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
He could modify his outbursts into what were sometimes hilariously campy performances.Robert Gray
campily adverb
The new film promises to be as campily outrageous as its predecessors. John Stark
… the Addams Family, the campily macabre clan created by the late cartoonist Charles Addams … 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
… a power-mad despot, played with exhilarating campiness by John Malkovich. Steven Rebello

Examples of campy in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web
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That’s no doubt because their contributions to this equally campy and earnest musical signal a truly collaborative endeavor. Manuel Betancourt, Los Angeles Times, 29 Oct. 2024 The opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Olympics was a campy explosion of French culture that even pouring rain couldn’t dampen as 85 boats carrying athletes from 205 delegations puttered down the Seine to rapturous applause from an enthusiastic crowd. Tess Demeyer, The Athletic, 26 July 2024 With a few shakes, edible glitter can turn nearly any food into a festive, even campy, feast. Karen Yuan, Bon Appétit, 2 Dec. 2024 The sale is also full of weird, campy little prints (non-derogatory)—the bandana print and the leopard print ones def caught my eye. Aamina Inayat Khan, StyleCaster, 26 Nov. 2024 See all Example Sentences for campy 

Word History

Etymology

camp entry 3 + -y entry 1

First Known Use

1932, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of campy was in 1932

Dictionary Entries Near campy

Cite this Entry

“Campy.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/campy. Accessed 18 Jan. 2025.

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