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假戏真做

假戲真做
jiǎxì-zhēnzuò
idiom #33,777

Meanings

  1. 1 to play a fake game for real
  2. 2 to act out something pretend with full commitment
  3. 3 to take a sham seriously; for a pretense to become reality

Examples

HSK 3
电视剧里两个演员假戏真做，最后真的结婚了。
Diànshìjù lǐ liǎng gè yǎnyuán jiǎxì-zhēnzuò, zuìhòu zhēnde jiéhūn le.
The two actors in the TV drama acted out their romance for real and ended up actually getting married.
HSK 7-9
他们本来只是排练，没想到假戏真做，真的吵了起来。
Tāmen běnlái zhǐshì páiliàn, méixiǎngdào jiǎxì-zhēnzuò, zhēnde chǎo le qǐlái.
They were just rehearsing, but the fake fight turned real and they actually started arguing.

Tips

history
The phrase is traced in modern usage to drama theorist 洪深's 《电影戏剧表演术》 (Techniques of Film and Drama Acting, ch. 3): what makes acting move people is the actor's sincerity - what we call 假戏真做. Originally a praise of actors who fully commit to fictional roles.
usage
Two flavors today: (a) admiring - an actor commits so fully the performance feels real; (b) ironic - a pretense, prank, or sham accidentally turns into the real thing (the 'showmance becoming a real romance' usage is now the most common in entertainment news).

Stroke Order

假 jiǎ
戏 xì
真 zhēn
做 zuò