Where did Caging come from?

The earliest documented Caging prank was uploaded by YouTube user youjustgotcaged on February 11th, 2011, showing a friend's room covered in Nicolas Cage printouts.

What does Caging mean?

Caging refers to the practice of secretly covering someone's space or belongings with photos of Nicolas Cage's face as a prank. Urban Dictionary user The Cage Queen submitted an entry defining the term in November 2012.

How do you use Caging?

You Cage someone by printing lots of Nicolas Cage photos, cutting out his face, and hiding them across their room, office, car, or personal items while they're away.

Is Caging still popular?

Caging peaked in 2014 with the viral /r/funny post of 3,200 Cage cut-outs planted in one house, covered by Mashable the next day. It stays a well-known prank format from the early 2010s Reddit era.

Caging

Q: What is Caging?

Caging is a practical joke that involves planting printed photos of actor Nicolas Cage across another person's belongings, room, or workspace without their knowledge.

2011prankclassic

Published August 16, 2026

Caging is a practical joke where someone plants printed photos of actor Nicolas Cage across another person's belongings, room, or workspace without warning. It started with a 2011 YouTube video, spread through Reddit and Tumblr, peaked in 2014 with a 3,200-photo prank covered by Mashable, and eventually reached Cage himself in a 2022 Variety interview.

prank memes unwilling celebrity memes photo fad memes early 2010s memes participatory video memes

Overview

Caging is a practical joke where someone plants printed photos of actor Nicolas Cage all over another person's room, belongings, or workspace without their knowledge1. The pictures are usually cut-outs of Cage's face pulled from movie stills, taped or hidden on as many surfaces as possible2. Victims often keep finding new photos for weeks after the initial reveal, which is a big part of the joke1.

Beyond the slapstick, Caging is the physical version of the broader online Nicolas Cage fixation that produced projects like Nic Cage as Everyone, which pasted his face onto every character in a movie3. What those Photoshops did with pixels, Caging does with tape and scissors.

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Origin & Background

Platform

YouTube (origin) / Reddit (viral spread)

Creator

youjustgotcaged

Date

2011

The earliest documented Caging prank was uploaded on February 11th, 2011, by YouTube user youjustgotcaged, who filmed a friend's room after covering it in Nicolas Cage printouts2. That short clip established the format later pranksters copied: print, cut, hide, film the reaction.

How It Spread

On July 6th, 2012, a Tumblr blog called You've Been Caged launched, opening with a photo of an airline seat-back with a Cage cutout taped to it3. That November, Urban Dictionary user The Cage Queen submitted a definition entry for 'Caged'4, marking the joke's move from image-only humor into named slang.

The prank kept scaling up. On June 5th, 2014, Imgur user Timbo57 posted an album of roughly 3,200 Nicolas Cage cut-outs planted throughout his brother's house, which hit 16,500 upvotes on /r/funny within 24 hours1. Mashable covered the prank the next day, quoting Timbo57 that his brother was still finding new photos more than a week after the reveal1. Timbo57 also told Mashable he expected his brother would keep finding photos for months1.

The joke reached its subject in 2022 during a March 14th Variety interview for The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, where an interviewer explained Caging to Nicolas Cage himself. Cage reacted with bemusement and called it 'fun but trippy'3.

How to Use This Meme

A typical Caging setup starts by printing dozens or hundreds of Nicolas Cage photos, often a mix of expressive movie stills. The common convention is to cut out just the face, then hide or tape the cutouts across a target's room, office, car, or personal items while they're away1. The comedic payoff often stretches over days or weeks as the victim keeps stumbling on more hidden Cage faces1.