"See the difference? There's only one right way to tell any gag and that's to make it brief, little—like the works of a watch that'll fit in a thin watch case and be better and finer than a big turnip of a pocket clock."
So, then, each point and gag in a monologue is told in the fewest, shortest words possible and the monologue, as a whole, is marked by compression. Remember, "brevity is the soul of wit"—never forget it.
4. Vividness
If a successful monologue writer has in mind two gags that are equally funny he will invariably choose the one that can be told most vividly—that is, the one that can be told as if the characters themselves were on the stage. For instance, the words, "Here stood John and there stood Mary," with lively, appropriate gestures by the monologist, make the characters and the scene seem living on the stage before the very eyes of the audience. That is why the monologist illustrates his points and gags with gestures that picturize.
Every gag and every point of great monologues are told in words that paint pictures. If the gag is supposititious, and the direct right-here-they-stood method cannot be used, the point is worded so strikingly, and is so comically striking in itself, that the audience sees—visualizes—it. [1]
[1] Walter Kelly, "The Virginia Judge," offers a fine example of the monologist who makes his words picturize. He "puts his stories over" almost without a gesture.
Unlike the playlet, the monologue does not have flesh-and-blood people on the stage to act the comic situation. The way a point or gag is constructed, the words used, the monologist's gestures, and his inflections, must make the comic situation live in vivid pictures.
Therefore, in selecting material the monologue writer should choose those gags and points that can be told in pictures, and every word he uses should be a picture-word.
5. Smoothness and Blending
A monologue—like the thin-model watch mentioned—is made up of many parts. Each part fits into, the other—one gag or point blends perfectly into the following one—so that the entire monologue seems not a combination of many different parts, but a smoothly working, unified whole.