Corpsing: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

{{quote|''"You enjoyin' that sandwich, are you?"''|'''[[Not Only but Also|Peter Cook]]''', as '''Dudley Moore''' tries to hide his laughter with one.}}

A common type of [[Hilarious Outtakes]].

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== Film ==

* A famous example occurs in ''[[The Wizard of Oz (Film)|The Wizard of Oz]]''. When Bert Lahr (the Cowardly Lion) makes his first appearance, [[Judy Garland]] (Dorothy) hides behind Toto. This looks like it's because she's frightened, but in actuality she was just trying to cover up the fact that she was laughing at Lahr.

* ''[[Dr. Strangelove (Film)|Dr. Strangelove]]''

== Live Action TV ==

* Jerry more or less constantly in ''Seinfeld''

* Peter Cook, a master of improv, liked to get his partner Dudley Moore to corpse during filmings of ''[[Not Only but Also]]''.

== Music ==

* [[Elvis Presley]] had an [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nes2FFjllnM epic one] during one performance of "Are You Lonesome Tonight", following a deliberate [[Mondegreen]]:

{{quote| Do the chairs in your parlor seem empty and bare?<br />

== Professional Wrestling ==

* An infamous example of corpsing in pro wrestling occurred on an episode of WCW programming where "Macho Man" [[Randy Savage]] was having a fit backstage, flipping tables and whatnot. During this segment, he came across a giggling Torrie Wilson, and to stop her from corpsing, he slapped her. ''[[Botchamania]]'' turned this into a [[Professional Wrestling/Memes|meme]]:

{{quote| ''X CORPSING?''<br />

** And cue complete cast corpsing.

* The play ''Oblomov'' is based on a Russian novel about a character who almost never leaves his bed, briefly has a romantic attack, finds out he's incapable of love and goes back to bed. Theatrical presentations would have necessarily been grim had it not been for the most famous presentation casting Spike Milligan as the lead. Milligan proceeded to act up to such an extent that they renamed it ''Son of Oblomov'', and apparently considered it his job to try and corpse his fellow actors whenever possible. Only one - [[The Stoic|Joan Greenwood]] - managed to keep her dignity intact despite Milligan doing things like rowing the bed offstage with an imaginary oar or - on one occasion - conscripting the Boulting Brothers (twin filmmakers) to sit in the bed with him for the entire play.

* This happened a lot during Kristin Chenoweth's final performance on ''[[Wicked (Theatre)|Wicked]]''.

** Picture it: a tense scene during the second act of ''[[Wicked (Theatre)|Wicked]]'', when Fiyero has his gun trained on the Wizard, Glinda and Elphaba are both telling him to flee, and he admits he loves her and is going to go with her. Cue a little girl in the audience going "Yay!"—clear as a bell and quite loud in the silence. Everyone in the theater busted up—and while the actors were quite professional and did not break character or the scene, the actress playing Elphaba was visibly struggling not to burst out laughing, and giggles were in fact audible. Unsurprisingly, the same was true of Glinda's actress.