Monologue

My daughter is in search of the perfect monologue, a minute or so snippet of a play that, when she performs it, will be the calling card that tells people who she is and what she can do.
 
While I have taken a little dramatic license with my description of a monologue, it sounds an awful lot like something more familiar to us non-actors--a resume. Just as a minute of monologue will get my daughter in the door or not, considered highly or not, a resume (often read for even less than a minute) is designed to do the same for us. A monologue may be full of words written by someone else, but how my daughter plays those words will make all the difference. And while the words of a resume may be our own, it is often how we tailor them to our audience that gets us more than just a first look.
 
For my daughter, there is the challenge of finding something enough "like her" to be believable, yet enough of a stretch to show off her acting. Long enough to generate interest, but not long enough to bore. For both of us, it seems, there is this imperative to put our best self--our most "right for the part" self--forward, in not much more than the time it takes to say "Hello, how are you?" And that's not easy, when we are far more than just a string of words.
 
I wonder sometimes why so much has to be based on so little. Sure, there is a skill to presenting yourself well in a few words, whether out loud or on paper. But does that skill really translate to what your skill level will be once you're in the door? Is your success in the one-minute exercise an indicator of your flexibility or your ability to work hard or your efficiency of language? Or is one-minute presentation simply the only way to keep things running in a fast-paced world?
 
My daughter will undoubtedly find a monologue that she can make her own, at least for now. Who she is and who she wants to present will change from audition to audition, just as the person I want to present will change from job to job. The key--for both of us--will be finding the things that "play" quickly and well--that tell the story of us, and what we can do, all while our audience is still listening.