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• curtain raiser
  curtain raiser

  noun

  a short play preceding a main play.
• curtain-raiser
  curtain-raiser

  noun

  theatre a short dramatic piece presented before the main play

curtain raiser

American  

noun

1. a short play preceding a main play.

2. any preliminary event or performance.

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curtain-raiser British  

noun

1. theatre a short dramatic piece presented before the main play

2. any preliminary event

   the debate was a curtain-raiser to the election

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curtain raiser Idioms  

1. Preliminary event, as in This limited attack on the chairman is just a curtain raiser for the concerted effort to oust him. This term literally refers to a short play or skit presented before the main theatrical production. It began to be transferred to other preliminaries about 1940.

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Etymology

Origin of curtain raiser

First recorded in 1885–90

Example Sentences

After the women opened the season on Saturday with their giant slalom on the Austrian glacier, the men battled poor visibility and welcome wintry weather in their traditional curtain raiser.

From Barron's • Oct. 26, 2025

Today is something of a curtain raiser for the U.S.

From New York Times • May 29, 2023

The Venice theater presents “Fam and Yam” as a curtain raiser for Harold Pinter’s more substantial and stylistically assured “The Dumb Waiter.”

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 7, 2022

"It's really exciting. How great that the men are the curtain raiser when normally in most sports it's the other way around?" she says.

From BBC • Oct. 25, 2022

It had placed Archie at a disadvantage for the first time as assigner because Rollo had only been the curtain raiser, a bit of amusement Obie had arranged to enliven the proceedings.

From "The Chocolate War" by Robert Cormier

Related Words

• lead-in