sarcasm. She is currently “nearly finished” with numerous works-in-progress, which range from the biographical to the highly imagined. She does her best thinking while watching the banks of the Mississippi River blaze by on the back of her husband’s motorcycle. With a few more trips down the river, she hopes to knock one of the WIP’s out of the park and end her tour of duty in the corporate world. She lives in Minneapolis with the aforementioned husband.
GINA NICEWONGER has been “writing in the moment” by performing improv comedy for over ten years. She has written and performed in shows at the Annoyance Theater and Improv Olympic in Chicago and, more recently, at various theaters throughout Los Angeles. Gina wrote one-acts produced by Studio C Artists and enjoys writing sketch comedy with the groups BBQ Committee, Chrissy and Gina, and Hot Lunch. When not making stuff up, Gina enjoys teaching elementary school.
JEFF PASSINO is a Los Angeles–based writer and director. At age four, he won first place in a talent show in his hometown of Perrysburg, OH, by singing The Greatest American Hero theme song. After that, Hollywood seemed like the only real place for him. Since his arrival in 1998, Jeff has worked in various aspects of the film and TV industry. He is currently directing a web series he wrote for NBC/Universal. Additionally, Jeff is a photographer, a stand-up comic, and an improviser who has performed on various stages throughout L.A. In his spare time, he bakes pies that friends have described as being “pretty good.” He ran the L.A. Marathon twice, though he didn’t win either time.
jeffpassino.com
CHRIS QUINTOS is a writer/actor/housewife who is lucky enough to live in both San Francisco and Los Angeles. She loves being right, hanging out with her dog, Beta, shopping in bulk, a
nd books. She dislikes scary movies, walking on sidewalk grates, cleaning her car, and clowns. She’d like to thank her husband for being wonderful and handsome (AND VERY PATIENT). Many thanks to her family and friends who let her be 1,000 percent Chris, whatever that means. Thanks also to Alisha Gaddis for being a kick-ass lady. Chris cannot believe she is being published in a book—an actual book! Follow, stalk, chat @chrisquintos.