Back in the office; my first chance to get off my feet since I rolled out of bed at 5 this morning, except for the 10 minutes I took to boil an egg, wolf down toast and scan the Wall Street Journal. Speaking of which, in the book review section today some academic claims that a substantial amount of research has shown that writing is better for working through a problem than talking to friends or even to a professional counselor. I think that’s true. Writing helps you focus, as does going through life at a dead run. You weed out the unnecessary distractions.

Sometime this week I have to locate a monologue for –to put it delicately – an older woman. This is the problem: in nearly all monologues for women over 40 she’s an alcoholic, a drug addict, neurotic, suicidal, terminally ill, living her life through (or manipulating) her kids, reminiscing on some past time when life was more interesting than it is today or delivering some variation of the housewives’ lament, i.e. “I could have been a contender but for my husband.” Oh, or she’s tarted-up and from West Virginia (not the nice part).

A half-century of feminism and the wise, strong, competent, sexually desirable roles for women wouldn’t fill a shot glass. I’m not the first one to point this out.

This is the other problem: the instructor in my On-Camera Scene Study class says I look like I come from Connecticut or Long Island (and he did mean the nice part). Oh, kiss of death! The only two actresses I can think of who fit that description were Grace Kelly (Main Line Philadelphia actually, I think) and Dina Merrill, who didn’t seem to have much of a career (sorry, Dina, but it’s true).

But play to your strength, right? Maybe Connecticut will come back in fashion! Timing is everything!

So, this week, find a monologue that presents an older woman as warm, wise, compassionate, even witty. TV, film or stage. It has to have a beginning, middle and end. Preferably not a memory piece. And I’m on deadline; my next On-Camera class starts a week from tomorrow.

For now it’s on to stringing-out a recruiting video for an army special forces unit and a chat with the very nice sergeant major who hacked up the narration I wrote for this thing. Must dust off my diplomacy.