English · Idiom Candidate

get the show on the road

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Both English Tiếng Việt

Meaning · English

to start something or make progress after a delay

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

bắt đầu điều gì đó hoặc làm tiến triển sau khi bị trì hoãn

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Literally: to begin a performance or journey

Where it’s used: Used Widespread English

Examples

Never mind the debt, the slogan seemed to be, get the show on the road.

Such are the weaknesses of human nature that initial enthusiasm sometimes overcomes care and prudence in a desire to get the show on the road.

British National Corpus sentence via the MAGPIE corpus (CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-30)

Sources & notes

Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Figurative class: Metaphor (PIE-English corpus, CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-31). Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-30; pending editor spot-check.

Common questions

What does “get the show on the road” mean?

to start something or make progress after a delay Literally: to begin a performance or journey

Is “get the show on the road” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.