Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Theatrical manner or style; showiness.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The theory and methods of scenic representations.
- noun Staginess; artificial manner.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun
theatrical style or behaviour
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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Mixed with all the nineteenth century theatricalism, the early twentieth-century talent for making movies move, and the overall impression of utter falsity, Unconquered has some authentic flavor of the period.
Empire of Dreams Scott Eyman 2010
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Where theatricalism governs all, and Hamlet is master of the revels, we hold fast to Horatio, who is too drab to be theatrical.
Archive 2006-10-01 M-mv 2006
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Where theatricalism governs all, and Hamlet is master of the revels, we hold fast to Horatio, who is too drab to be theatrical.
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Absolutely natural and approachable at all times with never the remotest hint of theatricalism, (unless the careless tossing over his shoulder of one flap of the cape of a cherished brown overcoat might be called theatrical), he is yet so many sided and complex that, without this self-same naturalness, often would be misunderstood.
The Dead Men's Song Being the Story of a Poem and a Reminiscent Sketch of its Author Young Ewing Allison Champion Ingraham Hitchcock
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You never hear it sung by concert singers; because it has no theatricalism in it.
The Dead Men's Song Being the Story of a Poem and a Reminiscent Sketch of its Author Young Ewing Allison Champion Ingraham Hitchcock
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"Has it been nothing but a bit of theatricalism, after all?"
A Husband by Proxy Jack Steele
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He laughed with a sense of treating himself to a theatricalism.
Erik Dorn Ben Hecht 1929
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Shorn of so much of the theatricalism of ordinary stage performances, there was reality and charm about this that warmed the spectators into frequent bursts of spontaneous enthusiasm which were as draughts of elixir to the players.
Seven Miles to Arden Ruth Sawyer 1925
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The assassin fell as he sprang from the box to the stage, where he brandished his bloody dagger, yelled with terrible theatricalism, "_sic semper tyrannis_," and stalking lamely from the platform disappeared in the darkness and rode away.
Life of Abraham Lincoln Little Blue Book Ten Cent Pocket Series No. 324 John Hugh Bowers 1920
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He found it finally and opened it on a table, displaying with some theatricalism a rectangular piece of muslin and a similar patch of striped ticking.
The Man in Lower Ten Mary Roberts Rinehart 1917
qroqqa commented on the word theatricalism
The play is so simply written that there is never a suggestion of the theater about it; even such a tired trick as the singing of an off-stage army marching off to war somehow loses all theatricalism and becomes grippingly real, so naturally and quietly is it brought in.
—Dorothy Parker, review of John Drinkwater's play Abraham Lincoln, in Vanity Fair, Feb. 1920
November 13, 2008