laugh on the other side of one's face

present singular third person laughs on the other side of one's face · participle present laughing on the other side of one's face · participle past laughed on the other side of one's face · past laughed on the other side of one's face · alternative laugh on the other side of one's mouth · alternative laugh on the wrong side of one's face · alternative laugh on the wrong side of one's mouth · alternative laugh out of the other side of one's face · alternative US laugh out of the other side of one's mouth · alternative laugh out of the wrong side of one's face · alternative laugh out of the wrong side of one's mouth

1. UKinformalintransitiveTo experience discomfiture after displaying cockiness.

   You'll be laughing on the other side of your face when the police find out you've been lying to them.

   1 more example

   Socialism? Ha! ha! ha! Where’s the money to come from? Ha! ha! ha!... Hitler will at any rate go down in history as the man who made the City of London laugh on the wrong side of its face. For the first time in their lives the comfortable were uncomfortable, the professional optimists had to admit that there was something wrong.

   1941, George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn, Pt. II