Chewing the Scenery

Nick Nolte takes it a bit too literally.

"Chocolate? Did you say "chocolate"?!"

"Chocolate?!! CHOCOLATE!!!!! CHOOOOCOOOOOOLAAAAAATE!!!!!!!!!!!!"

— Tom Smith the Fish, SpongeBob SquarePants

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ACTING with EMPHASIS. Nearly any emotion will do here, so long as it's EXTREME!

A common term for a scene where an actor's acting so damn hard that they're picking bits of scenery out of their teeth for days. Sometimes scenes can actually require this, but more often the actor and/or director just has the character go over the top.

This can include Berserk Button, Freak Out!, and other exaggerated emotions.

It's well worth noting that this trope is one of the biggest causes of memes.

While this can often be a bad thing and ruin a scene, just as often it can add to the fun, whether a work is So Bad, It's Good or genuinely good. In a Police Procedural, this will often be due to a Perp Sweating or an Exasperated Perp.

This is a Super Trope, which includes:

• Atomic F-Bomb
• Big Entrance
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Chewing the scenery without sense, it came the hell out of no where and it disappears in the end.

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• Big "NEVER!"
• Big "NO!"
• Big "OMG!"
• Big "WHAT?!"
• Big "WHY?!"
• Big Word Shout
• Big "YES!"
• Boisterous Bruiser: Kicking ass, and chewing scenery.
• Camp
• Cold Ham
• Comical Overreacting
• Desk Sweep of Rage
• Drama Queen
• Evil Is Hammy
• Evil Laugh: MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
• Gainax Ending: a generally over-the-top ending that makes little to no sense.
• GASP!
• Ham and Cheese: In an otherwise cheesy or campy situation.
• Hammy Herald
• Ham-to-Ham Combat: Who can out-overact the other?
• Incoming Ham: Did someone order a Large Ham?!
• Large Ham: Actor does this throughout (a performance, or a career).
• Large Ham Announcer
• Large Ham Title: Even the mere mention of their name brings out the ham.
• Laughing Mad
• Milking the Giant Cow: Theatrical stage gestures.
• Mundane Made Awesome
• No Indoor Voice
• Punctuated! For! Emphasis!
• Say My Name: "KHAAAN!" / "MY NAME IS X!!!!"

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• Slow "NO!"
• Skyward Scream: Often combined with one of the above.
• Suddenly SHOUTING!
• The Ham Squad
• Villainous Breakdown: "No! This Cannot Be!!"
• World of Ham: The 'verse itself requires it.

A Sister Trope to Melodrama.

Compare Narm, Narm Charm.

Contrast Dull Surprise (emotionless moments when emotion is called for), Dramatic Deadpan (when the dramatic punch is from how low key it's presented).

Not to be confused with This Billboard Needs Some Salt (actually munching on the scenery), even when it looks like it is happening (that's just the camera).

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Examples:

• Live-Action TV

Anime and Manga

• Most of the main cast in Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann acts like this on a regular basis via Hot-Blooded ranting.
  • Especially Kamina. WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK HE IS!?
  • ESPECIALLY Simon. MY DRILL IS THE DRILL THAT WILL PIERCE THE HEAVENS!!!
• Episode 3 of Mai-Otome Zwei gives us Nina's Big "NO!" after Nao is petrified. A good portion of that OVA (and the last few episodes of the main series, 22, 24 and 25 in particular) has Tomoe's teeth marks all over it.
• In the same vein, during some of the later episodes of Neon Genesis Evangelion the English dub cast did this sort of thing in quite a few scenes, perhaps most in Tiffany Grant's portrayal of Asuka's climactic battle in The End Of Evangelion and when Ritsuko destroys the "Reiquarium", sounding absolutely insane in the English dub while Yuriko Yamaguchi had a much more detached delivery in the original Japanese.
  • Scenery-chewing is hardly exclusive to the dub - Megumi Ogata's screams, for instance, could raise the dead, and especially in the climax of Evangelion 2.0.
• Dragon Ball Z's Super Buu brought us such lines as "PROOOOOOODDDUUUUUUUUUCE!!!!" and "FEED ME, YES, EVERYONE FEED ME NOOOOOW!"
  • Vegeta's much-parodied "IT'S OVER NINE THOUSAAAND!" from the Ocean Dub.
  • Another Vegeta quote:
  Vegeta: People of the Earth. RAISE YOUR HANDS RIGHT NOW OR YOU'RE ALL GOING TO DIIIIIIE!
  • YOU WON'T ESCAPE... MY WRAAAAAAAAAAAATH!!!
  • KAKAROOOOOOOOT!
    • VA Vic Mignogna, best known as suave blonds like Edward Elric and Tamaki Suoh, actually does lose his voice when acting as Screaming Warrior Broly for too long.
  • "AND THIS, IS TO GO EVEN FURTHER BEYOND! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA" (continues for several minutes.)
  • Linda Young as Frieza. Regardless of what anyone thinks of her casting, there's no denying that her actual performance was glorious:
    • "I am FRIEZA!!!!! The most powerful BEING in the UNIVERSE!!!!!!! And you are nothing but a MONKEY!!!!!. You can't win, because I am MIGHTY!!! And YOU are NOT!!!"
    • Of course, any time Frieza laughs, regardless if Ryusei Nakao, Linda Young, or Chris Ayres is voicing the character.
• Sailor Moon's villains love feasting on the scenery, especially in the English dub:
  • Queen Beryl: You are MIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINE!!!!!!!!!!!
    • Naz Edwards even manages to make her screams digest the scenery.
  • Everything that comes out of Rubeus' mouth.
  • Queen Nehelenia: ''ZIRCONIAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!"
  • Alan and Anne were already notoriously hammy in the DiC dub, but this gem came out of Anne's mouth: KITCHEN'S CLOOOOOOOOSED!
• In the climactic episode of Record of Lodoss War, evil sorcerer Wagnard gets to chomp on many bits of scenery, especially during his death scene. (His English VA does likewise, but that's hardly a drawback. It actually works in the character's favor.)
• Harry Ord, the resident CHAR of ∀ Gundam, wants you to know that you'll feel the wrath of his revenge across the UNIVAAAAAASE!!!
  • Still, Harry is no match for Gym Ghingham and GEKKOCHOU DE ARU!! Heck, he chews up so much of the scenery in this clip of SD Gundam G Generations that he devours Super-Ham Master Asia along with it.
• The whole point of the Giant Robo Anime and its main Charm Point is providing every single character with one of these on a regular basis. There's not a single person in the final episode who can be accused of underacting, even the random redshirts.
• The 2012 anime adaptation of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure made Dio even more memetic thanks to the dulcet tones of Takehito Koyasu and Patrick Seitz taking large bites out of the scenery, in and out of battle. The entire cast does quite a bit of scenery chewing, but Dio really takes the cake.
  Dio: (after forcibly kissing Erina) "You thought you would get your first kiss from JoJo, BUT IT WAS ME, DIO!"
  • Another standout example: Major Rudol von Stroheim.
  FFFFFFOOOOOOOL! German science is the world's greatest!
• Gaara's Minor Injury Overreaction in Naruto in both Japanese and English:
  Gaara: BLOOOOD! IT'S MY BLOOOOOD!
  • Itachi's Motive Rant from episode 136 of Shippuden. If you pay attention, you could hear his seiyuu literally GASPING for breath between sentences!
    • As one can imagine, Crispin Freeman had a field day with that scene.
  • Jiraiya: "When you've reached the stature I have... THE LADIES... KNEEL AND WORSHIP... AT YOUR AWESOMENESS!!!"
  • Chapter 579: Complete with shaky text to indicate insanity:EVEN HE COULDN'T BECOME A TRUE SAGE IN THE END JUST LIKE ME! My power in the sage mode...If you're Dr.Snakes, I hope you keep that in your mind... I'm no longer a snake... The perfect force of sage helped me shed my snake skin...AND I'M A DRAGON NOW!!
• Koutarou Taiga from GaoGaiGar. The rest of the cast dutifully attempts to keep up. They mostly succeed.
• Light in Death Note whenever he's Kira-ing, and Mikami at times, mostly when he's "deleting" people. The best example is during the penultimate episode when he attempts to kill Near, the rest of the SPK force, and all of the task force members apart from Light, which would get rid of anyone who is in Light's way. He's get more psychotic than ever, and goes into an absolutely insane deleting spree, repeating the word over and over again as he writes down all the names and it culminates with him screaming the word at the top of his lungs towards the sky. Terrifying for some, but probably quite entertaining for others.
  • Potato chip, anyone?
• Baccano!'s psycho hams, Ladd Russo and Graham Spector. Of course, then there's Claire Stanfield, who's in a category all his own. But he still manages to ham up his philosophy while fighting Graham and Ladd.
  • THANK YOU! FUCK YOU! THE STAR IS HERE!
• Dantalion is quite fond of taking hamminess Up to Eleven For Science!!
• TAKE THIS! THE STORM OF MY LOYALTY!!!
  • Lelouch sometimes goes into this.
    "YOU THINK I CARE ABOUT THAT!? FIND NUNNALLY NOW! THAT'S AN ORDER! ALL FORCES SEARCH FOR NUNNALLY!!!!!"
    • Code Geass R2 episode 19 has Lelouch chewing off scenery (1:06-1:13, 3:54-4:14) while breaking down.
    • 5:07-5:40 however, the drama still works.
  • STOP IT! STOP GIVING ME YOUR PITY! SPARE ME YOUR CHARITY! THIS IS SOMETHING I HAVE TO ACHIEVE ON MY OWN! AND SO FOR THAT, I SHALL STAIN YOUR HANDS WITH BLOOD, EUPHEMIA LI BRITANNIA!
  • Anytime Emperor Chuck makes a speech.
    • You might as well say any role played by Norio Wakamoto speaks like this. It's absolutely impossible to describe.
    • Seeing as Norio Wakamoto can be the biggest ham in Wolf's Rain as an owl that gets some of the least lines in the entire series... Anything Wakamoto does is potentially going to be like this.
  • Michael McConnohie's Emperor Chuck is equally hammy as well, and does a mean Evil Laugh in Episode 22. YES, YOU'RE WORTHY OF BEING CALLED MY CHILD NOW!
• The Fullmetal Alchemist dub has Roy Mustang's famous miniskirt line in episode 13.
  • Then there's his famous "I LOVE dogs!". It also turns out that the voice Mustang had then was actually based on his voice actor's first tryout... as Armstrong.
  • From episode 30 of Brotherhood: "IIIII OTO DA!!"
  • THIS SCENERY-CHEWING TECHNIQUE HAS BEEN PASSED DOWN THE ARMSTRONG LINE FOR GENERATIONS!
• Excel Saga: Any time Lord Il Palazzo annouces that "This world, is corrupt!". Or whenever Excel is extolling the virtues of ACROSS to the ignorant masses. Excel's dub VA got landed in the hospital for this one.
• Domon Kasshu.
  • And friends!
  • Even in this World of Ham, Master Asia stands out above all others.
    "I shall become the Undefeated of the East, West, North, South, and Center! I shall become SUPER ASIA, and be master of all!
• They Are My Noble Masters begged the question of Hikari Ni Nare versus Shining Finger, the answer will leave you full for a week.
• I'M IN DESPAIR! SHOUTING OUT THINGS THAT BUG ME IN OVERDRAMATIC WAYS HAS LEFT ME IN DESPAIR!
• In One Piece, Marshall D. Teach aka Blackbeard enjoys doing this, whether showing off his powers to Ace, announcing his plans at Impel Down, or Declaring war on the World after stealing Whitebeard's powers. Of course, this being One Piece there are bound to be others.
  • If that's how he does it in the manga, let's just wait until Akio Ohtsuka gets to deliver these same lines in the anime. Oh, booooooy.
  • Luffy when he's really angry and/or yelling someone's name. Examples: "CROCODIIIIIIILE!", "EN-NER-RUUUUUUU!" and of course, "ROOOOOOOOO-BIIIIIIIIIN!" And just before the timeskip, "UUUUUUUU-SOOOOOOOOOOPPPPPP!"
  • Chopper pulls a nice one in episode 162 after the Knight of the Sky shoots Shura off of his mount using an Impact Dial.
    Chopper: SO-RA NO KI-SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!
  • In this scene, Luffy, Spandam, Sogeking, Franky and even Robin tried to out-chew each other. Sogeking takes bonus points for his boast being about a custom-made sling.
• Minori in Toradora!, especially near the end of the series. Although sometimes she's just overdramatic just for fun... diet warriors, indeed. The homeroom teacher also really chews the scenery during the Pro Wrestling event and has to be carried off.
  Minori: Nosebleeds are tears of the heart!
• In Niea_7, Tomoko Kawakami is clearly having the time of her life voicing Karna, tearing through every scene in which she occurs with almost limitless abandon—but especially during the "alien awareness meetings".
  Karna: I've been an elite ever since I was born... and I'm so beautiful!
• Sayaka Ohara's role as Beatrice in Umineko: When They Cry. My god, she really was having a blast at that role.
  • "Let's start chewing scenery together, USHIROMIYA BATTORAAAAAAAA!!"'
  • Kinzo doesn't express anything half-way. Ooooooooooo, Beh-aaaaah-to riiiichiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!
• Kaoru does this intentionally in Amagami SS.
• Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's' Lucciano should really calm down before he hurts himself.
• The English Dub of Hellsing Ultimate is full of this. The best example is probably the Major's Speech, which is simply glorious.
• This seems to be the entire point of Amelia's character in the Slayers series.
• The evil sultan in the classic Astro Boy story "The Greatest Robot In The World" not only chews scenery figuratively, but in one scene he does it literally.
• Gundam
  • Lord Djibril in Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny, as he prepares to fire the Requiem.
    "And now Gilbert Durandal, I will play a Requiem, for you and all your kind!
  • Duo's infamous scream when his Gundam gets destroyed, which is so overblown that it reaches into space. His English VA, Scott McNeil, said that the scream was a copy of the one he did when he saw his wife back over his motorcycle in the driveway.
• Roman Saotome from SKET Dance takes this to a whole 'nother level; she warps the scenery via Otome Vision, much to the shock of Himeko and Bossun.
• Roger Smith calling his mecha, Big O, normally uses tame levels of shouting, but in some episodes he really goes all-out.
• Ichiko Sakura from Binbougami Ga, transforming into Kenshiro when she needs to avoid her newest classmate. Her equally hammy rival Momiji sees this, so she — and eventually everyone else in the area — copies her.
• Kamille Bidan in Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam. Especially due to the histrionic nature of the character. It's evident in both the original Japanese and the dub.
• In the ADV dub of Super Dimension Fortress Macross, the voice performances are pretty over the top for Hikaru, Misa, Roy, Exedore, and Kai-Fun. Compare Vic Mignona, Monica Rial, Brett Weaver, Andy McGavin, and Christopher Ayers to the more subdued performances of Tony Oliver, Aline Leslie, Dan Woren, Ted Layman, and Eddie Frierson decades ago in Robotech. Kakizaki (like the original Japanese seiyuu Katsumi Suzuki) was equally hammy whether voiced by Jason Douglass or Richard Epcar.
• In Star Blazers, Eddie Allen performs Desslok in a hilarious effete voice that makes him come off as a fop. In the original Space Battleship Yamato, Masato Ibu gives Desler a typical bad guy's deep voice.

Comic Books

• Back in The Silver Age of Comic Books, chewing the scenery was pretty much the default; characters and narration alike were always hamming it up and often indulging in Purple Prose. See anything by Jack Kirby or Stan Lee, both of whom practically exemplified this trope in American comics (hell, Stan Lee qualifies for this in real life while he’s at it). Homages to the era often parody this.
  ”There came a time when the Old Gods died! The brave died with the cunning! The noble perished, locked in battle with the unleashed evil! It was the last day for them! An ancient era was passing in fiery holocaust! The final moment came with the fatal release of the indescribable power — which tore the home of the Old Gods asunder — split it in great halves — and filled the universe with the blinding death-flash of its destruction! In the end there were two giant molten bodies, spinning slow and barren — clean of all that had gone before — adrift in the fading sounds of cosmic thunder... Silence closed upon what had happened — a long, deep silence — wrapped in massive darkness... it was this way for an age... THEN—THERE WAS NEW LIGHT!"

Fan Works

• In The Legend of Total Drama Island, the normally deadpan Noah is oblivious to the fact that he's hamming up the delivery when he gives a flowery blank verse speech based on the “St. Crispin’s Day” speech during the dodgeball match. The Storyteller also notes that “a swell of dramatic music” accompanied Noah's speech in the finished episode.
• In Tales of the Emperasque the Emperor's new, Nigh Invulnerable form allows him to chew the scenery more often than not, even when he's under enemy fire, especially as he has No Indoor Voice now. Dante also has his moment during the canyon battle, when he theatrically pretends to blow Orks with his pistol (they explode because of mines on the ground).
• Basically everyone in A Very Potter Musical does this at some point, but Snape really takes the cake and throws it away in favor of some delicious scenery.
  Snape: WHAT THE DEVIL IS GOING ON HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERE?!
• Those Lacking Spines gives us everyone in The City of OC, but special mention goes to JEFFIROTH, who says all his lines with all-caps No Indoor Voice flavor (sometimes bolded for no particular reason), punctuated with some Smug Snake, all while a 100-piece orchestra conducted by Nobuo Uematsu plays in the background as he gives a long speech about how the three Nobody heroes are blights upon the world that need to be destroyed.

Films — Animation

• Lilo & Stitch!
  • Bonus points to Lilo for doing it on an actual stage
  • If I fed Pudge tuna It'd be an ABOMINATION!!!!
  • Nani's breakdown after Lilo is abducted by Gantu: "LILO! SHE'S A LITTLE GIRL, THIS BIG, BROWN EYES, AND WAS HANGING AROUND WITH THAT THING!!" (referring to Stitch)
• Hercules:
  • When Hades gets mad, he will literally get fired up, as in blowing flames in all directions.
  • And then there're the Titans...
    Hades: Brothers! Titans! Look at you, in your squalid prison! Who put you down there?
    Titans: ZEUS!
    Hades: And now that I set you free, what's the first thing you're going to do?
    Titans: DESTROY HIM!!!!
    Hades: Good answer.
• Beowulf:
  • Grendel, perpetually shrieking and moaning and having difficulty walking.
  • "They SAY... you have a MONSTAH here? They SAY... your land is cursed! My name is Beowulf. I am here to kill your MONSTAH!"
• Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty:
  • " No! IT CANNOT BE!!!!!!"
  • " Now you shall deal with ME your Prince... AND ALL THE POWERS OF HELL!!!!!!!!! AHAHAHAHAAHAHA!!!!!"
• Cruella DeVille in 101 Dalmatians:
  • "Poison them, drown them, bash them on the head. Got any chloroform? I don't care how you kill the little beasts, just DO IT!!!!! AND DO IT NOW!!!!!"

Films — Live-Action

• Pervasive during the silent film era. Justified in that, because audiences couldn't hear them speak, actors relied on exaggerated facial expressions and gestures to convey emotion.
• Forrest Gump to Jenny, as she's about to leave with her radical lefty boyfriend:
  Forrest: You know what I think? I think you, should go back, to Green-Bow, AL-A-BAM-A!
• The waitress in Maximum Overdrive: "WE MADE *YOU*!!!"
• It may be easier to list who doesn't in Pirates of the Caribbean.
• Star Trek:
  • Kirk's infamous "KHAAAAAAAN!" scream in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. In fact, William Shatner has one of these at least every five minutes, in everything he's ever done. The Khan thing is actually deliberate, since, if you remember what happens immediately thereafter (that it was all a ruse to make Khan underestimate them), it's made apparent that Kirk is the one who is acting, not Shatner.
  • Meanwhile, in Star Trek (2009).....
    SPOOOOOOCCCCCCKKKKKKK!!!!!
    FIRE EVERYTHING!
    I WANT SPOCK DEAD NOW!!!
  • Star Trek: Into Darkness:
    • Brought back, where the one to do the "KHAAAAAN!" is Spock!
    • Peter Weller hams it up during his Motive Rant. He also Milks the Giant Cow during this.
      Admiral Marcus: "War is coming! AND WHO'S GONNA LEAD US?! YOU?! If I'm not in charge, our entire way of life IS DECIMATED! So you want me off this ship, you better KILL ME!"
  • It is also so noticeable in Wrath of Khan because it is, by a long shot, Shatner's most restrained performance with this being the one time he goes rather over the top. (Seriously, watch a bunch of Shatner's other stuff, especially in recent years when he has become essentially a parody of himself, and then watch Wrath of Khan, the subtlety he shows is both brilliant and quite shocking giving Shatner's normal acting style.)
    • What... doyoumean? I....hadthoughtthatShatner'sstyleofactingwasjust....toomuchforthetime. Add movements for more hilarity. Or not.
    • IIIIIIII'MMMMMMM CAPTAIN KIRK!
    • OHH! THE HUMANITY!!!
  • In Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Christopher Plummer as Klingon General Chang also does his best to out-ham Shatner. Especially in the climax, when he endlessly quotes William Shakespeare at the top of his lungs, and spin in his captain's chair..
  • "CRY HAVOC! AND LET SLIP THE DOGS OF WAR!"

    McCoy: I'd give real money if he'd just shut up.

  • Averted in Star Trek: The Motion Picture by everyone. But, this aversion is one of the elements that detractors of the movie tend to point to when referring to this film as a cold, flat experience. In such a case, it could be an example of Tropes Are Not Bad.
• Margot Kidder in Full Moon Entertainment's Beanstalk, who gives the characters in Troll 2 a serious run for their money.
• William Atherton as Walter Peck in Ghostbusters (1984) when he demands the arrest of the Ghostbusters after forcibly shutting down the containment unit.
• Alternate Trope Namer via Memetic Mutation: The Monster Audrey 2 from Little Shop of Horrors, whose signature phrase is "Feed Me, Seymour!" played by deep-voiced and enthusiastic Levi Stubbs.
• Mortal Kombat has a handful, such as when Sonya gets captured by Shang Tsung:
  "NOOOOO!!!!! PUT ME DOOOWWWN!!!"
• The Matrix
  • Morpheus' speech to Zion in The Matrix Reloaded, although he had good reason to shout as the cave had no PA system.
  • Agent Smith, especially in his final You Have No Chance to Survive speech in The Matrix Revolutions.
• Mel Gibson in many movies, especially all the FREEEEEDOOOOOM!!s
• Al Pacino in The Devil's Advocate. Practically his whole performance, but especially the line "God... is an absentee landlord!"
  • Not to mention his final Big "NO!", which is so massive it basically causes the movie to implode on itself.
  • Many, MANY Pacino movies qualify. The final shootout in Scarface (1983) comes to mind.
• Marlon Brando's cry of "STELLaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" in A Streetcar Named Desire. Parodied on Seinfeld with Elaine Benes. Among other places.
• Dennis Hopper's character in Blue Velvet, Frank Booth, provides one of the scarier example of this trope.
• A review of Jeremy Irons in the horrid Dungeons & Dragons film commented he was chewing so much scenery they had to rebuild the sets twice.
• Most James Bond villains, actually.
  • Christopher Walken as Max Zorin in A View to a Kill.
  • Jaws. Literally.
  • Who can forget Boris Grishenko from GoldenEye? I AM INVINCIBLE!!!
  • And Jonathan Pryce in Tomorrow Never Dies.
  • Points have to be given to Steve Berkoff as General Orlov in Octopussy through combining this with the speech patterns of William Shatner and a ludicrously over-the-top Russian accent to turn a simple military briefing into a gloriously hammy rant against Western decadence and spinelessness, not to mention calling out his top colleague as a coward for not following his maniacal plan.
    • This is actually fairly standard for Berkoff. His whole idea of theatre is that it has to be overstated, over the top acting.
• King Leonidas in 300. And yes, we know what this is, thank you.
  • Blasphemy? Madness? Athens?
  • NO!
• Daniel Day-Lewis in every movie he stars in.
  • "I. Drink. Your. MILKSHAKE! *slllluuurrrrrpppp!* I DRINK IT UP!!"
    • "I'VE ABANDONED MY CHILD!!!! I'VE ABANDONED MY BOY!"
    • "BASTARD IN A BASKET! BASTARD IN A BASKET!"
    • "DRAAAAIIIINAAAAGE!"
  • "BECAUSE IT IS MY NAAAAAME! Because I cannot have another in my liiife! Because I lie and sign myself to lies! Because I am not worth the dust on the feet of them that hang! How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; LEAVE ME MY NAAAAAAAME!"
    • '''SHE'S! A! WHOOOOOOOOOOOORE!!!!"
    • I SAY GOD IS DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAD!
  • "What'll it be, boys? RIB OR CHOP? LOIN OR SHANK?"
  • "You STAY ALIVE! I WILL FIND YOU. No matter how long it takes, no matter how faaaar!"
• Agnes in Despicable Me.
  • ITTT'SSS SOOOOO FLUFFFFYYY I'M GONNNAAAA DIEEE.
• Star Wars
  • Darth Vader's Big "NO!" at the end of Revenge of the Sith. Also added to the Blu-ray release of Return of the Jedi, in the scene where Palpatine tries to electrocute Luke, to the chagrin of much of the fan base. One even parodied it in a YouTube video.
  • "POWWWWWWAAAAAHHHH!!!! UNNNNN-LIMITED..POWWWWWWAAAAAAHHHH!!!! " Playing bumper cars with the Galactic Senate boxes while cackling like a loon has to count, too.
  • Luke during the entire Luke, I Am Your Father scene. "He told me enough! He told me you killed him! (...) No... that's not true! That's impossible! (...) NOOOOOOOOO! noooooo..."
  • Many of Anakin's lines in Attack of the Clones are either this, garbage, or just plain normal, depending on your point of view. But a special mention goes to his confession on Tatooine:
    • I... I killed them. I killed them all. They're dead. Every single one of them. And not just the men, but the women, and the children, too. They're like animals, and I slaughtered them like animals! I hate them!
  • In general, Ian Mcdiarmid gives a relatively subdued performance as Palpatine. But once the charades are dropped in episode 3, and the Jedi know he's a Sith lord, it's time to wolf down the scenery like there's no tomorrow. This is the real reason most of the movie was CGI: he devoured all the sets!
  • Armitage Hux's big speech in The Force Awakens. It's like he walked up to one of the cameras, yanked the film right out of it and proceeded to gnaw and chew the shit out of it for over two minutes.
• Iron Man: TONY STARK WAS ABLE TO BUILD THIS IN A CAVE! WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS!
• Any time Harvs and Batsy are within a hundred feet of each other in The Dark Knight turns into this. (One expected them to break out the Big "NO!", but NOOOOOO...)
  • Well, Harvey did, Batman was just a little late for it.
    • Just about any time Harvs or Batsy got pissed off in the second half of the movie.
    • It's not about what I want, IT'S ABOUT WHAT'S FAIR!!!
  • What do you believe in, huh? WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE IN?
  • WHHHHHHERE IZZZZZZHEE?!
• Tim Burton's Batman (1989) features Jack Palance, well, being Jack Palance. Not to be outdone, Jack Nicholson lampshades this in-universe, and actually Out-Hams him, when he borrows one of his lines.
  Joker: "BOB-UH! YOOOOU! ARE MY NUMBER! ONE! GUY!"
• Batman & Robin
  • Poison Ivy.
  • What killed the dinosaurs? THE ICE AGE!!
• As Ebert's Bigger Movie Glossary notes, "no Nicolas Cage movie is complete without the scene in which Cage's character finally loses his temper and screams at the top of his lungs."
  • The Wicker Man (2006). All of it.
  "OH, NO! NOT THE BEES! NOT THE BEES! AAAAAHHHHH! OH, THEY'RE IN MY EYES! MY EYES! AAAAHHHHH! AAAAAGGHHH!"
  "'''MURDER! THIS IS MURDER!!! YOU'LL ALL BE GUILTY!!!'''"
  "How'd it get burned? HOW'D IT GET BURRRRNED?"
  "KILLING ME WON'T BRING BACK YOUR GODDAMN HONEY!!!"
  • Knowing:
  "YOU WANT SOME OF THIS?!? *thonk*
  • Moonstruck:
  "I'VE LOST MY HAND!!! AND I'VE LOST MY BRIDE!!!"
  • When he incarnates Castor Troy in Face/Off : "Ha HA HA HA HA Ha!"
  • In fact, every time he plays a dangerous lunatic.
  • As Big Daddy in Kick-Ass he mimics the speech pattern of Adam West.
  • Perhaps the most over-the-top performance in his entire career comes in Vampire's Kiss, in which he portrays a vampire or a paranoid schizophrenic or possibly both.
  "YOU'RE FIRED!!!!"
  "I'M A VAMPIRE! I'M A VAMPIRE! I'M A VAMPIRE! I'M A VAMPIRE! I'M A VAMPIRE!"
  • Or in Deadfall, where he often gets incomprehensibly hammy.
  "WHAT AM I, A FUCKING RETAAARD, MAAAN!? AM I A FUCKING RETAAAARD, HUUUH!?"
  • Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance
  "HE'S SCRAPING AT THE DOOR! SCRAPING AT THE DOOOOOOOOOOAAAAHHHH!!"
  • Nic Cage in general, frankly.
• In Serenity, any scene where River has a mental breakdown. Especially when she collapses in the streets of Miranda, screaming a frantic prayer in Chinese.
• Sharon Stone's performance in Casino isn't looked too fondly upon now because it frequently involved this. Roughly the entire last third of the movie seems to involve her screaming at either Robert De Niro or Joe Pesci about something.
• Jack Nicholson in The Witches of Eastwick (most notably in his speech about women towards the end). But, hey, what did you expect? It's Jack Nicholson playing the freakin' Devil.
• Charlton Heston's performance in Planet of the Apes:
  You cut up his braaaaaaiiiinnn!
  It's a madhouse! A MAAADHOUUUSE!
  YOU MANIACS! YOU BLEW IT UP! GODDAMN YOU! Goddamn you all to hell!
  • Really, any of his performances, from The Ten Commandments to Earthquake.
• Soylent Green: "You tell everybody. Listen to me, Hatcher. You've gotta tell them! Soylent Green is people!"
• Brian Cox in Troy certainly qualifies. Then again, Brian Cox in almost anything. That man is definitely not kosher.
  "I will smash their walls to the ground! HEAR ME, ZEUS!"
• John Noble chews the scenery while munching on everything remotely edible in The Return of the King. And he has atrocious table manners.
• When Pink in Pink Floyd The Wall decides that he is a British fascist leader and sings "In the Flesh". Just watch as a rock star (Bob Geldof) playing a rock star (Roger Waters) during an insane fantasy of being a fascist dictator while in front of an audience of Pink's rock fans during a concert.
• Jim Carrey's comedic styling. Which is part of what makes the live-action How the Grinch Stole Christmas! so much fun to watch. Green eggs and ham, indeed.
• Certain bites of James "Jimi" Kinstle's performance as Norman Osborn (a.k.a. The Green Goblin) in the Spider-Man fan film The Green Goblin's Last Stand. As may be expected from a classically-trained actor playing a homicidal maniac, this is genuinely frightening at times. That joke about Osborn being scarier without his mask on? It's true here.
• The last two scenes of the second flashback in The Bad and the Beautiful got this from Kirk Douglas and Lana Turner respectively.
• The saving grace of Daredevil was a delightfully over-the-top portrayal of Bullseye by Colin Farrell. He barely speaks and rarely raises his voice, but his snarling, twitching, and whispered ramblings chew the scenery in a big way. He kills people with pencils, peanuts, and paper clips in scenes that cross the line into Comedic Sociopathy. Just about every scene he's in is simultaneously hilarious and disturbing because of his overacting juxtaposed with the sadistic character.
  "He made me... miss. I never miss!"

• Arnold Schwarzenegger's performance in Kindergarten Cop, a film where he spends half his time screaming incomprehensibly at small children.
  GAAAAHHHH!!!!
  SHADDUUUUPPPP!!!!!
  IT'Z NAHT!! A TWOMUR!
  Bring your toy back to the CAHHPEHT!!
• UHF "Stupid! You're so stupid!"
• Happens in Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2. GARBAGE DAY! Now a staple of memetic mutations.
• Michael Stephenson in Troll 2. Has to be seen to be believed.
  They're eating her! And then they're gonna eat me! OH MY GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOODDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD!
  "And you can't piss on hospitality! I WON'T ALLOW IT!"
  • Also Deborah Reed as Creedence.
  "Think about the CHOLESTEROL! Think about the TOXINS!"
• COME TO ME, SON OF JOR-EL! KNEEL BEFORE ZOD!
  • Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor in Superman Returns.
  "WRONG!'''"
  KRRRRYYYYYPTONITE!
  Lois Lane: But millions of people will die!
  Lex Luthor: BILLIONS! Once again, the press underestimates me.
• And Cabin Fever has an example of chewing the scenery in a literal sense, PANCAKES!
• NOOOO...WIIIIREEEE.....HAAAAAANGGGEEERRRRSSSSS!!!!
  • Because I am NOT one of you FANS!
  • Tina! Bring me the ax!
  • The Variety review of Mommie Dearest stated: "Dunaway does not chew scenery. Dunaway starts neatly at each corner of the set in every scene and swallows it whole, costars and all."
• Gary Oldman in Leon/The Professional:
  "Bring me everyone."
  "What do you mean "everyone"?"
  "EVERYONE!"
• Street Fighter: Raúl Juliá makes quite a exit from acting in his last role, and is the best thing in it:
  M. Bison: Something wrong, Colonel? You come here to fight a madman, and instead you found... a god!? You still refuse to ACCEPT... my godhood?! KEEP your own god! In fact, this might be a good time to PRAY to Him! For I beheld Satan as he FELL FROM HEAVEN! LIKE LIGHTNING!!!
• The Producers:
  • Leo Bloom without his blue blanket.
  • FAT!
  • Gene Wilder in the original.
• Adolf Hitler's Villainous Breakdown in Downfall. Bruno Ganz's scenery-chewing has become a Memetic Mutation thanks to the Gag Subs applied into it. For example, Hitler gets banned from Xbox Live.
• Woody Harrelson's DELICIOUS turn as a mad conspiracy theorist in the new 2012 movie practically screams this trope.
  • Well, Woody Harrelson, right there.
• Hans Conried as the villainous Dr. Terwilliker in The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T.
  "Should you wish to escape: THE BARBED WIRE ON THE FENCE IS ELECT-RIFIED!! Mwahahahaha!"
  "I want him disintegrated: ATOM... BY ATOM!"
• Captain Rhodes in Day of the Dead (1985):
  'I'M RUNNIN' THIS MONKEY FARM NOW, FRANKENSTEIN, AND I WANNA KNOW WHAT THE FUCK YOU'RE DOING WITH MY TIME!!!'

  CHOKE ON 'EM!!!
• Zadok, the drunken old sea dog in Cthulhu (2007).
  "They came out of the sea AND KILLED LOTS OF PEOPLE!"
• Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory had Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka:
  "It's all here, BLACK AND WHITE, CLEAR AS CRYSTAL! YOU STOLE fizzy lifting drinks! You bumped into the ceiling which now has to be washed and sterilized, so you get... NOTHING! You LOSE! GOOD DAY, SIR!"
  • In fact, any time Gene Wilder freaks out and/or loses his temper in a film, so much so that his face goes redish purple. Will & Grace: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6WxmAAvpCc
  • Gene Wilder period. "ANY SIGNS THAT THEY ARE SLOWING!" "THE PRESERVATION OF LIFE!"
• Or Antonio Banderas in Assassins. He's quite hammy to begin with, but he chews the scenery in such a way that it gained the status of being the Ensemble Dark Horse.
  " YOU BLEW IT!!! I AM STILL ALIVE!!! HAHAHA!!!"
  • Best bit is when he is sharpening his marksmanship skills by shooting fruit and he turns to an orange that he has beside him : "Ha Ha Ha! I just killed YOUR BROTHER!'
• IT WOULD TAKE A THOUSAND OF YOUR TINY MEALS TO SLAKE MY GIGANTIC APPETITE!!!
• Just about ANY Villain Song in a musical. Audrey however, gets special notice for one song. That song? "Feed Me." of course! "Mean Green Mother" might also count.
• Battlefield Earth is a Universe of Ham, but Jonnie "Goodboy" Tyler and Terl are easily the biggest scenery chewers.
  • Jonnie: (to his tribemates) Has anyone here ever seen one? (prances around them excitedly) A demon... a monster... a beast! YAAAAAAH!!!
  • Terl: (to Ker) While you were still learning how to SPELL YOUR NAME, I... was being trained... TO CONQUER GALAXIES!!!
• The entire film of Doubt. Case in point, the Confrontation scene "YOU HAVE NO RIGHT!!" or "I HAVE MY CERTAINTY"
• Anything with Jack Palance in it. If Tim Burton's impersonation of the man on Batman's commentary track is any indication, the man chewed as much scenery in real life as he did on celluloid!
• Jurassic Park, near the beginning: SHOOT HA! SHOOOOT HAAAA!
• Satoris, the evil cult leader from the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode, The Final Sacrifice, is very fond of chewing scenery (and spitting it out again).
• Prince John, Robin Hood (2010): I declare him, to be an OUTLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAW!!!!
• Dr. Strangelove. Most of ... well, Strangelove himself's lines.
  • Animals... vill be brred... and SLAUGHTERED... HAAAAAA! (wrestles with own arm) MEIN FUHERER! I CAN WALK!!!
  • One of the actors (George C. Scott) was forced to ham it up to unbelievable levels, which he himself HATED. The director most frequently chose these takes, and the actor was outraged.
  • Stanley Kubrick actually tricked Scott into doing this (as General Buck Turgidson). For each scene he told Scott to go completely over the top in the first few takes, before playing it straight in the later ones, promising to not use the earlier, wilder ones. (He lied.)
• Brad Pitt plays a total loon in 12 Monkeys.
• Bill Murray actually shouts out "Feed me, Seymour!" at the end of the movie Scrooged to encourage the theater audience to respond to his hilariously over-the-top ad-libbing throughout the film, most notably in the dinner sequence.
  Frank: (thinks he sees a ghost) AH-HAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaa!
  Waiter: Oh no sir, that's the Baked Alaska, sir, that's a dessert.
• The Addams Family was all about this; between Raúl Juliá and Christopher Lloyd there wasn't a set unchewed.
  • For that matter, anything Raúl Juliá has acted in. OF COURSE! Chris Lloyd is no slouch, either.
• Nick Nolte. Full stop.
  • Nick Nolte's character in Lorenzos Oil crying and wailing hysterically over the numerous side effects of his son's illness.
  • And he does it pretty frequently in Hulk (2003), with the scene pictured above being his ultimate moment.
  Honest Trailers: And Bruce Banner's father, who's either an unpredictable Mad Scientist or just Nick Nolte wandering onto the set and being himself for a few hours.
• Inglourious Basterds:
  "TEDDY FUCKIN' WILLIAMS HITS IT OUT OF THE PARK!!!!! Fenway's on it's feet for Teddy!!! FUCKIN' BALL GAME!!!!!"
• Tom Hardy in Bronson: almost the whole scene with the librarian. (Quicker, quicker, QUICKER, QUICKAH!, QUICKAH!, FUCK OFF! SIT DOWN! Awesome, believable and completely justified.
  • Also the lip sync of 'When I'm a RAHCK AND ROWLLLLLLL STAAAAH!'
• The 1996 William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet, main offenders Harold Perrineau and Leonardo DiCaprio. This makes Mercutio's death unintentionally hilarious.
• Robert Mitchum as the crazy industrialist in Dead Man. He spends most of his time "talkin' to a goddamn bear" or hiding behind his desk, shotgun in hand.
  "SHUT UP! Mah boy is dead! Oh, I ain't askin' this time. I'm tellin'. And if somebody don't like it, I'm prepared to do a little killin' of my own! (later) I want this out over the wires. Post a $5000 reward from here to hell and back. Bring everybody in. I want that bastard's head. And make sure you include a full description of my Pinto. I want that horse back.
• Sure, Masters of the Universe was pretty bad, but Frank Langella as Skeletor sure did chew himself some scenery, especially in this scene.
  Skeletor: Now. I, Skeletor, am Master of the Universe! YES! Yes... I feel it, the power... fills me. YES, I feel the universe within me! I am... I am a part of the cosmos! The power flows... Flows through me! Of what consequence are you now? This planet, these people. They are NOTHING to me! The universe is POWER! Pure, unstoppable POWER! and I am that force! I am that power! KNEEL BEFORE YOUR MASTER! Fool! you are no longer my EQUAL! I am more than man, MORE THAN LIFE! I... am... a... GOD! Now. You... will... KNEEEEL!!!!!
• Bram Stoker's Dracula has Keanu Reeves in his usual mode... but this is redeemed by Anthony Hopkins as Doctor van Helsing, particularly when he actually roars "Feed me!" for an unintentional invoked trope.
• Willem Dafoe in The Boondock Saints:
  • "THERE WAS A FIRE FIGHT!!!!!!!!!"
• Alan Rickman in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves as the Sheriff of Nottingham was gloriously hammy in his portrayal. His best line was probably (at the end of a long list of canceling donations to various charities) "...and call off Christmas!"
• Herbert Lom as Inspector Dreyfus in The Pink Panther films tends to do this a lot after Inspector Clouseau unwittingly succeeds in pushing him over the edge mentally, especially in The Pink Panther Strikes Again, where he plays an Evil Overlord.
• Paul Giamatti as King John in Ironclad. "YOU DARE TO QUESTION MY REIGN!!!!"
• John Tuturro in Anthony Hopkins' confusing art flick Slipstream, playing a over the top growling, insane producer who is sidesplittingly funny as well and this a year before Tom Cruise in Tropic Thunder. In one scene, he loses it with the director when he brings his child to the filming and almost nearly attacks him like a wild animal. I don't know if it was ment to be this way or if Tuturro was just hamming it up big time, though he would be in competition with Christian Slater, who literally dies of overacting in the movie as the actor playing a menancing gangster along with Jeffrey Tambor who is at least subtle about it. Though in Slater's case it might just be that the script called for his chewing the scenery.
• Crispin Glover in River's Edge, I know he was suppose to be a cokehead but Glover played him too much like the dark side of George McFly complete with stuttering threats and nervous chatter. I know he got high praise for the role, but I couldn't help but think he wasn't just Chewing the scenery so much that the character rose laughs out of me instead of fear or intimidation.
• Reb Brown in almost anything he does, complete with over the top yelling at the top of your lungs acting style like most 80s action stars, his highlight though would be Space Mutiny with lines such as
  "SON OF A BITCCCCCCCCCCCCCHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
  "LEEEEAAA WAAATTTCCHHH OOUUUUTTTT!"
  "AHHHHAAAHAAAAAA"
  "C'mon MOOOVVEEE, MOOOVVEEE,MOOVVVEEE, MOOOVVVVEEE,MOOOVVVEEE!"
  "Let's get out there and KICCCKKK SOOMMMEEE ASSSSSS!"
• And in another movie called Strike Commando after a little kid dies he screams the villians name like this
  "JAAAAAKKKAOODDDDAAAAA!"
• That Tom Riddle fellow in the Harry Potter films. In every. Single. Scene. He consumes more scenery than unicorn blood. All of Voldemort's portrayers have their moments, but Ralph Fiennes especially. He even has videos dedicated to the anticipation of his most hammiest of moments on Youtube.
  • TROLL IN THE DUNGEON!!!!!
• Ever After: Everyone is occasionally (probably consciously, due to the quick changes between humor and seriousness) guilty of this, child!Danielle in particular.
  • Honourable mention to Marguerite who throws a full-blown temper tantrum with stamping and screaming and yelling in front of the Queen of France.
  • "I would rather die a thousand deaths than SEE MY MOTHER'S DRESS ON THAT SPOILED! SELFISH! COW!"
• The scenery literally fell apart when Tobey Maguire starts wrecking the kitchen in Brothers. See it here. (1:07 onwards)
  • YOU KNOW WHAT I DID!!!!????
• "In place of a dark lord, you would have a QUEEN! NOT DARK BUT BEAUTIFUL AND TERRIBLE AS THE DAWN! TREACHEROUS AS THE SEA! STRONGER THAN THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE EARTH! ALL SHALL LOVE ME AND DESPAIR!"
• Sir Ben Kingsley as Don Logan in Sexy Beast: "You're the problem! You're the fuckin' problem you fuckin' Doctor White honkin' jam-rag fucking spunk-bubble! I'm tellin' you, Aitch, you keep lookin' at me I'll put you in the fuckin' ground, promise you!"
• "I WAS FROZEN TODAY!
• "I ... AM... MEGATRON!!!
• The audio commentary for Priest mentions that many of Karl Urban's scenes seem to exist for the purpose of letting Urban chew scenery.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • Tom Hiddleston as Loki in Thor and The Avengers singlehandedly accounts for approximately 70% of the scenery-chewing in those movies.
    Loki: TELLLL MEEEE!!!
    
    Loki: Kneel before me. I said... KNEEL!!!!
    
    Loki: THIS is my bargain, you MEWLING QUIM!
    
    Loki: I am a GOD, you dull creature!
  • Loki's extensive chewing is to be expected, though, seeing as his father Odin (played by Anthony Hopkins) does some extreme chewing of his own.
    Odin: You are unworthy of these realms... You're unworthy of your TITLE... YOU'RE UNWORTHY!!!
    Loki: Father...
    Odin: HYAEEERGH!
  • Brother Thor also gobbles much scenery, mixing fancy vocabulary.
  • In one of the Hilarious Outtakes of The Avengers, Cobie Smulders' Maria Hill does a Comical Overreacting to Agent Coulson's death that must be seen to be believed.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy: Ronan the Accuser doesn't so much as chew the scenery as maul and raven it to bloody pieces. Lee Pace recalled once how he would keep glancing back to James Gunn to tell him when to dial it back, while Gunn just kept going "more, more." The final product, when Ronan is really allowed to cut loose, is a screaming fanatic who manages to make Thanos look subtle by comparison:
  Ronan: You call me BOY! I will unfurl one-thousand years of Kree justice on Xandar, and burn it to its core!
• Watch Helen Mirren and Christopher Plummer munch away on the beautiful Russian country side in The Last Station.
• Almost everyone in Judge Dredd, especially when pronouncing the word "law"/"lauwh"/"lllaaaawww". The most notable is probably Armand Assante's notorious delivery.
• David Johansen really chews up the scenery in Tales from the Darkside: The Movie. Even when a cat is crawling down his character's mouth, he manages to keep chewing the scenery.
• Virtuosity: Russell Crowe is a one-man feeding frenzy.
  "Hey buddy! How's the wife and kid? Still dead, huh?"
• While everyone in Jupiter Ascending is having some fun with the script, no one is chewing more scenery than Eddie Redmayne. Most of the time, he speaks in a hoarse whisper... Until things start going downhill, and then he breaks out the shouting.
  Balem: I CREATE LIFE!!!!!
  Balem: And... I... destroy it.
• Rocky films give us the wonderful Burgess Meredith as Rocky's trainer Micky, who appears to be a wizened vegetable magically granted life, on the sole proviso that he devour scenery wherever it may present itself.
  Micky: He's a WRECKIN' MACHINE!
  Micky: GEDDUP, YOU SONOFABITCH!...CAUSE MICKY LOVES YA!
• Cleopatra Jones has Snake, a heroin dealer who wavers between badass pimp and yapping puppy from line to line.
• In The Christmas Tree, when Mrs. Mavilda is firing Judy, she chews it so hard that the voice actress's mic almost blows out.
• NO! Don't go in there! You don't have to die! No one has to die at 30! You could live! LIVE! Live, and grow old! I've seen it! She's seen it!
• Richard E. Grant takes scenery chewing to a whole new level in Hudson Hawk. "What can I tell you? I'm the villain!"
• An over the top hilarious moment in 22 Jump Street happens when Jenko finds out the the person Schmidt had sexual relations with was none other than Captain Dickson's daughter.
  Jenko: OHHH SHIT! OHHH SHIT! [laughs hysterically] OH SHIT! NO! That is NOT happening right now! NO! [yells to everyone in the room] HEY Y'ALL, HE'S FUCKING THE CAPTAIN'S DAUGHTER! YO!
  Dickson: Every time...he say that shit...
  Jenko: OH MY FUCK!
  Dickson: That's another foot in your ass!
  Jenko: Schmidt! You clearly- Oh this is the best thing ever! [laughing hysterically] SCHMIDT FUCKED THE CAPTAIN'S DAUGHTER! [dancing and chanting] SCHMIDT FUCKED THE CAPTAIN'S DAUGHTER! SCHMIDT FUCKED THE CAPTAIN'S DAUGHTER! SHIT! FUCK! [still laughing] YOU FUCKED CAPTAIN DICKSON'S DAUGHTER?! CAPTAIN! WHAT THE- YOU BRAGGED TO HIM TO HIS FACE! TO HIS ACTUAL FACE! CAPTAIN- Do you understand that this face, Right here, you bragged to that face? You actually high-fived Schmidt for fucking your daughter! HOLY SHIT! OH MY GOD! THIS IS- [noticing Dickson's unamusement] It's really not that funny.
• Young Frankenstein - the whole cast. Everyone, and I do mean everyone, is as far over the top as one could imagine. Then there is Gene Wilder in the title role, whose performance is so melodramatic and madcap that it must be seen to be believed.
  Dr. Frederick Frankenstein: I am a scientist, not a philosopher! You have more chance of reanimating this scalpel than you have of mending a broken nervous system!
  Medical Student: But what about your grandfather's work, sir?
  Dr. Frederick Frankenstein: My grandfather's work was doodoo! I am not interested in death! The only thing that concerns me is the preservation of life! [jams the scalpel into his leg, lets go of the scalpel and it sticks upright out of his leg, grasps it again, then slowly crosses his legs to block the scalpel from view]
• As expected when one of the best dramatic actors of his generation plays Dr. Zachary Smith, Gary Oldman dines defiantly while delivering his delectably devilish dialogue in Lost in Space. Scintilatingly scrumptious.
• Samuel L. Jackson in... oh, just about everything he’s been in. The man can get loud when he needs to. “WHAT DOES MARCELLUS WALLACE LOOK LIKE?!?!?!?”
• The Two Faces Of Doctor Jekyll - Paul Massie, as both Jekyll and Hyde; "WHAT HAVE I DONE? WHAT HAVE I DONE?"

Music

• Burly Chassis is the musical equivalent; after recording "Goldfinger", she probably needed A Glass of Chianti to wash down all the soundproofing in the recording booth.
• Tom Jones.
• In the music video for Aerosmith's "Sweet Emotion", a hammy Steven Tyler grabs a scarf from the microphone stand and begins to actually chew on it.
• Ghostface Killah
• Steppenwolf's "The Pusher" is big moment for lead singer John Kay. "I SAID GODDAMN! GODDAMN THE PUSHERMAN!"
• Merry Clayton's guest vocal in The Rolling Stones' classic "Gimme Shelter", which was actually rumored to have caused her miscarriage.
• Miyuki Nakajima usually has at least one in each of her Yakai concerts. The second half of this number is an excellent example, as is this one.
• Michael Jackson, cf. "Black or White"'s finale.
• Every one of VNV Nation's live performances, and we wouldn't have it any other way. If you're curious just search for some live performances on YouTube and watch him play the crowd.
• Journey's video for "Separate Ways". The song isn't too hammy. But Steve Perry does the most exaggerated expressions possible.
  • "Chain Reaction". Enough said.
• Much of Linkin Park. "CRAAWWWWWWWWWWLING!!! INNNNNNNNNNNNN!!! MYYYY!!! SKINNNNNNNNNNN!!!"
• The music video for "Stay" by Shakespears Sister.
• Two words: James. HETFIELD!
  • AH!
• The music videos for Of Monsters and Men's second album Beneath the Skin consisted simply of one person per song singing along into the camera and disgorging emotion and humanity, each a different flavour.
• Much metal has a tendency towards the hammy. For example, Judas Priest: "HE! IS! THE! PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAINKILLLLLER! THIS! IS! THE! PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAINKILLLLLER!"
• Dio's vocal style popularized much of this in metal, with younger Power Metal bands taking it to its logical extreme (minus his sheer energy).
• David Draiman: the only "acting" he's ever done in a video was a Big "NO!". His voice is the kind that can somehow make "WE BEGIN THE HUNT TONIGHT! FEEL THE POWER COURSE AS THE CREATURES TAKE FLIGHT!!" sound cool. He also loves to fill songs with Evil Laughter. If anyone else did this, it would be So Bad, It's Good. With him, he really can convince you that he's an indestructible master of war.
• Christina Aguilera - all those riffs, runs and malismas. Your Mileage Will Vary if you like it or not!
• After the video for The Ballad of Mona Lisa, Brendon Urie must've been picking scenery out of his teeth for weeks.
• How has everyone forgotten Meat Loaf? NNNGHHYOOUBETTAHBELEEVEIT!!
• The Crazy World of Arthur Brown. "I am the god of HELLFIRE!"
• Jim Morrison slipped into this trope when he was parodying a fire-and-brimstone preacher at the beginning of the title song on The Doors' The Soft Parade. "YOU CANNOT PETITION THE LORD WITH PRAYER!"
• Spamalot, being a musical with No Fourth Wall, comments about how this is common in Award Bait Songs:
  A sentimental song / That casts a magic spell / They all will hum along / We'll overact like hell / For this is the song that goes like this
• Nightwish's vocalist, Floor Jansen, can and will come up with grandiose belting and screams from time to time, especially during live performances.
  My... my fall... will be... FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOR YOOOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!
• As if a live jazz album by Jeff Goldblum would be anything but this.

Pro Wrestling

• Extremely common during the territorial era, especially the southern United States, which pretty much ran on emotional celebrations and Ham-to-Ham Combat. The most famous frequent offenders in the 80s were Dusty Rhodes and Ric Flair among wrestlers, Jim Cornette and Jimmy Hart among managers, the latter even being known as "The Mouth Of The South", sometimes taking on said moniker himself in third person with a megaphone to boot.
• Dave Prazak is usually the Straight Man and stoic when it comes to commentary, but there have been moments where he completely cuts loose, mostly in IWA Mid-South and Full Impact Pro were he was a heel commentator.
  "No, he said You Are A WHOOOORE! And he speaks the truth!"
• Ring of Honor
  • The most frequent offender was Homicide, until his stoic foil Bryan Danielson won the World Title Belt and proceeded to demand he be announced as "The Best Wrestler In The World".
  • Prince Nana has tends to do this while threatening to sick his Embassy on someone, often while back pedaling away or hiding behind something for added effect.
  • Jimmy Jacobs increasingly on the topic of Lacey(who is no slouch herself when the time's right), culminating with his But I Would Really Enjoy It filibuster at Good Times, Great Memories.
  • Whenever Larry Sweeney, Chris Hero and Tank Toland were together and given the floor they threatened to devour everything in sight, usually starting with Bobby Dempsey.
  • The Briscoes were supposed to be putting over the champions but Dem Boys will take the time to chew you out, even if they don't mention you by name, reDRagon and Michael Elgin!
  • Ever since he joined the House Of Truth, Jay Lethal seesawed between calm and relax and shouting lunatic.
  • At Supercard Of Honor X Colt Cabana returned to let out everything Adam Page decided to let out everything he felt about the promotion for the past half decade all at once. On night two, Adam Page followed suit, pulling up a chair for a long pent up rant against BJ Whitmer.
  • And The House Of Truth didn't forget about the women. In fact, Taeler Hendrix's rant on the Honor Is Fair Play mindset that permeates through the promotion might have drawn as much attention to the rebranded Women Of Honor division as any match.
• Many of the above mentioned examples have worked for TNA, but it was Matt Hardy who gained a reputation for doing so particularly in the promotion, where he finally "broke" Seventeen minutes of insanity dubbed "The Final Deletion" got TNA some much needed attention for their Pop program.

Tabletop Games

• Exalted, being a game designed to let players be over the top in all they do, allows your character to live this trope. There's even a mention of player characters getting a dying monologue, no matter how they die.
  • Dragon Blooded, almost literally, chew the scenery when they use a lot of 'mana', because their anima banners start doing damage to everything within a few yards. Accordingly, they tend to furnish their homes with sculpture and heavy stone furniture, so they don't have to buy a new couch every time someone gets pissed off.
  • In the source book for the Infernal Exalted, the Storytelling chapter has a section on how to use them as Card Carrying Villains (their original intent) entitled "This Scenery Looks Delicious." In fact, at one point in the book it's explained how the player of a 'Green Sun Prince' can even receive mechanical benefits from dramatic monologuing under the right circumstances.
• Warhammer 40,000's Orks. Especially their leaders. And, to a varying extent, everyone else on the battlefield. (See Dawn of War for the canon voice acting.)

Theater

• There is a popular theatre blog called "Chewing the Scenery" which often slates over the top or silly acting in British theatre.
• The "Spartacus and the Gladiators" recitation in The Solid Gold Cadillac serves no purpose except to allow whoever is playing McKeever to overact ludicrously.
• Herakles enters the scene in the midst of dying a Cruel and Unusual Death in The Women of Trachis. In itself such a situation may call for some scenery chewing, but since the character is Herakles in this case it's a prerequisite.
• We Will Rock You: Pop/Buddy flat-out feasts on the scenery during any scene he's in, especially in the US version. Ditto for Khashoggi and the Killer Queen.
  "It's called a VI-DAY-OH TAH-PE!"
• Starship is a World of Ham, more or less, but the greatest of all these Hams are probably Taz, played by Lauren Lopez, Up, played by Joe Walker, and Tootsie Noodles, played by Dylan Saunders. Not that Pincer (Saunders) is much better. Walker just cheerfully chews up the scenery with their aid, trying to see who can eat more of it. For what scenes he's in there, of course, Krayonder (played by Joe Moses, who is Snape in A Very Potter Musical), eats what he can, as does Jim Povolo (Sweetheart and The Overqueen).
• In Peter And The Starcatcher, a play based on the book of the same name as a prequel, there is a line that hangs a lampshade on this trope as pirates Black Stache (pre-hook Hook and a very Large Ham to boot) and Smee flee the crocodile:
  Smee: He's chewing up the scenery!
  Black Stache: NOT IN MY SCENE HE'S NOT!

Video Games

• Any scene featuring Nightmare in SoulCalibur.
  "YES! YES! THIS IS IT!"
  "MY THIRST... IS ENDLESS!"
  "SOULS! COME UNTO ME!"
• Possibly in an incredibly strange homage to A Streetcar Named Desire, normally nonham Senel from Tales of Legendia screams "STELLAAAAAAAAAAA" at one point in the game in a very over the top manner.
• Joneleth Irenicus, Big Bad of Baldur's Gate II, has less screentime than most Big Bads, but damn does he make up for it.
• Devil May Cry: "I should have been the one to fill your dark soul with LIGHT!"
  • Between the two of them, in Devil May Cry 4 Dante and Agnus manage to masticate the entire cathedral.
  • Scarily enough, Dante and Agnus are having a serious discussion about the nature of man behind all that Shakespearean prose and hammy acting. Having a serious discussion would have just felt wrong for the series, but since the scene happened to be in an opera house, players ignored the conversation and focused only on the theatrics.
  • Even the most ridiculously hammy dialogue of the third game managed to remain believable. You'd think Arkham's very name would be quite a clue; behold. ^note Not to mention that "ark" is pronounced like the Greek-originated prefix "arch" which means "highest".
• Sengoku Basara is the such a samurai World of Ham, it's a wonder there's any scenery left. There's Mouri's "I AM THE CHILD OF THE SUN, NOW COOOOOOME!!", and Nobunaga's "I AM THE DEVIL KING OF THE SIXTH HEAVEN!!! (plus he's played by Norio Wakamoto). But even the other voice actors have expressed respect and sympathy for Soichiro Hoshi who voices Hot-Blooded Yukimura who has No Indoor Voice and who really, really, really loves his "OYAKATA-SAMAAAAAAAAA!!!!!"
• Halo: Despite being a giant tentacle corpse monster thing, the Gravemind eats everything it can find, including the scenery. And it often speaks in trochaic heptameter (which actually matters, given Bungie's self-acknowledged obsession with the number seven).
• Ace Combat 6: "MAAAAATILDAAAAAAAAA!" That scene was then MSTed with hilarious results by Unskippable. Which was beautifully parodied even more with the plane crash in the opening of Haze, also by the Unskippable lads.
• Kane from Command & Conquer. Every scene involving him has some of the most awesomely bombastic, larger-than-life acting one could ask for. Hell, in the intro to Kane's Wrath, his pre-battle speech comes complete with explosions, thunder, and earthquakes. Red Alert 3 goes for a World of Ham with Tim Curry as the Soviet Premier, George Takei is the Japanese Emperor and J.K. Simmons as the American President. The only denser concentration of ham is a purely theoretical double act with William Shatner and BRIAN BLESSED. Adding Ric Flair in the mission pack is the icing on this ham-cake. The funny thing is, he's actually fairly quiet and charismatic in a completely different way (with one memorable lapse) throughout the original game. Not that anybody's complaining either way.
• Metal Gear Solid 4. The whole thing. Double points for any scene with Liquid Ocelot, who can blow things up by pointing at them dramatically. He Points. Bang. *Helicopters falls out of sky*; Pulls his other arm up as everyone is collapsing, and starts to make MACHINE GUN noises! " BANGBANGBANGBANG..."
  • Also right after the Metal Gear fight when the game does a modern version of the end of the first game with "Fox..." "...Die!" Liquid jumps up, says, "Not this time!" then giggles and dances around like a little girl before running away.
  • Then there's "SSSSSNNNNNNAAAAAAAAAAKKKKKEEEEEE!! from everyone. There are other overly acted out scenes but they never really yell.
  Behold! GUNS of the PATRIOTS!
  • By no means is this limited to the fourth installment:
  "What was she fighting for? What am I fighting for? WHAT ARE YOU FIGHTING FFOOOORR?!?"
  • Although Raiden only turned into a Large Ham in Revengeance, a specific slip from him in Metal Gear Solid 2 is one of the biggest Memetic Mutations in the entire series.
  Colonel? I've got Emma Emerich here... We've managed to avoid DROWNING!
  • Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain has a darker story than previous instalments, but by no means does this decrease the amount of ham:
  Such a lust for revenge... WHOOOOOOOOO?!
• Resident Evil is full of them.
  • Barry "Jill Sandwich" Burton from the original PlayStation version is a prime example.
    "It's Forrest! Oh my ^COD  GOD!"
    "Just - take - a - look - at - THIS!"
    "Run Jill! He's insane!"
  • The Raccoon City Police Chief: "But you're not leaving my town! Everyone's gonna DIE!".
  • Wesker (or "WESKERRRRR!!") has some of the most over-the-top villainous monologues ever.''
  • RE4 wasn't so bad and never had anything over-the-top, but RE5 has Chris overacting every scene. Wesker's gem monologues are good, and become awesome when he throws his glasses at Chris so he can punch him whilst he's distracted!
    "Seven minutes is all I can spare to play with you."
    "CHHHRRIIIISSS!!!! SSSHHHEEEVVVVVAAAA!!!!!" EEEXXXXCCCCEEELLLLLAAAAAA!!!
    "Uroboros will be released into the atmosphere, ensuring complete, GLOBAL, SATURATION".
• Mega Man X:
  • Zero's infamous WHATAMIFIGHTINGFOOOOOOOOOOORRRAAAAGH!!!!. Recently redubbed.
  • In Maverick Hunter X, X prepares for his climactic battle with Sigma by vigorously devouring the scenery. It's actually quite chilling. Possibly justified by the fact that the Vile battle (and Zero's fate) were shifted from the first Sigma stage to the third, meaning that X had just watched Zero die minutes before, not a whole fortress ago, and therefore the pain and fury are nice and fresh.
• Practically all of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. Most known for this one. The dialogue was completely redone in the PSP port The Dracula X Chronicles (which also included Castlevania: Rondo of Blood), for better or for worse.
• Sergeant Reznov from Call of Duty: World at War must have gotten really hungry after the events of the level "Vendetta", because starting with "Their Land, Their Blood", he can't stop yelling at his men to keep killing Germans wherever they find them. Commissar Markhov, however, manages to outeat even him, as his lack of volume control for his voice, coupled with the fact that half his lines are spoken from a megaphone, ensure that he can be heard all the way over in Berlin.
• Tales of Vesperia has Zagi:
  "I will carve your NAME into my BLOOOOOOOD!"

• The eponymous Kain of the Legacy of Kain series is able to sustain himself on both blood AND scenery.
• Saavedro in Myst III: Exile is prone to this - his despairing cries when you trap him are particularly gnawful.
• Tony Jay in Planescape: Torment: "I WILL TEACH YOU MUCH... OF PAIN!"
• Dog gets so much of this in Half-Life 2, without even speaking.
• Metal Wolf Chaos has the President and Vice President of the United States engaged in Ham-to-Ham Combat when battling each other in Humongous Mecha.
• Xenosaga's Albedo rides the line between this and Large Ham. Margulis also gets a couple of these. They usually involve him screaming "UZUKIIIIIIIIII!"
• The Elder Scrolls:
  • Dremora, a Proud Warrior Race of lesser Daedra who tend to serve as Mehrunes Dagon's Legions of Hell, ham it up throughout the series. They take a level in badass between Oblivion and Skyrim, which is accompanied by a level in ham, as well.
    "I honor my lord, by destroying you!"
  • Skyrim has the infamous Heimskr, a priest of Talos who preaches in Whiterun's Wind district. His repeating spiel has been a source of amusement and annoyance for players since day one.
    Heimskr: "We are but MAGGOTS, WRIIITHING in the FILTH of our own CORRUPTION! While you have ascended from the DUNG of mortality, and now walk among the STARS!"
• Even in the World of Ham that is the Dynasty Warriors series, Lu Bu's reaction when you kill his Love Interest Diao Chan stands out.
  "Diao Chan! Ohhh, Diao Chan!!"
• Scott McNeil's performance as the Psychopath Antoine in Dead Rising 2:
  HOW DARE YOU?! I AM ANTOINE! I AM THE KING OF CUISINE!!!
• Kingdom Hearts: Master Xehanort. Bonus points for being voiced by Leonard Nimoy and Chikao Ohtsuka. His various incarnations too.
  KINGDOM HEARTS! FILL ME WITH THE POWER OF DARKNESS!!!
  DARKNESS CONQUERS ALL WORLDS!!!
  Voice of the Legion: "This Χ-blade will open a door, one that leads to ALL WORLDS! Then, Keyblade-bearing warriors will flock here from each and every one of them, to battle for the light within KINGDOM HEARTS! And just like the legend says, the Keyblade War will BEGIN!"
• Lani Minella:
  • She reached the pinnacle of this trope with the undead dragon queen Sindragosa in World of Warcraft.
  • Her voice acting as Adria in Diablo:
    Adria: The Butcher IS A SADISTIC CREATURE...
• Just about every boss in World of Warcraft, but Yogg-Saron wins by being made of mouths to chew with.
  'BBBOOOONNNNNEEEEEESSSSSTTTTOOORRRMMMMMM!
• Ganon in Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon and Link: The Faces of Evil:
  Ganon: You DARE bring light to mah LAIR?! YOU MUST DIE!!!
  
  Ganon: Join me, Link. And I will make your face the grrrreatest in Korridai! Or else you will DIE!
• Sin and Punishment: Star Successor:
  My blood... IS ON FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRREEEEEEEEEEEE!
• Destroy All Humans!: RADIOACTIVE EXPLODING ZOMBIE COWS!!!!
• From Asura's Wrath: Gongen Wyzen. "AAASSHHUUURRAAA THE TRAITOR!!! AAAASSSSHHUUURRRAAA THE DESTRUCTOR!!! YOU DO NOT BELONG TO THIS WORLD!!! (Commences finger poke of doom) DDDDDDDDDIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!"
• Sonic the Hedgehog:
  • Dr. Robotnik was having way too much fun at the beginning of Sonic Adventure. "You know NOTHING, fools! It's Chaos, the GOD of DESTRUCTION!!! MUAHAHAHAHAHA'!!!" In Sonic Generations, even his past self is thrown off by his scenery chewing tendencies.
  • Also, the Anti-Climax Boss of Sonic Heroes, the Metal Overlord comes out with such gems as "This victory shall soon turn into DESPAAAAAIIIIRRR!!!", "IT'S! TOO! LAAATE!!" and, of course, "BUUURRNNN! TOOOOO DEEEAAATTHHH!!!", complete with voice echo! What's more, he is ACTUALLY eating the ship while he's on while doing so (implied). What's more, he gets worse after he takes off!
• Mike Toreno tends to do this in his Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas cutscenes. Even more so when he phones CJ repeatedly to "motivate" him to get his pilot's license, having survived the helicopter explosion.
• Loghain in Dragon Age: Origins. Who, unsurprisingly, shares a voice actor with Kain. Simon Templeman seems to subsist on a steady diet of scenery whenever he's voicing a game character. Not that anyone's complaining.
• The Arishok in Dragon Age II when Hawke gets in a duel with him. Snarky!Hawke him/herself gets in on the act in the "Mark of the Assassin" DLC where s/he decides that the only way to act like a noble is to be as over-the-top and obnoxious as possible.
• In Tali's loyalty mission in Mass Effect 2, Paragon Shepard can approach the Admiralty Board to defend her with an impassioned speech. If you're playing as female Shepard, Jennifer Hale simply demolishes the scenery and then spits what's left of the Migrant Fleet out into your stunned face.
• Every villain in the Professor Layton series (Don Paolo, Anton, Clive and Descole) has one thing in common: at some point in their game/movie, they will shout Layton's name very loud.
  LLLLLAAAAAYYYYYTTTTTOOOOONNNNN!!!!!
• Cyril Kalmar in Rift, at least in the Guardian intro cinematic.
  "You are our salvation. You are a Guardian!"
• Kefka in Dissidia: Final Fantasy, with an encore in its sequel Duodecim. A sample of what I mean.
• Parodied in Saints Row: The Third by Josh Birk/Nyte Blade.
  Birk: "MARIOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!"
• The news anchor from Bill Nye the Science Guy: Stop the Rock!, played by Pat Cashman of Almost Live! and Super Smash Bros. Brawl narration fame, loves this trope. Best exemplified by his screaming rant on Day 5:
  ...with winds! Exceeding! 250 Miles! An hour! So have a nice evening! [calms down] And...good night!
• Hakeev in Star Trek Online. By the time Obisek/the Romulan PC finally kills him, it's questionable if there's a piece of scenery in the entire Beta Quadrant without teeth marks on it.
  "This isn't over! When the Iconians get here—"
• Councilor Vay Hek from Warframe takes No Indoor Voice to a whole new level. Perhaps it's to make up for being just a degraded clone head kept alive by inferior Grineer life support machinery...
  Vay Hek: DID YOU REALLY BELIEVE... IT WOULD BE... THIS... EASY!?!?
• Pretty much every character in Battleborn Applies, Although Ambra in particular would like to remind you to WASH your FILTHY HANDS.

Visual Novels

• While the anime of Umineko: When They Cry didn't give the actors the occasion to chew much scenery, the PS3 remake of the sound novel does. Let the torture begin… Ushiromiya BWATORAAAA!!!

Web Animation

• Red vs. Blue's Sarge can get like this at times
  Sarge: I LOVE BLOOD AND VIOLENCE! I GOTTA BONER FOR MURDER!

Web Comics

• Sparks in Girl Genius are usually rather normal whenever they're not in The Madness Place — but when they are, this trope applies to damn near everything they do. Which counts as a deconstruction, since Mad Scientists chew the scenery due to being, well, mad — oscillating between psychotic breaks from reality and psychotic breakthroughs into reality.
  • ...which is why they also easily slip into loud mood swings. Or jump into loud mood swings. Childish flares of rage are all the rage among the Sparks, too.
  • That does explain Othar Tryggvassen, GENTLEMAN ADVENTURER! quite well.
  • The chapter where Agatha meets Gilgamesh Wulfenbach enter "The Madness Place" was named "Gil Chews the Scenery". After some rumours, this episode later was explicitly referenced as "chewing the furniture".
• Goblins had a scene that the author actually changed because he thought it was too narmtastic. A mook is getting painfully transformed into a pile of snakes and screams, "I feel sick... Oh God, it hurts!
• The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob!: Galatea lives and breathes this trope. "'Crazy? Me? You dare?! All the world is mad and only I am sane!" "We are a new race, more intelligent than man and obliged to supplant him! We... are the ubermensch!!!... Or is that ubermenschen... or uberfrauen... or..." "SO ENDS THE AGE OF MAN!" "Heed me, Butane! This is Captain Galatea Martin of the starship Lathe of Empires!... I promise you wise and just leadership... if you surrender... NOW!''
• Awful Hospital: Doctor E.M. Balmer, the mortician, is probably the number one hammiest embalming machine that ever ham-balmed.
  Can your feeble head-stuffings even fathom the delectable horror of an entire perception zone simply rotting away to nothing? Devoured from within by insatiable vermin!? Oh, the very thought of it tickles my wires with such decadent revulsion! How excitingly abominable!

Web Original

• The performances in Kickassia as a whole play this to the hilt, for pure hilarity. Most impressive are the portrayals of The Nostalgia Critic (Doug Walker) and Spoony (Noah Antwiler), which are absolutely over the top and down the other side.
  • Though they've had plenty of practice in their reviews, such as "EXPLAIN, MOVIE! JUST ''EX-PLAAAAAINNN!!!''", the Critic's huge freak-outs over the likes of Batman & Robin. Or Ma-Ti's "A movie that make my nipples tingle with fear!"
  • Noah Antwiler's brilliant impression of WARRIOR in the The Spoony Experiment/Atop the Fourth Wall reviews of the Warrior comics quite happily swallows down a whole lot of scenery, seemingly without it even touching the sides. He probably could have managed more, had there been any actual scenery to munch on... Worryingly, the actual Ultimate Warrior appears to be so much worse than Spoony's impression.
  • In the Battlefield Earth review, Spoony's version of Terl somehow manages to chew the scenery more than John Travolta's. And it is glorious.
• This.
• Epic Meal Time has 100% chewy monologue. SPREAD THAT SAUUUUZZE!
• Super Sonic Short by Deviant ART's Link3Kokiri has Sonic the Hedgehog and friends screaming at the top of their lungs while changing into their super forms. It's not so much the original animation that qualifies for this trope, but the German dub. They literally overload the speakers.
• Hiram Mc Daniel's many heads from Welcome to Night Vale.
• Many, many Let's Players of Getting Over It With Bennett Foddy.

Western Animation

• Ren from The Ren & Stimpy Show in almost every episode. "What do you MEAN you don't agree with me?! DO YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE DEALING WITH??!!!!"
  • "Do you have to keep tapping like that?! You bloated sack of protoplasm!"
  • From the episode Stimpy's Fan Club':
    Ren: "I... I was nice today. Nice to those insipid little monkeys, answering their stupid letters. My hands... DIRTY! THE DIRT WON'T COME OFF! AAAAAAAHHHH! [Lying in bed] President... Ha! What a joke. President...President of WHAT?! [Enviously looking over at Stimpy] His fan club?! How they love him! Look at him, lying there asleep. [Creeps over to Stimpy's side]The idol of millions. He's a fool! Blind, silly little fool. How easily I could end the farce... with these hands! These DIRTY hands! AND WITH THESE HANDS I HOLD THE FATE OF MILLIONS!!! They think he's a god, but he's as mortal as we. I know! [Visually drawing a dotted line along Stimpy's neck] Just..one...quick...TWIST! And it's over. Just one... Just... AAAAH! It's happening again! MY BRAIN! MY HOT... STINGING... BRAIN!!!! WHAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!! WHAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!! WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!"
  • For the LAST TIME! I! WANT YOU! TO BE! QUIET!!!!!
  • "It is not I who am crazy. It is I who am mad!"
  • "I told ya I'd shoot! But you didn't believe me! WHY DIDN'T YOU BELIEVE ME?!"
  • "Oh no! I know what you want! YOU COVETETH MY ICE CREAM BAR!"
  • "I've had this ice cream bar since I was a CHILD!! PEOPLE! ALWAYS TRYING TO TAKE IT FROM ME! WHY WON'T THEY LEAVE ME, AAAALOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONNNEEEEEEEE!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?
  • "YOU FILTHY SWINE! I WILL KILL YOU!!!!"
• Sweet holy mother of Glob, Justin Roiland's gorgeous performance as Lemongrab in Adventure Time. He didn't chew the scenery- he completely DEVOURED IT! And he came back a year later later to reprise the role, HUNGRY FOR MORE SCENERY TO RAVENOUSLY FEAST UPON!
  Lemongrab: This castle Is... In... UNACCEPTABLE CONDITION! UNACCEPTABUUUL!!!
  Lemongrab: NO ONE... NO ONE UNDERSTANDS! I AM ALONE! AND YOU MADE ME LIKE THIS! YOU MADE MEEE! YOOOU MAAADE MEEE!!! YOU'RE... MY... GLOB! YOU'RE MY GLOB!!!
  • In the words of Tom Herpich (one of the two writers of Lemongrab's episodes) on Justin's performance as Lemongrab: "He crushed it perfectly."
  • There are some scenery-chewing moments with Jeremy Shada as Finn:
  Finn: I'LL KILL YOU, LUMPY SPAAACE!!!
  • And also Tom Kenny as the Ice King:
  Ice King: I have powers, TOO, you BUTTS!
• Invader Zim: HE IS ZIM!!!
  FOOLISH EARTH PIGS!!
  LIES! THIS FILTHY EARTH BOY LIES!
  No! You lie! YOU LIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIE!
  • Any character voiced by Richard Steven Horvitz will chew the scenery given half a chance.
  "But, invader's blood marches through my veins, like giant RADIOACTIVE RUBBER PANTS! THE PANTS COMMAND ME! DO NOT IGNORE MY VEINS!"
• The vampire Joker is like this constantly in The Batman vs. Dracula, constantly screaming and moaning and even once said the titular line, right before eating a cockroach.
• Mark Hamill's Fire Lord Ozai in Avatar: The Last Airbender, particularly in the series finale War Room meeting. In fact, any of Hamill's villains could fit on this page, especially the Joker in Batman: The Animated Series Joker and Hobgoblin in Spider-Man: The Animated Series.
• Professor Dementor in Kim Possible was created with this trope in mind.
• X-Men:
  • Henry Gyrich was always a little unhinged, but his appearance in the last episode shot him straight into scenery-chewing territory. Acoustic feedback from his microphone fails to slow him down. By the end of the scene, for the character's swan song, Barry Flatman shifts gears from merely chewing the scenery to practically devouring it.
  • Storm was wondering if you could MEET HER AT THE MONORAIL!
• Metalocalypse:
  "I LOVE BEING MOTIVATED! I LOVE BEING MOTIVATED!!!"
  "WE'RE HERE TO MAKE EVERYTHING METAL! BLACKER THAN THE BLACKEST BLACK TIMES INFINITY!"
  "CA-CA-CA-YEAAAAAH! IT'S ME DOCTOR ROCKZO THE ROCK 'N ROLL CLOOOOWWWWWWN! YOU KNOW WHAT I DO BA-BA-BA-BABY?! I DO COCAAAAAAINE! CA-CA-CA-YEAH! COCAINE!"
• Calculon of Futurama and his UNHOLY ACTING TALENT:
  UNHOLY ACTING DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY! GOOD NIGHT!
  ROOOOOOOBOOOOOOOT HOOOOOOUUUUUSEEE!
• Decepticons in Transformers Animated are prone to scenery-chewing:
  YOU INTERRUPTED MY SPEEEEECH! But don't worry. It won't happen again.
  • Lugnut. Especially with anything in regard to his GLORIOUS leader.
  STASIS LOCK ITSELF COULD NOT DETER ME FROM YOUR GRAND AND GLORIOUS PLAN! OH WISE AND NOBLE MEGATRON!
• The Boondocks: FUCK YOUR COURT, NYUKKA!
  • Colonel Stinkmeaner is probably the best example.
  "Bitch ass, punk ass, faggot ass, pussy ass, BITCH ASS NIGGA!"
  "NIGGA! You better have insurance! Ass-whooping insurance! And you're about to pay a DEDUCTIBLE!"
  "Who in the hell parked in my spot! That's like calling 1-800-COLLECT-AN-ASS-WHOOPIN', but NO, that ain't no toll-free call!"
  • Gin Rummy is a frequent culprit as well. Being voiced by Samuel L. Jackson probably makes it more severe
  "I'd be dead on his ass like Spenser For fuckin' Hire. I'll hunt him down and feed him his own testicles. And I'll do it in a jiffy. And I don't care if his mama there, his grandmama, innocent bystanders, little kids, baby-sitters, bill collectors. Whatever! I'll leave his whole block filled with hot brass if I have to. And you know why? BECAUSE I JUST DON'T GIVE A FUCK!
• My ability of chewing the scenery must be the work of...FAIRY GOD PARENTS!
• The Spectacular Spider-Man:
  • "SILENCE YOU IMPERIOUS MORON!" Oh, Doc Ock. You shift between this and a boderline Creepy Monotone so well it's almost scary. It should be noted this is his first line after officially becoming a villain.
  • "WE'RE VENOM!!!"
  • "MYSTERIO, MASTER OF THE ARCAAANAAA!"
• Teen Titans
  • Notably lampshaded in an episode where Cyborg gets a virus that messes with his programming. As a result, he literally starts eating the scenery...you can guess what happens.
  • Whenever Slade gets pissed. For example: "But the only thing you care about are your WORTHLESS LITTLE FRIENDS!!!!!!!!"
  • "YOU! RUINED! MY! DRESS!!!!!!!!!!"
• Tom and Jerry: The Movie: "We've GOT to have......MONAY!!!"
• He is the Terror that Flaps in the Night. He is the Caped Crusader who chomps chewy chunks from the scenery as he counters cheesy chumps. He is ... Darkwing Duck! Every single character on the show has moments of this. One especially cheesy episode lampshades this trope by showcasing a giant space slug which chews up the set in the background. Darkwing (of course) thinks it's ridiculous.
• South Park: Some of the characters Trey plays can leave a hole in the scenery.
  • Cartman lives and breathes this:
  Cartman: I... AM... GOD!!!
  • Randy. Constantly. In later episodes.
  • Unusually, Mr. Mackey in "Royal Pudding".
  Mr. Mackey: (to Kyle, taking over Ike's role as Tooth Decay) You call rolling your fat ass out on the stage and lazily blurting out your lines like a turtle takin' a shit, YOU CALL THAT TRYIN'?!
• Beast Wars. Three words. FOR THE ROYALTY!!!
  • Well before Inferno, dear old Megatron proved that you don't have to constantly lose control of your volume in order to devour the scenery; simply speaking in a more grandiose fashion than a trained Shakespearean actor among a troop of cretinous morons and one expectedly duplicitous spider, oftentimes using unnecessarily long words, and occasionally while doing things like brushing the teeth of your giant T-Rex head for an arm. Probably to clean the bits of scenery out of it, yyyeeeeessss.
    • In the Season 2 finale, Megatron proves you can chew the scenery without saying a word, making his entrance by mugging for the camera while planting his foot on someone he'd just shot.
  • Beast Wars is very much a World of Ham, with most of the Predacons, and even some of the Maximals, gnawing on the early-CGI landscape.
• Aku from Samurai Jack: "Samurai, samurai. Why. Won't. You. DIIIIIEEEE?!"
  • "...and GREAT FLAAAMMING EYEBROWS!"
• The Venture Bros. Seriously, is there a single character who isn't Hammy to the extreme?
• Benson from Regular Show, big time, but only when provoked.
• Binky the Clown from Garfield and Friends spends the whole time screaming, to the point where there were shorts called "SCREAMING WITH BINKY". The cartoon played this for laughs quite often; at one point he was temporarily given a job as a newscaster, where he kept his signature mannerisms.
  • "HEY!!! I WANT MY PANTS BACK!!!!"
    Garfield: "After being unable to find work, Binky eventually did what so many other clowns end up doing - he went into politics."
• Robotnik from Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog often overdoes his lines, like here.
  Robotnik: Why is my precious rocket ship drifting off into deep space?! Why am I reaching you at the coordinates of the abandoned space station?! WHY?! WHY?! WHHYYY?!
• Hank Hill from King of the Hill:
  • LOSER! YOU'RE A LOSER! ARE YOU FEELING SORRY FOR YOURSELF?! WELL YOU SHOULD BE, 'CAUSE YOU ARE DIRT! YOU MAKE ME SICK YOU BIG BABY! BABY WANT A BOTTLE? A BIG DIRT BOTTLE?!
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
  • Rarity. Oh so very much. In "Inspiration Manifestation", You can almost imagine Tabitha St. Germain desperately trying to hold back the maniacal laughter in her rant at the end, especially with the omnious bells chiming in the background.
  Rarity: ...until there isn't an inch of Equestria that hasn't been utterly transformed by my! creative! GENIUS!
  • Also Luna, in "Luna Eclipsed", who combines Large Ham with No Indoor Voice, Gale-Force Sound and Flowery Elizabethan English in one package. It probably helps that both she and Rarity are both voiced by Tabitha St. Germain.
  • Pinkie Pie. Give her a big enough megaphone, and her yelling can push back mountains.
  • Kathleen Barr does it too. The relevant equation is Trixie + Stage = VOLUME.
  • You wouldn't think Fluttershy would ever chew the scenery, right? Wrong! Of course, she's suffered Sanity Slippage leading up to this.
• Danny Phantom "Say my name! SAY MY NAAAAAAME!"
  "I! AM! NOT! A! FROOT! LOOP!"
  "IIIIII AM THE BOX GHOST!! BEWARE!"
• In ThunderCats (2011), Will Friedle is clearly getting very into it whenever his Lion-O recites the famous, "Thunder! Thunder! Thundercats! HO!" Battlecry. In fact, it sounds like he's trying to roar the line more often than not.
• The Simpsons
  • Sideshow Mel is all over this trope. Every. Single. Line.
  • In the episode "Behind the Laughter" during the period where the family split up to pursue solo careers Homer mentions having a short lived stage career where he literally chewed the scenery (as in he ate part of the set).
• Zoe from Littlest Pet Shop not only chews the scenery, she sets it on fire.
  "GAIL'S TRAPPED INSIDE THE LARGEST EVER PET SHOP!!!!!"
• Dill from Stickin' Around...actually, scratch that, because saying that he's chewing the scenery would be the understatement of the CENTURY.
  "HOLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY MACKEREL!!!!!!!!!!!!"
• In the Sonic Boom episode "The Meteor", Sonic and Eggman end up swapping bodies. The real kicker? They keep their original voices. When Sonic speaks with Eggman's ham and inflections, he pulls out all the stops.
• Steven Universe
  • Peridot has two sides to her personality: the cold and overly rational Deadpan Snarker side and the hammy side.
  "Freedom is MINEEEEEEEEE!!!!"
  "DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIED DIE DIE DIE DIE!!!!!!!!"
  "Pff, who cares about how SHE feels? WHO CARES ABOUT ANY OF YOU?!!!! YOU'RE ALL JUST ROCKS, RUDDY MUDDY CLODS BENEATH MY GRAVITY CONNECTORS!!!!! GHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUGH!!!!!!"
  • Pearl also has some moments of this.
  "WE'LL NEVER ESCAPE!!! THIS IS OUR NEW HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOME!!!!!"
  "I'M NOT OVERREACTING!!!!!!! GHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA...!!!!!!!!!"
  "Of ALLLLLLLL INDIGNITIES!!!!!!!! Do what you want- I'll NEVER talk!!!"
  • Ronaldo's full character consists of pure ham. He's a bad case of No Indoor Voice
  "Jane!! MY OHIME-SAMAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
  "YOU CAN'T MAKE UP DRAMA THIS GOOD!!!!!"
  "WE'RE ABOUT TO WITNESS THE TRUE POWER OF THE SUPREMOOOOOOOOOO!!!!"
• Both Tim Curry and Tress MacNeille in Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost as Ben and Sara Ravencroft:
  Ben: You should SERVE ME!!!!!
  Sara: I SERVE NO ONE!!!!!!!!!
  Ben: But I have THE BOOK!!!!! And I will return you back INTO THE BOOK!!!!
  • God, almost anything that comes out of Sara's mouth:
  Sara: FOOLS!!!!!! I SHALL DESTROY THEE!!!!!!!
  Sara: I WON'T GO BACK ALONE!!!!!!!!!!!

Real Life

• Most politicians have shades of this, especially more than a century ago. You can guess why, in a world without microphones, booming voices and exaggerated mannerisms might be advantages when giving a speech.
  • The politicians in the ancient Greek and Roman democracies may have been even more extreme. Unfortunately, for the most part, all we have are the texts of their speeches. There are some descriptions of speeches, however. In particular, we know that Late Republican Rome (around the 1st and 2nd centuries BCE), the most popular speechmaking style, especially in the courts, was the "Asiatic," which called for long speeches with florid language and hand gestures, overemphasized speech, and Manly Tears; when Cicero appeared with his Simple Country Lawyer act, which used a clear style of oratory that got straight to the point, the audience was impressed with the freshness of it. (In Rome, watching trials was a major form of entertainment, and there was no shortage of them—you think modern Americans are litigious? They have nothing on the Romans.)
• Although the movie Mommie Dearest seems to have Joan Crawford thoroughly digesting the scenery, according to her daughter, Christina Crawford, the performance was understated.
• Adolf Hitler tended to do this every time he spoke in public. The movies (like the Downfall example above) aren't really that far from the truth this time. Most other dictators have a tendency to indulge in the same style.
  • It was Hitler's ranting in the Downfall movie, coupled with the subtitles and the German, that inspired the Hitler parodies that are popular on the internet.
  • Hitler was reputed to do this a bit more literally in less-public venues. William Shirer mentions at one point in Berlin Diary that in some circles, he was referred to as Der Teppich-Fresser (the carpet eater), because it was rumored that when he was agitated, he would throw himself to the floor and start chewing the edges of the rugs.
• Somehow, against all logic, BRIAN BLESSED has managed to accomplish this in real life. Observe his performance as guest host of Have I Got News for You, with lines such as "PETROL! WE'RE RUNNING OUT!" and, referring to the beleaguered Prime Minister Brown, '"GORDON'S ALIVE!"
• Transylvanian stage actor Gyorgy Kárp, who, among other roles, played Juror#3, is often seen turning red and yelling so loud, it makes you wonder how come he didn't spit out his own lungs.
• Fidel Castro. He used to deliver speeches taking 3 or 4 hours, even in front of the United Nations. They weren't quite amused... He was once asked an inane question at a party and spoke for FOUR HOURS without stopping. Dear god man...
• Nikita Khrushchev's infamous "We will BURY you!" speech, as well as a separate incident at the UN where he took off his shoe and started banging it against the table. Though, contrary to public belief, he wasn't saying he would bury the US. The speech Khrushchev was giving was not threatening to destroy the US, but that communism would outlast capitalism, so the USSR would see the old ways die. As in "you will dig your own grave and we'll be the ones to attend your funeral", not cause it.

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