"Chewing the Scenery"

Troll. but a fun troll.

Most of Sean Penn's performances.

Since certain basic tasks appear to be a bit beyond you...

This term is not just about emoting, is it?

Someone post a vid or describe an example of the scenery being chewed.

TIA

Getting my good deed for the week out of the way...%0D %0D Do you need help with your shoes, too?

Well, maybe I can't spot "overacting," because I never notice the examples you guy give when I'm watching a movie -- say, like the fava beans scene mentioned above? Why was that "overacting"?

Take a look at the daytime soaps.

Think Lucille Ball.

r6, he was a big ham bone throughout the entire movie! For me it means I can tell they're acting and not very well. They come off like a HS drama student.

Charlton Heston in 'Soylent Green' or 'Planet Of The Apes'%0D %0D Susan Hayward in 'I'll Cry Tomorrow'%0D %0D and of course,%0D %0D Faye Dunaway in (altogether now) ' '%0D %0D %0D

Robin Williams as Mork in Mork and Mindy. Actually, Robin Williams in anything, including every interview he's ever done and probably in real life.

Mommie Dearest!

"Susan Hayward in 'I'll Cry Tomorrow'"

Or Hayward in pretty much anything

Watch the movie Titus and you'll see Anthony Hopkins and Jessica Lange devouring the scenery from opposite ends of the screen. It's an acting Clash of the Titans.

The first I became aware of it was when my mother said Anthony Geary did it in General Hospital back in the early 80s days of Luke and Laura on General Hospital.

Frankly, I'd say a good 30-40% of Oscar nominees are chewing the scenery. Perhaps Melissa Leo is a good example. Although I thought she was very good and understated in Frozen River, she was a little over the top in The Fighter (not to mention her acceptance speech).

Anthony Hopkins in anything

Mandy Patinkin in anything he's ever done

Al Pacino in anything.

Good one R18, especially And Justice For All.

What do you mean, R18?

WHOO-AAHH!!!

Based upon the responses to OP so far, it sounds to me like "chewing the scenery" is a highly subjective assessment.

It's an example to of terribly affected "art critic speak" and it needs to stop now.

I don't want to ever read "chewing the scenery" on DL ever again.

I am telling you now so I don't have break your fingers later.

Robin Williams was first to come to mind.

Sometimes I dread watching him. A few times I have enjoyed him.

I don't recall ever dreading Pacino, but I haven't seen his lesser known works. (and I liked 'Scent of a Woman').

It might just be a matter of taste, OP. But the classics that endure (whether they be movies, actors, directors, writers, etc.) usually does not involve dread.

When I imagine someone chewing the scenery I envision someone reaching beyond their own direct and simple capacity of expression, if they have any, to get attention, while on stage. Not sure if this has anything to do with the derivation of the phrase.

Watch Judy Davis in Where Angels Fear to Tread. A terrible movie and a terrible performance, by a great actress who should have known better.

Of course, assessments of acting are subjective.

What did you expect?

But that's what OP asked for.

Vincent d'Onofrio in Law and Order owns this thread. Several times there was a good storyline but you just wanted to slap him and tell him to sit down and shut up.

Faye Dunaway in Mommie Dearest is the quintessential example of an actor chewing the scenery, swallowing it, vomiting it back up and chewing it all over again.

OP, maybe you'd understand the phrase better if you watched examples of the opposite -- actors who are so subtle and real that you forget you're watching a performance and feel as if you're spying on your neighbors: Walter Huston, Spencer Tracy, Barbara Stanwyck.

I like Vincent, r25!

I can't stand that dark-haired guy on L&O LA. The one who replaced Skeet...

R13 beat me to it. I always thought the quintessential chewed scenery performance was La Hayward in "I Want to Live!" I don't think there's a real moment in it.

I'd add Dustin Hoffman to the mix. It's gotten so that I can't stand the sight of him on the screen.

R27 makes an excellent point. I'd add Fredric March to the list of people that you never catch acting.

Joan Crawford post-"Mildred Pierce"

Kathleen Turner enjoys tearing it up--she's chawin' on a fair amount of palmetto while working over William Hurt in "Body Heat" & her ability to play to the loftiest balcony has only "improved" since

Brenda Blethyn in "Secrets & Lies"--so much hysteria, so little film stock

Faye Dunaway post-"Mommie Dearest"--"Supergirl" can only be seen to believed

Elizabeth Taylor in "Suddenly Last Summer," especially the climatic scene. Someone added some stupid music to this clip, but yeah, that's chewing the scenery.

Can be seen now in Game Of Thrones on HBO.

Lea Michele, constantly.

I don't really understand either.%0D %0D Ok, here is my guess... Jeff Goldblum in Independence DAy? see, or maybe he just gets on my nerves.

If Faye Dunaway is the queen of scene chewing then Daniel Day Lewis is certainly the king.

Oh, please. "Mommie Dearest" was entertaining none-the-less as were most of the movies mentioned here. People who take everything as seriously are some of you here will never enjoy movies for what they are, just, for the most part, mindless entertainment.

R29, I agree about Frederic March. Also Claude Rains -- easier to find men who don't overact than women.

And the concept of scenery chewing doesn't apply to comedy. There, timing is everything and you've either got it or you don't.

Jeff Goldblum is a very good example, R34. He always chews scenery.

R36: The entertainment is always mindless when you are . . .

No one chews...more like chomps and swallows whole, like William Shatner.

Miranda Richardson is a terrific comedic actress, but whenever she has to play a dramatic part she is a classic scenery chewer. Especially in "Damage" and "Sleepy Hollow."

"People who take everything as seriously are some of you here will never enjoy movies for what they are, just, for the most part, mindless entertainment."

Recognizing the symptoms of Swingforanoscaritis is part of the fun. One can both enjoy the moment & recognize the unintentional arch hilarity at the same time.

It's not just about the acting. It's usually what actors need to do when there's a deficit in the writing - thus, they chew on the scenery instead.

"Chewing the Scenery" is extremely unprofessional; anyone who does this has no respect for the art form and should never work again. Anyone who goes off script or ad libs, takes away from the play and makes a mockery of the art of acting. I blame it on young actors who have had no training, for this is pretty much exclusively where you see it. It's a shame.

[quote]No one chews...more like chomps and swallows whole, like William Shatner.

Shatner and Loren Greene did summer stock together in Canada back in about 1964. I can't imagine what that combination was like.

That said, NO ONE . . . chews . . .THE . . . scenery like. . . . MR. David . . . . Caruso and his sunglasses.

Dixie Carter on Designing Women

Yeah, but a 'chewing the scenery' used to be considered good acting prior to Stella Adler or the method, as far as I'm concerned. %0D %0D I was watching a few GOOD films from the 1930s and boy did they chew the scenery.

[quote]Lea Michele, constantly%0D %0D I disagree.%0D %0D One thing the examples above (and the definition of the phrase) clearly imply is that to chew the scenery you have to be able to act. BIG, but nonetheless, act. %0D %0D The list of scenery chewers is always comprised of very good actors who for whatever reason are allowed to run with the full spectrum of emotions and need to pull back or bring it down 7 notches. Everyone from Betty Davis to Tyne Daly to Meryl Streep has done it at one point or another - some with fantastic results, others with career-breaking impetus.%0D %0D You will never see Elizabeth Berkley, Sofia Coppola, Madonna, or Lorenzo Lamas accused of scenery chewing.%0D %0D I truly believe Michelle belongs with the latter lot.

What's astonishing to me is how many people even today can't recognize the difference between chewing the scenery and a great performance. Many of those mentioned here--Al Pacino, Miranda Richardson, Mandy Patinkin--actually have people who think their worst and hammiest performances are examples of great acting. Pacino won an Oscar, after all, for "Scent of a Woman," and Patinkin won an Emmy for his shameless histrionic overemoting on "Chicago Hope."

Sometimes I think people like scenery-chewing performances because they can at least recognize acting as acting. The subtler fine actors (Fredric March, Myrna Loy, Blythe Danner, Donald Sutherland) rarely get the kind of award recognition they deserve because they are rarely caught "acting" all over the place--and when they do win a big prize it's for one of their rare showy parts (like March with "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde").

Thanks, R31 -- that was helpful.

Rarely do I, when watching a movie, say to myself, "So-and-so's obviously acting." I guess I just get caught up in movies when I'm watching them. OTOH, for the most part, I only watch movies I know I'm going to enjoy.

A rare exception was "The Black Swan." I really hated that movie. Would you call THAT "scenery chewing"?

I can't stand to watch "I Love Lucy" either, but it never occurred to me that LB was "chewing the scenery." I just thought she wasn't funny.

OP, this should help you recognize it too:

Actually, the best tutorial I can imagine in the difference between a good performance and chewing the scenery is from the classic Carol Burnett comedy sketch "The Kidnapping"--she starts out with a genuinely good performance (Carol Burnett is actually a terrific dramatic actress), and by the end when she does it the third time she's at Shatner's level.

Yum! Scenery!

Its NIKI you dumb cunt.

I was once thin but started chewing the scenery a little bit. But once you get a taste, ya can't stop!

Jessica Lange can answer OP the best.

I realize I'm several years late to the party, but I think Claude Rains is the absolute antithesis of a "natural" actor.

Barbara Hayward: I WANT TO LIVE!

Yikes! I meant Susan. But Barbara had her moments too:

Pia Zadora in "Butterfly." That accent!

some people seem to use the phrase as a compliment and some as a criticism.

I think the meaning is generally taken as pejorative.

"use the phrase as a compliment "

Chewing the scenery? As a compliment? Really? I've never heard it used that way. If someone does say that, I think they're misusing the phrase.

I always thought chewing the scenery was a compliment, in that, I thought it specifically meant over-emoting, but doing it in such a convincing way that the audience believed it was a credible emotion--very much the opposite of melodrama.

To me, Bette Davis in The Star or Gloria in Sunset Blvd were good examples of scenery chewing.

This phrase was coined expressly for Nathan Lane.

Judy Davis in "The Starter Wife" TV series. Simply awful!!!!

ITS A FUCKING COMPLIMENT YOU CUNTS

Can someone throw out a couple of more current examples of scenery chewing vs. subtle/more natural?

If I'm following correctly, Cate Blanchett in Blue Jasmine = scenery chewer but who'd be a good example of a more subtle actor?

Nancy Kelly and Eileen Heckart in THE BAD SEED own this thread!

Glenn's stopped chewing the scenery lately.

Then again, I gather Poligrip has its limits.

Bastard!!!

I always thought chewing the scenery was over acting but I gather more people here consider it... intense acting?

I think it's oftentimes a combination of both, R71. I've seen a few stage actors who had trouble dialing it down for movies or TV. With them it seems like overacting, gestures and facial expressions that are too large.

Oh, pul-eeez.

Miss Bette Davis was the ultimate scenery chewer. The only time she didn't was in a forgettable flick called "Winter Meeting" and she was boring.

She actually thought she should have won an Oscar for Baby Jane, when she was more than sufficiently OTT.

She was perfect as Margot Channing. A ham (h)ac(k)tress playing a ham (h)ac(k)tress.

Meryl in August/Osage owns this thread

I'm surprised that there was any scenery left after these two got through with it.

I have never considered it a compliment. Acting on a stage in a theater and acting for a film are two entirely different talents. You can chew a bit more scenery in the theater than you can in a movie.

Watch any film with Rod Steiger in it OP.

THE BIG KNIFE has to be seen to believed. There was no scenery left standing after Steiger, Palance, and Winters got through with it.

Usually the stars that are over rated..i.e. Shaun Penn, Al Pacino, Robin Williams, fading Jim Carey.

I thought it had to do with over-intense facial expressions as actors looked out the windows of houses, carriages, and such.

Glad to be corrected.

Nicolas Cage and Sean Pean are the worst offenders.

Faye Dunaway in almost anything she's ever done. She wasn't so noticeable in NETWORK, but that was because she was playing an over-the-top character in a thoroughly over-the-top movie.

Christopher Lloyd in anything. That said, I loved him as Reverend Jim in Taxi. It worked in Who Framed Roger Rabbit because the Toons were dead serious scenery chewing competitors. Elsewhere (BTTF) it got old.

Katherine Hepburn in almost every film she ever appeared in. She was as subtle as a nuclear bomb blast.

Elizabeth Taylor. Her range of acting was limited to shrill to overly shrill to extremely shrill. If she wouldn't have been born beautiful she would have been a Z-list extra on shoe string budget productions.

Jim Carry. Has turned Chewing the scenery into a career. Like Robin Williams he is now recognized more for being truly annoying then for his acting abilities.

Al Pacino. Performs the same character over and over again. Pacino's acting range consists of shouting and not shouting.

Sean Pean. Sour faced . Seems to suck the life out of any production he is in. Not only chews the scenery but buries it in a unmarked grave in the back yard.

What Natalie Portman, Matthew McConaughey and Cate Blanchett got them their Oscars.

Think "MOTHERFUCKING SNAKES ON A MOTHERFUCKING PLANE" for another example.

Any worst offenders list has to include William Shatner, Robin Williams, Jack Nicholson, Albert Finney, Al Pacino, Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Dustin Hoffman, Faye Dunaway, Meryl Streep, Katharine Hepburn, Rod Steiger and Anthony Hopkins.

Soaps are notorious for hambones. As someone mentioned above, Anthony Geary has shredded every bit of scenery he has ever been around, but so did Jeanne Cooper, Billy Miller, Kim Zimmer, Nancy Lee Grahn, Victoria Rowell, Laura Wright and Christian LeBlanc. Soap viewers equate overacting with "real" acting so the behavior is rewarded.

Jessica Lange as Constance Langdon in AHS owns this thread.

Anyone ever see Bette Midler in Gypsy? Je-sus! That's the perfect example of scenery chewing gone horribly wrong. Even in the rafters of Radio City Music Hall, people would told her to calm down.

Her monologue right before launching into "Rose's Turn" is one of the worst things I've ever seen in my life.

Try not to laugh when she shouts "BECAUUUSSSEEEE I was born too soon...."

Was I a scenery chewer? C'mon, be honest...

"Sometimes the material and the character justify that kind of a performance..."

Cary Grant in "Arsenic And Old Lace" - but try underplaying THAT role...

Do any of you remember "these pretzels are making me thirsty" from Seinfeld?

George Costanza gave an example of scenery-chewing when he yelled out the final part of that line: "These pretzels... are MAKING me THIRSTY!"

R52's example is perfect.

Re: Fredric March, He also won a mid-career Oscar for a very nuance and subtle performance in "The Best Years of Our Lives." I know revisionist history has it that the Oscars should have gone to "It's a Wonderful Life" and James Stewart, but I think "Best Years" is a far better film, that still has the power to evoke what that return was like for those men and their families. And I'll take the unstudied "amateur" acting of Harold Russell when he is reunited with his family over all of Stewart's bug-eyed mania in "Wonderful Life."

Best Years of Our Lives is one of the best BP winners. It's a fabulous post-war film. Like Brief Encounter, released in the U.S. the same year, it is a greater achievement than the more widely known classic It's a Wonderful Live. In fact, Francis Ford Coppola listed Best Years among his top 10 greatest films.

Wow it took until page 4 to mention BETTE DAVIS? And page 5 to mention Katharine Hepburn. Two of the greatest actresses of all time as far as I'm concerned, but there were days they ate entire sets for lunch.

Rosalind Russell was another pro at this. Especially in Picnic. "The gutter's where you came from and the gutter's where you belong!!!" She offers another master class in the art when she plays Mother Superior.

The above were brilliant actors, but when they chewed scenery they tended to be a bit off the rails.

I really think it's Susan Hayward who chewed it up and spit it out the best. Really pitch perfect. Very natural, very believable. I prefer Davis, Hepburn, and Russell to Hayward (although not by much), but I really think Hayward chewed scenery the best of all. "Well Broadway doesn't go for booze and dope! Now you get outta my way 'cause I gotta MAN waitin' for me!!"

"That's a switch from the f@gs you're usually stuck with."

"AT LEAST I NEVER MARRIED ONE!"

As much as I adore Bette Davis, she wouldn't have played Helen Lawson as perfectly as Susan Hayward did.

M in the remake of The Manchurian Candidate. AL in the original.

No, R100, Angela Lansbury did not chew the scenery in The Manchurian Candidate. But thanks for playing.

Is campy the same as chewing the scenery?

While it's a miniseries, Al Pacino chewed every bit of scenery in the latter days of Roy Cohn.

Not sure why r101 bumped this thread but it was made for pointing out Annette O’Tool’s acting on Netflix’s Virgin River. It is truly a thing of wonder. The way she projects her voice, her facial expressions, and stomping around flailing her arms must be seen to be believed.

I bumped it because, as a good member here, I googled "chewing scenery datalounge" to make sure that there was not an active thread on a topic of interest.

There was - this one.

So I commented here at r101 rather than create a new thread.

Why thank you r103. I do appreciate it.

Sally Field in Lincoln. Sally Field in Norma Rae. Sally Field in Steel Magnolias.

When Gary Oldman was young and just starting out, I found his scenery chewing very entertaining. Now that he won an Oscar and is considered A-list ,he's in serious movies, playing serious characters, he's just an obnoxious scenery hog.

I'm glad you posted this, OP, because I've wondered the same thing. I always assumed it was just another DL-specific term, so I never bothered to Google it. Interesting.

Bette Midler in Gypsy. Every moment is over the top