I’ve seen this phrase used a lot in film reviews lately. I think I know what it means but I’d be hard pressed to define it exactly. Recently I used it during a conversation with my brother (who is minoring in film studies) and just got a blank look, then couldn’t explain it very well.
Anyone know where “chewing the scenery” comes from, or can anyone define it concisely?
It’s popularly attributed to columnist Dorothy Parker in a 1930 review, but this page claims that the phrase may actually date to an 1894 story by author Mary Hallock Foote which appeared in Century Magazine: “Lads, did ye hear him chewin’ the scenery, giving’ himself away like a play-actor?”
I’ve found at least part of the story online here, but I don’t have time to read it.
Ah. Here it is. Second column, about halfway down. The Century, vol. 47, issue 4, page 511.
Re: the definition – over-acting to an extreme.
The reviews in which I’ve encountered the phrase seemed to use it in a complimentary fashion, and I’ve seldom thought of calling someone’s performance “overacting” as a compliment.
So I suppose that saying someone “chews the scenery” is about the same as calling them a “ham”.
Thanks for the replies.
This phrase was covered [url=http://www.word-detective.com/111703.html#chewthescenery]a month ago in The Word Detective
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. It doesn’t say why chewing the scenery means overacting (I’ve read elsewhere that the image is supposed to be an actor ludicrously upstaging everyone and everything on stage, but I don’t know how reliable that is) I,too, have seen it used as a compliment, meaning “to act vigorously” but far more often as an insult. A number of stage witticisms (“ould you like some salt with that scenery?”) and popular anecdotes tend to support this usage among actors themselves.
Some people simply confuse obvious acting with good acting (ask an ordinary person to demonstrate “acting” and they’ll usually overact grotesquely). Some people enjoy overacting. Some people use the phrase without knowing the correct meaning. – And, of course, sometimes overacting is actually a good thing (e.g. some comedy)
It all depends upon the type of film/scene that you’re talking about. Courtroom dramas tend to lend themselves to scenery chewing in a “good” way. The actor gets to explode with emotion as he/she harranges the jury about why they must decide this or that. Serious movies that have a villian who overacts suffer from “bad” scenery chewing.
Think of it in this way, “The actor did everything but chew the scenery.”
In other words, the actor overacted, overemoted, ran around, made enormous gestures, and did everything possible to gain attention short of actually climbing on the backdrop and chewing the scenery. Chewing the scenery is a shorthand way of expressing this.