campy

adjective

ˈkam-pē 

campier; campiest

: in the style of camp : absurdly exaggerated, artificial, or affected in a usually humorous way

campy horror movies

campy humor

Witnessing their synchronized routine, he almost expects them to break into some campy chorus line from one of the seedier nightclubs.

—Margaret Atwood

He could modify his outbursts into what were sometimes hilariously campy performances.

—Robert Gray

campily

ˈkam-pə-lē 

adverb

The new film promises to be as campily outrageous as its predecessors.

—John Stark

… the Addams Family, the campily macabre clan created by the late cartoonist Charles Addams …

—Margot Dougherty

campiness

ˈkam-pē-nəs 

noun

… hoped to take Rocketeer to a much higher level of sophistication and avoid the campiness of some of the more recent comics-inspired films.

—Ron Magid

… a power-mad despot, played with exhilarating campiness by John Malkovich.

—Steven Rebello

Examples of campy in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The Rhode founder arrived at the November 2 ceremony in New York City wearing a gold brocade Saint Laurent ensemble by Anthony Vaccarello, serving maximalist glamour without going into campy territory. — Marci Robin, Allure, 3 Nov. 2026

The Ryan Murphy Cinematic Universe™ assembled to celebrate the second installment of the campy legal drama, and its stars—Kim Kardashian, Sarah Paulson, Glenn Close, Naomi Watts, and Niecy Nash-Betts—dressed the part. — Hannah Jackson, Vogue, 3 Nov. 2026

The artist’s best work, in a new retrospective at the Whitney Museum, directs his campy humor at gender stereotypes. — Hilton Als, New Yorker, 2 Nov. 2026

Again, that hopefully will yield a debut album that fully captures her generation’s campy disenchantment and roiling vulnerability. — Los Angeles Times, 2 Nov. 2026

Word History

Etymology

camp entry 3 + -y entry 1

First Known Use

1932, in the meaning defined above