Mona Lisa Smile – Monologue (Katherine)

A monologue from the screenplay by Lawrence Konner & Mark Rosenthal

KATHERINE WATSON

“Quiet. Today you just listen. What will future scholars see when they study us, a portrait of women today?

There you are ladies: the perfect likeness of a Wellesley graduate, Magna Cum Laude, doing exactly what she was trained to do. Slide.

A Rhodes Scholar, I wonder if she recites Chaucer while she presses her husband’s shirts. Slide.

Now you physics majors can calculate the mass and volume of every meatloaf you make. Slide.

A girdle to set you free. What does that mean? What does that mean? What does it mean? I give up, you win.

The smartest women in the country… I didn’t realize that by demanding excellence I would be challenging… what did it say? 

What did it say? Um… the roles you were born to fill. Is that right? The roles you were born to fill? It’s, uh, it’s my mistake. Class dismissed.”

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