Until the 1950s, Real Life phone booths were made of wood with slit windows, offering an amount of privacy. Then they started being replaced by booths walled in glass or plexiglas-walled booths, making this a Discredited Trope ripe for parody. The slow disappearance of phone booths due to the ubiquity of cell phones has lead to this being mostly a Forgotten Trope in modern works.
Often overlaps with Secret Identity Change Trick. Compare with Anonymous Public Phone Call, which is when a character creates an anonymous phone call with a telephone booth.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Case Closed: In a case involving a trip to London, Conan is trapped in a phone booth by Ran seeking Shinichi, and has to use a dose of apoptoxin (that had been reserved for getting him past customs to return to Japan) to do a Superman-style quick change to Shinichi in order to avoid awkward questions.
Asian Animation
- Referenced in Happy Heroes' two-part first episode; the title card for both parts has various robots dressed like Superman, Spider-Man, and Batman attempting to go into a phone booth, only for Happy S., who is hiding inside the booth, to beat them up.
Comic Books
- Dial H: The Hero Dial is actually connected to a disused phone booth, meaning Nelson has to transform in a phone booth.
- Superman: Ironically, despite popularizing the idea, this is an Unbuilt Trope in the actual comics. Superman only used phone booths to change into his costume a grand total of three times during the 1940's (back when phone booths were made of wood rather than see through glass), with the last time involving him outright admitting that it's really not that good idea due to the risks involved. If it wasn't for the Fleischer cartoons originally using the idea, it likely never would have gotten engrossed in popular culture.
- A crossover between Superman and Spider-man had the later needing to change into his costume and asking if there was a phone booth nearby.
- Wonder Woman #2 and #89 feature phone booth changes.
Comic Strips
- The Far Side: One comic shows Clark Kent in a phone booth, in the middle of changing into his Superman costume, pausing to see if the previous user left any change in the phone's coin return.
- U.S. Acres: Orson changes into his superhero alter-ego, Power Pig, by running into a phone booth. There are jokes about it, such as when the booth is waxed and sends Orson crashing into the wall, or when he walks in on someone already using the phone.
- One of Sergio Aragonés' gags for MAD magazine was a series of superhero-themed shorts, including one where a hero rushes into a phone booth to change and rushes back out one panel later. In the final panel, the phone booth door opens to reveal a bewildered man and woman who had been making out in the booth looking disheveled and covered in the hero's discarded civilian clothes.
Fan Works
- In The Many Worlds Interpretation, the Caltech gang from The Big Bang Theory (with input from visitors out of the Discworld) speculate that a previously unremarked power of Superman is that any phone box Clark Kent rushes into in order to change automatically becomes a tesseract or a static Tardis - far bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. this allows him far more room to change, as opposed to the interior of a standard phone box, and more crucially, somewhere to hang up the Clark Kent clothes where they are out of sight of normal human beings. Otherwise what's the betting they'd get thieved, or else somebody goes through the wallet, and deduces his secret identity...
Films — Animated
- Lucky Luke, of all people, does this in Go West! A Lucky Luke Adventure. He was wearing formal clothes to attend the trial of the Dalton brothers, and when they escape he rushes to a phone booth to change back in his classic cowboy outfit in a matter of seconds then chases them.
- Phineas and Ferb The Movie: Across the 2nd Dimension: In the climax, when Phineas, Ferb and their friends gear up to fight back against the invading Norm-Bots with recreations of all of Phineas and Ferb's past inventions, Baljeet and Irvine emerge from a phone booth wearing The Beak Powered Armor, implying that they changed into the costume in there. Then subverted when Baljeet hangs up the phone and apologizes since he thought an incoming call was meant for him.
Films — Live-Action
- Collateral: Discussed by Fanning. He finds Max changing in a phone booth unlikely.
"You're telling me the guy walks into a phone booth and changes into a meat-eater super assassin?"
- Deadpool: No Good Deed: Deadpool gets into a phone booth to change into his costume so he can stop someone from being mugged in his outfit. Unfortunately, the man Deadpool was trying to save gets shot by the time he changes into his costume.
- The Invisible Woman (1983): Sandy enters a phone booth in order to become invisible and sneak into the art museum. Her uncle has to stall for time with a Cassandra Truth.
- Played for Laughs and subverted in Superman: The Movie. When Lois is hanging from a disabled helicopter, Clark tries to find a place to change into his costume. The audience is shown a side shot of a public telephone, which looks like it's in a booth. The shot pulls back to reveal that it's a modern public phone with no booth. Clark passes by it, looks at it for a moment, then continues on and changes to his heroic identity by going through a revolving door multiple times at high speed.
Literature
- The Super Dictionary: Unsurprisingly, Clark Kent uses a phone booth to change into his Superman costume. Surprisingly, he actually uses it to make a call first.
- In Super-Folks: At one point, David Brinkley wonders why he changed into his costume so frequently in phone booths-when phone booths are transparent. This a joke on the stereotype of Superman changing into his costume in a phone booth-something he rarely did in the comic books. Superman did change in a phone booth in the 1940's cartoons-which, since they came out in the 1940's, came out when phone booths were made out of wood and resembled outhouses.
Live-Action TV
- The Adventures of Superboy: In "The Fixer", Clark gets into a phone booth to change into Superboy.
- Bill Cosby once did a routine about Superman and the phone booth, which had a cop coming up as Clark was changing clothes in the phone booth.
- Mythbusters tested out using a phone booth as a changing room for their superhero special to see if it was practical.
- Sesame Street:
- Grover changes in a phone booth when turning into Super Grover.
- In the episode "Slimey the Hero", Oscar's pet worm Slimey changes into his superhero costume in a tiny phone booth.
- CSI: NY: In "Super Men," one of the victims (who had tried to fly out a window when he was four which resulted in Childhood Brain Damage) still fancies himself an avenging superhero. He is found dead in an alley, dressed in his costume, complete with cape. His street clothes and Clark Kent-style glasses are discovered in a phone booth just a few blocks away.
Music
- Dragonette: The song "We Rule the World" includes the lyric "Know how to change our clothes in a phone booth".
- Frank Zappa: Studebaker Hoch (fantastic new superhero of the current economic slump) and Gross Man both run into a phone both to transform.
Video Games
- Fortnite: From Chapter 2 Season 2 till Chapter 2 Season 4, phone booths were dotted around locations so that players can disguise themselves to fool the guards and access ID Locked chests around places such as The Authority, Catty Corner, The Fortilla, etc. Shooting at a guard will cause you to lose your disguise.
- In the opening of Jazz Jackrabbit, the titular rabbit comes out of his den and enters a phone booth to try different superhero outfits: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and finally, his own bandana and gun.
- The LEGO Batman games have occasionally referenced Superman changing into his super-suit using phone booths after his first inclusion:
- The second game's bonus level starts with him as Clark Kent, who can't fly, so you need to work through the level to reach a phone booth so he can change and use said flight.
- LEGO DC Super-Villains has one challenge requiring the player to destroy several phone booths in Metropolis, while the Superman-to-Clark transformation now includes him summoning a phone booth out of Hammerspace to change in.
- The Simpsons Hit & Run: When discussing phone booths in a Dummied Out tutorial note, Bart mentions that people sometimes change their clothes in one.
Webcomics
- In one arc of Evil, Inc. (post-reboot) an elderly superhero can't find a phone booth to change in, and all the places with restrooms are for customers or employees only.
- The Non-Adventures of Wonderella: Parodied in "BOOTH or Dare."
A giant asteroid threatens New York, so Dana looks for a phone booth where she can change into her Wonderella costume. But all the phone booths have been torn down, or replaced by public phones without the booths. By the time Dana finally finds a proper phone booth, the asteroid has already crashed into it.
- In El Goonish Shive, Elliot demonstrates how out-of-date his superhero knowledge is by searching for a phone booth when changing away from his superheroine form. Because the comic takes place in the modern age of cell phones, he doesn't find one and has to settle for a gas station bathroom.
Web Original
- During the Happy Tree Friends episode See What Develops, Splendid attempts to do one of these, but is stopped due to Cub being next to the phone booth.
Western Animation
- Fish Hooks: Milo becomes convinced his teacher Mr. Baldwin is really the superhero Captain Aquarian and sets out to prove it by following him. At one point, he claims Captain Aquarian changes outfits in a phone booth. Cue Baldwin going into a phone booth and partially undressing, only for it to turn out he's actually taking a nap.
- Looney Tunes: In "Super Rabbit", Bugs Bunny decides that, after losing his super powers, "this is a job for a real superman!" So he ducks into a phone booth and comes out as... a Marine. The Corps were so flattered that they inducted Bugs as a private. At the end of the war, he was honorably discharged as a Master Sergeant.
- The Pink Panther: Pink wants to be a superhero ("Super Pink") and answers the call to a potential emergency. However, the nearest phone booth is occupied. Pink simply removes the phone booth exterior (leaving the occupant and phone where it is) and proceeds to change into his costume in it.
- Superman Theatrical Cartoons: In the short, "The Mechanical Monsters", Clark Kent changes into his Superman suit in a phone booth. This is in fact the first time Superman was depicted doing this.
- Underdog: Being a parody of Superman, Shoe Shine Boy was prone to running into the nearest phone booth to transform into his super alter ego: Underdog. The booth usually exploded when he did so.
- Inadvertently weaponized by the villain Simon Bar Sinister. He dotted the city with innocent-looking "Phoney Booths" that put any user under his mental control, giving new weight to his catchphrase "You will do what Simon Says!" He wasn't expecting Underdog to come out of one and be his puppet!
- Inadvertently weaponized by the villain Simon Bar Sinister. He dotted the city with innocent-looking "Phoney Booths"
- One ad bumper for the FOX Kids afternoon animation block spoofed this by having a Superman Expy enter a booth and fly off in costume, after which an old woman leans out of the booth with the telephone receiver to her ear and a "what the hell?" expression on her face.
Real Life
- According to some accounts, there were certain phone booth stuffers who would show off by changing clothes while hemmed in by a large mass of other people.
