2 Best Elise Monologues

Category: Play Role: Elise From: Incendiary

Elise says

I want to stop. I really do. I’m trying. I really am. But I don’t think you understand. A fire is the most beautiful thing ever created. I dare you to show me a work of art that can rival a five alarm fire. You couldn’t do it. You just couldn’t. And I like art as much as the next person but I wonder always when I see a Van Gogh or a Rembrant–I imagine, as I’m sure you do, what it would look like on fire. That second before the painting caves in, that would be . . . it would be . . . incomparable. But sadly, I don’t think any of us will live to see it. We could burn prints, I suppose, cheap gift store prints, but it would just be paper. No melting paint, no disintegrating wood. It’s a waste.

There is nothing in this world like fire. At first it’s just a match, an idea, a spark, a little yellow flame, and it need nurturing to grow to an inferno. Those oranges, those yellows, those cores of blue don’t just happen themselves. They take planning. They take skill. They take love. I am not some Zippo-flicking fourteen year old -no. I am an artist. I can light a fire so precise all that’s left of the building is dust while the rest of the block is miraculously untouched. And of course, me and the boys are always around to come and put it out in case anything should happen.

Category: Play Role: Elise From: Incendiary

Elise says

I could stay. I could stay. Oh, but the light and the heat and the smell, oh the smell. But I could stay. He has smells. He has heat. He has other fine attributes.

The light. The sound of a scraping match. Acetone. Gasoline. Kerosene. The dripping. The pain in the eyes. The light. The heat. The billows of smoke. We have too many buildings, don’t you think? Too many construction sites, empty warehouses, all so much fuel. It’s a service to take away these extra dangerous buildings. They are in the way, they are dry and cracked and falling down and they need a good match, a good flame a cleansing of the palate, a cleansing of the city.

But I could stay and climb into his arms and breathe his foul comfort of a breath. I could cling to his beliefs in right and wrong and the law. I could give up firestarting right now for good. I could climb back into his bed, dive under the covers. I could warm myself on his broad back, lick the back of his neck, put my small hand around his trigger finger.

But there’s the light. There’s the heat. There is love and there is love and there are things that I need. And I . . .

(ELISE folds JAKE’s, puts it with care on his bed, then kisses him on the forehead.)