campier; campiest
: in the style of camp : absurdly exaggerated, artificial, or affected in a usually humorous way
campy horror movies
campy humor
Witnessing their synchronized routine, he almost expects them to break into some campy chorus line from one of the seedier nightclubs.—
Margaret Atwood
Margaret AtwoodHe could modify his outbursts into what were sometimes hilariously campy performances.—Robert Gray
Robert Gray
campily
adverb
The new film promises to be as campily outrageous as its predecessors.
—John Stark
John Stark
… the Addams Family, the campily macabre clan created by the late cartoonist Charles Addams …
—Margot Dougherty
Margot Dougherty
campiness
noun
… hoped to take Rocketeer to a much higher level of sophistication and avoid the campiness of some of the more recent comics-inspired films.
—Ron Magid
Ron Magid
… a power-mad despot, played with exhilarating campiness by John Malkovich.
—Steven Rebello
Steven Rebello
Examples of campy in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
Arden had never seen the film before the COVID lockdown, but was instantly drawn to its mix of a sexy teen drama with a campy yet terrifying adventure.
—Patrick Ryan, USA Today, 26 May 2026
Motorola took a bold stance with the Razr Ultra’s design and rolled out two (somewhat campy) finishes: Pantone Orient Blue wrapped in Alcantara and Pantone Cocoa with a natural wood veneer.
—Kimberly Gedeon, PC Magazine, 21 May 2026
But rather than imitate what came before, Hsu leans into Janet's awkward sincerity and gradual awakening, finding fresh emotional textures beneath the show's campy surface.
—Dave Quinn, PEOPLE, 19 May 2026
The resulting feature is enigmatic and lightly campy, strange and hallucinatory, taking place in a liminal futuristic city that’s clogged with thick mist and terrorized by a violent serial killer named Leather Man.
—Rachel Handler, Vulture, 18 May 2026
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Patrick Ryan, USA Today, 26 May 2026
Motorola took a bold stance with the Razr Ultra’s design and rolled out two (somewhat campy) finishes: Pantone Orient Blue wrapped in Alcantara and Pantone Cocoa with a natural wood veneer.
—Kimberly Gedeon, PC Magazine, 21 May 2026
But rather than imitate what came before, Hsu leans into Janet's awkward sincerity and gradual awakening, finding fresh emotional textures beneath the show's campy surface.
—Dave Quinn, PEOPLE, 19 May 2026
The resulting feature is enigmatic and lightly campy, strange and hallucinatory, taking place in a liminal futuristic city that’s clogged with thick mist and terrorized by a violent serial killer named Leather Man.
—Rachel Handler, Vulture, 18 May 2026
See All Example Sentences for campy
Cite this Entry
“Campy.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/campy. Accessed 31 May. 2026.
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