History Main / ProsceniumReveal

* One episode of ''{{Castle}}'' opens with this. A couple is having an affair when the women's husband returns. The man goes to hide in a the closet and a dead body falls out prompting a camera pan to show the shocked cast and crew of the soap opera that is being filmed.

* One episode of ''{{Castle}}'' opens with this. A couple is having an affair when the women's husband returns. The man goes to hide in athe closet and a dead body falls out. Zig-zagged in that while the characters are actually actors filming a soap opera the dead body is real.

* ''Film/Gundam00AWakeningOfTheTrailblazer'' starts off with a ShowWithinAShow retelling of [[{{Anime/Gundam00}} the TV series]]' events; however, anyone at least passingly familiar with the show should instantly know something is up. [[spoiler:Seeing as Lockon isn't a pink-haired loli, Tieria isn't a ScaryBlackMan, and the Season 1 BigBad certainly didn't look like a rejected ''GurrenLagann'' design...]]

* ''Film/Gundam00AWakeningOfTheTrailblazer'' starts off with a ShowWithinAShow retelling of [[Anime/Gundam00 the TV series]]' events; however, anyone at least passingly familiar with the show should instantly know something is up. [[spoiler:Seeing as Lockon isn't a pink-haired loli, Tieria isn't a ScaryBlackMan, and the Season 1 BigBad certainly didn't look like a rejected ''GurrenLagann'' design...]]

* In ''Gundam00AWakeningOfTheTrailblazer'', this only explicitly happens when it shows the theater, but the viewers can generally tell right before that due to the very jarring genre change.

* ''SuckerPunch'', like ''MoulinRouge'', opens in a theater that becomes the movie (only it never returns). And also has a weird example: Baby Doll getting lobotomized... followed by a play in which Sweet Pea in a blonde wig [[WroWritesThisCrap complains about it]] [[PostModernism ending with the heroine ending that way]]. [[spoiler: And Baby Doll is still lobotomized later on the picture.]]

* The cartoon short starring Roger Rabbit and Baby Herman at the start of ''WhoFramedRogerRabbit'' is cut short by a human director calling "Cut!" This is followed by shots establishing that the animated characters are working on a live-action soundstage, thus setting up the concept of humans and toons living in the same world.

* The ending of Murder 101 is this. It turns the thing from merely being a bad movie into a bad movie ''about'' a bad movie.

* ''MoulinRouge'' begins with the 20thCenturyFox logo shown on a stage (with the {{Fanfare}} performed by the pit orchestra below), and ends with the credits scrolling by on that same stage.

* Roger Rabbit and Baby Herman's opening scene in ''WhoFramedRogerRabbit''.
* In Gundam00AWakeningOfTheTrailblazer, this only explicitly happens when it shows the theater, but the viewers can generally tell right before that due to the very jarring genre change.

* ''{{Bolt}}'' opens with an extended action sequence in which Penny and Bolt battle a horde of mooks. After Bolt vanquishes the last of them with his Super Bark, Penny picks up Bolt and walks away -- to a trailer with Bolt's name on the door. As they step inside, a bell rings, and the film crew wander into shot and start striking the set, while the "dead" bodies get up and walk off.

* The ''{{Supernatural}}'' episode "Hollywood Babylon" opens with two terrified 20-somethings, Wendy and Brody, in the woods. Brody runs away; Wendy calls for her friends, hears a noise, turns toward the camera and screams — unconvincingly, at a tennis ball stuck on top of a movie camera. "Cut!" calls the director. "Wendy" is actually Tara Benchley, the lead actress of ''Hell Hazers 2''.

The ''{{Six Feet Under}}'' episode "In the Game" opens with a young girl home alone when a slasher-killer breaks into her house. The girl screams...then cut to inside a movie theater where we realize it's only from a horror movie that is playing.

A Proscenium Reveal may end a DangerRoomColdOpen, a FakeActionPrologue or the KobayashiMaru. In a MusicVideo, it can indicate that we've been OnASoundstageAllAlong.

* The entrance of Admiral Kirk in ''StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan'' ends the TropeNamer for the KobayashiMaru.

* WithoutAThrace: Security guard sees suspicious car. He looks inside and sees a bomb, which explodes, setting him on fire. Turns out this security guard is actually a stuntman, participating and shooting of B-Movie. Then he walks away from the set and never comes back.

* The first scene of ''{{Bolt}}'' ends with Penny picking up Bolt and walking away from their vanquished foes — to a trailer with Bolt's name on the door. As they step inside, a bell rings, and the film crew wander into shot and start striking the set, while the "dead" bodies get up and walk away.

'''Note:''' Proscenium reveals can be {{Mind Screw}}s for the audience, especially if they occur late in the proceedings. (DavidLynch, I'm looking at you.) When citing such cases, consider tagging for spoilers.

The device which makes it clear that the scene we're watching is a part of a [[ShowWithinAShow show within the show]] or simulation. Examples could include a director calling "Cut!"; a line flub or dialogue prompt; the sudden appearance of a camera or sound crew; or a pan, zoom or cut that reveals the action is occurring in a theatre, a soundstage, a classroom, or on location.

A ProsceniumReveal may end a DangerRoomColdOpen, a FakeActionPrologue or the KobayashiMaru. In a MusicVideo, it can indicate that we've been been OnASoundstageAllAlong.

'''Note:''' {{Proscenium reveal}}s can be {{Mind Screw}}s for the audience, especially if they occur late in the proceedings. (DavidLynch, I'm looking at you.) When citing such cases, consider tagging for spoilers.

[[AC:Film -- Live Action]]
* The dismantling of BusterKeaton's "bedroom" in "ThePlayhouse."

* [[ZigZaggedTrope Zig-Zagged]] in the climax of ''BlazingSaddles'', where the action is somehow "real" even though it's shown to be happening on a Hollywood soundstage -- and eventually most of the backlot -- during the climactic BattleRoyaleWithCheese.
* The cartoon short starring RogerRabbit and Baby Herman at the start of ''WhoFramedRogerRabbit'' is cut short by a human director calling "Cut!" This is followed by shots establishing that the animated characters are working on a live-action soundstage, thus setting up the concept of humans and toons living in the same world.

* MerylStreep flubbing a line during TheOner that opens ''PostcardsFromTheEdge.''
* The cry of "That's a wrap!" and the applause following [[spoiler: LauraDern's "death scene"]] in the DavidLynch film ''InlandEmpire''.
* In the Club Silencio sequence of DavidLynch's ''MulhollandDrive'', Rebekah Del Rio [[spoiler: collapses]] during her performance of "Llorando" yet [[spoiler: we continue to hear her singing]], which causes Betty and Rita (and the viewers) to realize [[spoiler: she had been lipsyncing]].
* ''[[{{Film/X-men}} X-Men: The Last Stand]]'' opens with an action-packed scene in burning city ruins, but it is revealed to be just a Danger Room simulation after the Fastball Special.

[[AC:Film -- Animated]]
* The first scene of ''{{Bolt}}'' ends with Penny picking up Bolt and walking away from their vanquished foes -- to a trailer with Bolt's name on the door. As they step inside, a bell rings, and the film crew wander into shot and start striking the set, while the dead bodies get up and walk away.

* The ''{{Supernatural}}'' episode "Hollywood Babylon" opens with two terrified twenty-somethings, Wendy and Brody, in the woods. Brody runs away; Wendy calls for her friends, hears a noise, turns toward the camera, and screams -- unconvincingly, at a tennis ball stuck on top of a movie camera. "Cut!" calls the director. "Wendy" is actually Tara Benchley, the lead actress of ''Hell Hazers 2.''
* On more than one occasion in ''QuantumLeap'' Sam leapt into a strange situation, only to discover that he was an actor in a play/on a soundstage.
* OnceAnEpisode in ''[[FXTheSeries F/X The Series]]''.

[[AC:Theater]]
* In ''KissMeKate'', just before the overture reaches its final chords the conductor cuts it off and asks, "Is that all right, Mr. Graham?" Fred enters and says, "Yes, the cut's good, leave it in."
* ''NoisesOff'' opens with a housekeeper walking on stage and nattering into the phone. Then as she's walking off, she says "I take the sardines... I leave the sardines..." and an off-stage director's voice says "You take the sardines, and you leave the newspaper." This reveals that what you're actually watching is a rehearsal of a PlayWithinAPlay.
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[[AC:Film -- LiveAction]]

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