variants or stagey

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of stagy And even though there are stretches of stagey-sounding expository dialogue, the story manages to wheel along at a clip. Stephanie Zacharek, Time, 12 Sep. 2025 The Fence suffers from dialogue overload and a somewhat stagy mise-en-scène, although those elements occasionally yield strong sequences fraught with unsettledness, if not outright hostility, when the drama finally boils over. Jordan Mintzer, HollywoodReporter, 4 Sep. 2025 Some reservations: Song plays out the scenes between Lucy and Harry, and between Lucy and John, as two-way dialogues that are often stagy and too on-the-nose. Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor, 12 June 2025 His Cabinet gathered in the Rose Garden alongside supporters wearing hard hats and reflective vests—a stagy reference to all the manufacturing jobs that would presumably be flooding back to U.S. soil. Antonia Hitchens, New Yorker, 21 Apr. 2025 Ferrell just isn’t right for this part: The role is too stagy, too wordy for him, and his style of comedy is just too modern and deconstructionist to handle the Borscht Belt punning of Mel Brooks. Tim Grierson, Vulture, 4 Feb. 2025 Here was elegance without exaggeration, tension and beauty without stagy excess. James Shapiro, The New York Review of Books, 3 Jan. 2025 This framing device, which has the clunky air of a middlebrow play, provides a convenient if stagy way of breaking down his biography into manageable parts. Charles McNulty, Los Angeles Times, 9 Aug. 2024 Advertisement Gwen Grastorf’s embodiment of the scheming goody-goody Arsinoë is a tad stagy, but the character is still a fine foil for the quick-witted Célimène. Celia Wren, Washington Post, 4 May 2023
Recent Examples of Synonyms for stagy
Adjective
  • And Netflix doesn’t do theatrical releases.
    Bethy Squires, Vulture, 16 Oct. 2025
  • Designed with an amalgamation of pure engineering and engineered for theatrical performance, the bridge literally breathes fire and water.
    Atharva Gosavi, Interesting Engineering, 16 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • Premier League football in the 2000s could be dramatic and explosive, but what the nostalgia for that era ignores is the number of dour, sterile games there were, many of them settled by a goal from a set piece.
    Oliver Kay, New York Times, 16 Oct. 2025
  • Playing the role of a manager to George Clooney’s movie star character in the film, critics have praised him for what is clearly been another step in his evolution as a dramatic actor.
    Pete Hammond, Deadline, 15 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • Italian operatic tenor Luciano Pavarotti and Canadian rocker Bryan Adams played the venue, too.
    Miami Herald Archives, Miami Herald, 3 Oct. 2025
  • This musical blends gospel and Motown with operatic stylings to illuminate the changing times of the Civil Rights era while examining social and familial issues still prevalent today.
    Meredith G. White, AZCentral.com, 1 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • There were stabs at horny lounge jazz, a melodramatic Latin guitar ballad, even a folksy blues number.
    Vann R. Newkirk II, The Atlantic, 18 Oct. 2025
  • Another melodramatic series, Dynasty of Love, got an almost equally over-the-top launch on Wednesday night with a huge party at the Palm Beach club back on the Croisette.
    Jesse Whittock, Deadline, 17 Oct. 2025

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Cite this Entry

“Stagy.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/stagy. Accessed 22 Oct. 2025.

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