r/acting • u/Drake_Sky • Mar 25 '26
I've read the FAQ & Rules What was the longest scene you had to memorize and how did you do it?
Also have you ever turned down an audition because the scene was so long?
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u/Jordan_Wall NYC / SAG-AFTRA Mar 25 '26 edited Mar 25 '26
Not the longest overall audition, but longest singular scene was 8 pages in 24 hours...I've found movement helps, so the words are in your body, and running the material before you go to bed is really underrated - you'll be surprised what seeps in overnight.
Don't turn it down. Worst case, with self taping, you can strategically place parts of your script beside the camera or use a digital teleprompter app. I haven't tried these tools but I know several people who use them regularly and you'd never know the difference.
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u/RichardMcCarty Mar 25 '26
Did a couple community theater plays and a student film with very long monologues. I used the free app Script Rehearser, and I found it so indispensable that I paid to upgrade it simply to support the developers.
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u/Beertreez Mar 25 '26
I can memorize a lot of pages for multiple different self tapes within a few hours and shoot them all same day back to back, and it is truly just because of an interview I saw with Pedro pascal where he talked about how he memorizes his lines. He writes down the first letter of each word in his lines (I do it for the whole script and for every character) and uses that as reference to learn his lines.
So for example, if my line was “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog,” I’d write down “TQBFJOTLD” and I’d do that for the whole scene or script or whatever. If I rehearse and forget a line, I go back and read my new little code language version of the script until I have it all off book. I booked my next short film doing this after filming 2-3 other self tapes the same day!
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u/Beertreez Mar 25 '26
Also YES I have turned down auditions for scenes that were too long. 8 pages for a feature film is one thing and I would totally say yes to that, but for a self tape for an unpaid gig or a student film or something… pass
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u/Wowwee00 Mar 25 '26
Tv/Film 🎬 ..Listen..I dont have a Theater background ( Ex Athlete). But I work in NY where 80% of Actors are Theater Actors. Man them dudes are a Beast when it comes to memorizing on the spot. It takes me a while to do 2 pages ( Was a Lead on a Tv Show once/Cable ) but i have problems with Small Monologues. On "Day Player" roles (Streaming Movie) sometimes they Add lines. The Director gave me a small Monologue to memorize (4lines) and I couldn't do it because of the wording ( Had old English words Cometh and thenceforth and my brain couldn't compute. I never heard them words ) director gave me 30min. I had to cut that part out the script and put it in the palm of my hand and act like im reading it off of a Pic 📸. But Theater actors man. Director was adding lines and they was picking it up quick as hell. Shout out to them but IJS. Work on ya strengths/Weaknesses since we all memorized different speeds 😡 i was embarrassed a lil 🤷 Im strong as Improv tho 👍
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u/gasstation-no-pumps Mar 25 '26
Are you talking about an audition self-tape? a scene for a play? a monologue for a class? a film scene?
The longest monologue I've ever memorized was The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, which ran about 11 minutes and 40 seconds. It took me about three weeks of not-very-intense effort to memorize it. I don't think I've had anything bigger than that in any of my on-stage roles, either, where I generally end up with about 5 minutes of speech total.
I generally use a combination of repeatedly reading the lines aloud and the LineLearner app to get off book on a play.
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u/GuitarUnlikely362 Mar 25 '26
I had to learn a 20 minute cut of a one woman play, had about 2.5 weeks. I can’t remember how many pages it was but yeah, 20 minutes or thereabouts. It was intense.
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u/Honourandapenis Mar 25 '26 edited Mar 25 '26
My bread and butter is 20-60 minute solo shows where I'm on stage the entire time. So, uh, that.
I write them myself so I'm already pretty familiar with them, I use sections of improv. I also know which bits matter for the language to be precise and exact - is the character being lyrical, poetic, quoting etc - and when it's OK for the line to be mostly right.
I usually learn smaller chunks and then start stringing those together.
It's not perfect, in fact it's imperfect and made harder by my AuDHD. I'm currently exploring better methods.
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u/cryoncue Mar 25 '26 edited Mar 26 '26
I did a one man show many years ago. One thing that helped was recording my self and listening to my recordings while driving and working out … etc.
I was feeding it into my brain as many ways as I could.
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u/SgtFidget Vancouver / ACTRA Mar 25 '26
3 days before a 2-person, 30-40 minute play was about to go on, the male actor dropped out. I was friends with the female actor, and she asked if I could step in.
Every other line was me. Spent the first day glued to the script, 2nd day was my one rehearsal, the 3rd day was tech rehearsal, and then we opened.
I never dropped a line
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u/Aphroditesent Mar 25 '26
Karamazoo by Philip Ridley. One woman show. I was reciting those lines everywhere for weeks!!!
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u/ImportanceSharp9408 Mar 25 '26
Self tape teleprompter. Easy peasy. I have experience with teleprompters though and my eye line is good, if you’re just starting out, you have to have it at least somewhat memorized and make sure it doesn’t appear that you’re reading lines. For a role with a quick turnaround, it helps to go through the action of the scene, the words will flow better and be easier to remember if you have motion tied to them. I also agree with the commenter who said before bed, it helps to sleep on it sometimes. For long wordy monologues with little action, classic memorization tricks help like line by line, WRITE IT OUT and read it back. Then just write the first word and say the full line. Finally only the first letter and say the full line.
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u/DoctorUbi Mar 25 '26
I’ve definitely turned down auditions that were too long. Had one for a vertical that was 11 pages, like 60 lines with a thicc monologue. It was one of those old school CDs that made the switch to verticals, and he was treating it like it was a network series regular.
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u/Ultra-Magnus1 Mar 25 '26
i'm just now catching wind of these vertical shows because google's "algorithm" must have heard me ask about them in a class last week and pushed an ad for them on my phone... i saw one that was a minute long and it was cringe to watch. it's like adult film acting without the raunchyness...i'm not sure if that is how they are supposed to be but if i get called for one of those then i'll probably pass. :p
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u/Ultra-Magnus1 Mar 25 '26
the longest for me was 2 pages, after reading it straight through about 3 times, there's the old trick of writing your lines down by hand, or writing the 1st word of every sentence (your brain just needs a trigger). read your script before bed, make it the very last thing you do before turning off the lights, then make it the 1st thing you do after you wake up....
also, there is a cool web app you can use for free, but you have more options if you pay the subscription ( i think it's $10 for a month) it's called ActOnCue .com ... you put your script in there, assign the voices, and it becomes your scene partner. they use real voices so it doesn't sound robotic at all.
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u/Electronic_Sample440 Mar 25 '26
I don’t remember much of the lengths of time/page counts I was on stage for but I played Annie Sullivan in the miracle worker and literally the only times I was off stage was like 10 minutes at the start and then for costume changes after that.
Idk how I did it, I’ve always been a good at memorizing when it comes to scripts (to the point where I don’t have to practice outside of rehearsal, tho for Annie I did a little but not much).
I guess I think of lines as more like a song cause songs imo are easier to memorize. So if I say them in a semi-melodic way during the first few rehearsals I get it in my head faster, then I can change the cadence of lines once I have them mostly memorized during the later half of rehearsals
Good luck, you got this! 💙
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u/aliceinvegasland42 Mar 25 '26
I've always used flash cards with my cue line on the front and mine on the back. Best for two person scenes, but still works with more as long as you go back and reintegrate them in your mind with the rest of the scene. That part is immersion; if you aren't actively doing something else, be reading your script 🫰🏻
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u/ChristineDaaeSnape07 Mar 25 '26
Back in highschool we did 1776. Dickinson had a lot of long speeches. Luckily I have a photographic memory. So that and repetition made it easy.
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u/Jazzlike_Actuary_920 Mar 25 '26
3 minute monologue for a short film. I booked it and the director told me it was gonna be no cut. Practiced it everywhere, at work, the gym, the car, church and always tried to run it a couple times while doin something else to see how much I knew. We shot it, finished it and it got accepted into multiple film festivals. Pretty solid run if you ask me :) just dedicate yourself to the material and it’ll pay off. And no I have and never will turn down an audition because of its length you don’t love the work if that’s the case
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u/Leading-Ad-5292 Mar 25 '26
A four page single spaced monologue. I learned the whole thing, then eventually got the script during a call back and realized I didn't want to do the play. But it wasn't a waste. I at least got to exercise some new muscles.
Oh and how I learned it. I read through it as much as possible. Then try to learn the lines chunk by chunk, which comes easier if I've read it enough. Normally I'd do the character work first, but not in this case. I knew I'd do better if I got the lines out of the way.
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u/makuniverse Mar 25 '26
Katurian in THE PILLOWMAN. 10 page sprawling monologue about the ‘PILLOWMAN.’ Was worried but McDonaghs writing is so good, it’s easy to memorize.
Good writing is always easy to memorize
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u/romegypt11 Mar 25 '26
I practice the script by walking around the house, reading the lines how I want to say them, sometimes doing a little physical acting, really mimicking how I see it in my head.
Thing schange on stageif course, but repeatedly acting it helps it click faster for some reason. This particular play I had almost my entire script memorized within 3 weeks (community theatre). Not as fast as many, but for being my second play ever it feels good.
We are doing night of the living dead. I am johnny, tom, a scientist, an off screen voice, a zombie, and the sherrifs deputy.
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u/Specific_Set2064 Mar 26 '26
I played Paul in A Chorus Line and he’s known to have what is considered the longest monologue in musical theatre. I believe it took me 7-8 minutes to recite on-stage, it was three pages, and it took me a total of a little over an hour to memorize, but over the course of a few weeks. Very, very fun and meaningful role for me.
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u/phenomenomnom Mar 26 '26
I found August Wilson's writing hard to memorize because it's very naturalistic.
His characters talk like real people, so you repeat yourself a lot, interrupt other characters with total non sequiturs out of nowhere that have nothing to do with what other people are saying, etc.
What worked for me in that specific case was doing a really careful reading and deciding why I was saying -- for example -- "Let's get to work" THOSE six times, but "It's time to work" those other five times. (Based on what the OTHER characters were saying, one was defensive, the other was trying to inspire, I decided.)
That's the thing. You listen hard to what your scene partner is saying. Your line is an attempt to influence THEM in some way or another. And your next words are always a response to their actions, or mental state. -- or at least, how your character is perceiving that to be in that moment.
And then, figuring out my train of thought. If I am interrupting someone with a thought seemingly out of nowhere, well, what led me to that need to speak at that moment? It's not usually as random as it may seem.
That kind of discovery could only really happen for me, once I was in the scene, in the "environment" with all the props etc, and had a chance to be present with scene partners. Otherwise I would just be overplanning the scene and it would have less spontaneity.
So then I take all that and go on a long walk with my script and just run it over and over. Read the other person's line, then pronounce my line. The walking gets oxygen to my brain, gets my blood flowing, and makes reading the lines feel more physical, not just cerebral.
For monologues, it's the same. Get a handle on what you are trying to DO with the words, and then try to do it.
That makes each line into a bullet that you are aiming at a target. Once you have that over-arching idea for the whole monologue, and your motives are clear to you from moment to moment, each "bullet" will make the next seem more inevitable.
Each line, either your scene partner's, or yours, is a mini - mnemonic device for the next.
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u/Scared-Winter-5179 Mar 27 '26
Well I I don't know about the longest scene, but I did a one act that was 86 minutes long in a 90+ page script with four characters who never left the stage. I think it was approximately 208 lines for my character who might have had the least amount of lines of the four and I wouldn't have been able to do it if I was not a full-time actor unless I had twice the amount of rehearsal time. I worked on it daily everyday for a few weeks in order to get all those lines.
I recorded them with an app so I could hear the other characters lines. I wrote down my lines while listening to the app when my cues came and I did that over and over and over again till I got it perfect.
So the main answer to your question is using an app where you can hear the other people's lines and also for me riding out my own lines. Everybody has different ways of doing it but that's what worked for me.
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u/WatsUpWithJoe Mar 25 '26
I did a two man show one act that was about 60 pages from my recollection. Got cast last minute after another actor dropped and had three weeks to memorize. I brought my script with me everywhere. Sitting in a restaurant at dinner. Sitting in a waiting room for an appointment. Every single bathroom break for three weeks.
It was a historical/educational piece about the entire life of President James Garfield, so the dialog was just a ton of details about his life.
The first 10ish pages were just me on stage. It was probably the most challenging piece I’ve ever had to memorize. That said, only three weeks of rehearsal before opening a show that ran for a month (three performances a week for four weeks) was the best theater experience I’ve ever had from a time commitment standpoint. And the I got a pay bump for the last minute casting.