show-stopper

Related to show-stopper: to-and-fro, rapscallion, condescension, co-opting

show-stopper

The most exceptional or memorable performance or item among others; a stand-out. Yeah, the opening act was a real show-stopper—the headlining band was disappointing in comparison! All the pieces in the designer's collection were excellent, but the wedding dress was a real show-stopper.
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.
See also:
  • stop the show
  • stand-out
  • stopper
  • drain out
  • stand (one) for (something)
  • stand for
  • flow out
  • bullet-stopper
  • flood out of
  • flood out of (something)
References in periodicals archive
LAHORE -- The three-day Hum Bridal Fashion Week concluded on Sunday amidst a lot of colour, music, charm, celebrity show-stoppers, cool collections and magnetism laced with brilliance and quality.
Above, the Cloud three-seater armless sofa is oversized luxury in a completely uncluttered style; and right, the Airfoil Rectangular desk is fun, practical and a real show-stopper
Another show-stopper is the Bulles 12 Sphere lamp which would look stunning suspended above your chosen dining table whether glass or otherwise.
We're adding another show-stopper vehicle, and we're creating new employment.'
And this year's crop of competitors includes veterans of several past New England slam teams, so it's likely to be a show-stopper. Poets Adam Stone, Ryk McIntyre, Bobby Gibbs, Trevor Byrne-Smith, Nick Davis, Erin Jackson, Gary Hoare and Dave Keali'i compete at 7 p.m.
Reilly play guitar-strumming cowpokes with a taste for raunchy jokes but no home on the range, and Kevin Kline's ex-private eye Guy Noir now guards the stage door against all manner of threats, including tycoon and show-stopper Tommy Lee Jones, who has come to bury rather than praise Keillor and gang.
"Everyone was talking euro-compliance a year ago, but it's no longer a show-stopper," said Gary Turner, product marketing director at Pegasus.
He tells of doing an "entire concert," including "Love for Sale," his show-stopper from Torch Song, but didn't think it would go any further.
In the winter though--when its structure and the almost knurled twisting of its branches are more evident--the bur oak is a show-stopper. This tree has character.
While this soulful ballad was a show-stopper during the band's last four years in concert, this final version is unique.
The colt's participation in the Australian show-stopper on November 2 had been in the balance since he finished last of four in the Geoffrey Freer Stakes at New- bury a fortnight ago.
Wilkins was a show-stopper in the "Schnofler Tanz," a portrait of a happily introspective maiden.
Remixes also perpetuate the legacy of '70s dance music in a host of updated versions of standards such as Candi Staton's "Young Hearts Run Free" (remade by Respect featuring Hannah Jones) or the Donna Summer/Barbra Streisand epic "No More Tears (Enough is Enough)" (reworked hugely successfully this year by Kym Mazelle and Jocelyn Brown), or the old Dreamgirls show-stopper "And I Am Telling You" (astoundingly rerecorded by Donna Giles).
The three remaining bakers will have to prepare and decorate doughnuts, tackle a deceptively simple technical round, and create a multi-layered, edible landscape show-stopper.
Actor Saba Qamarzaman, who made her Bollywood debut in last year's critical, box office darling "Hindi Medium" was the show-stopper for Rimple and Harpreet Narula for their segment, "The Padmaavat Experience."