keep a straight face

1. Don't show one's feelings, especially refrain from laughing. For example, The school orchestra played so many wrong notes that I had trouble keeping a straight face. [Late 1800s]

Example Sentences

I have to fight to keep a straight face.

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This is so obviously a market mania that I honestly don’t know how anyone on the Street of Shame can say otherwise and keep a straight face.

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The world’s leaders—friends, foes, and those in between—keep a straight face at all this.

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It was very difficult to keep a straight face because we just played it as seriously as we could, and we’re like, “Should we make a procedural crime show? I think we might have to.”

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“Randy,” I thought, trying to keep a straight face as he took our orders.

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