Corpsing

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. The phenomenon where an actor is unable to stay serious while performing due to laughter or amusement
2. A situation in which a performer breaks character as a result of finding something amusing during a dramatic presentation
3. The act of a performer losing composure in a serious scene due to uncontrollable laughter or amusement while acting

Etymology: The verb "corpsing" comes from "corpse," the same word that gives us a dead body, but the link to the theatre is an odd one. An actor who "corpses" is one who breaks down laughing on stage and can no longer keep a straight face, and the sense grew out of the idea of a performer playing dead and losing control of his laughter while lying motionless. The stillness that a corpse requires becomes impossible to hold when a fellow actor or a stray joke sets off a giggle. The noun behind it has a longer journey. It came into English in Middle English as "corse," borrowed from Old French "cors," which itself descended from Latin "corpus," meaning "body." English already had its own words for a body, "likam" and "lich," which were gradually displaced. The "p" was added to the spelling later, under the influence of the original Latin form, which is why the modern spelling looks different from its French ancestor. "Corps" and "corpus" are doublets of the same word, each having entered English by a separate route.

Synonyms: laughing, giggling, chuckling

Antonyms: seriousness, solemnity