How can I say “make a big deal [about/out of/of] X”?

Question

See title. I'm looking for idiomatic ways to say something like this - over-emphasizing something, worrying about it overly much, etc.

Bonus points if a literal 大 (whether read as だい　or おお) is involved; I'm hoping to make a particular bit of wordplay work. Alternatively, perhaps a way of talking about "using 大 as a prefix to a word" that could have the former connotations?

Answer 1

Anything wrong with just a good-ole 大したものにしないで? Plus that should nab me some bonus points!

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EDIT:

大したものにしないで　→　大【たい】した・もの・に・しないで

• 大した　→　"serious", "important", lit. "made big"
• 大したもの or 大したこと　→　"a serious/important matter/thing", "a big deal"
• 〜にする　→　"make it this way"
• 〜ないでください or 〜ないでくれ　→　"(Please) don't do"
  • しないで　→　"Don't do" (with ください・くれ omitted)

I guess I subconsciously thought the title of the post said "don't make a big deal [about/out of/of] X", but now I see that it clearly does not.

Answer 2

I think what you're looking for is some variant on 過ぎる【すぎる】. It can mean "go beyond" or "go by" as in a physical sense, but is often used in a sense of "going too far" or "doing too much" in the sense you're talking about.

I've often seen it used with just hiragana when trying to convey that meaning. For example:

心配しすぎる　【しんぱい　しすぎる】　(over worrying)

強調しすぎた　【きょうちょう　しすぎた】 (over emphasized)

For "making a big deal of X", as asked for in the comments, you could do this:

Xを大騒ぎする 【Xを　おおさわぎする】 (Making a big deal out of X)

It doesn't use すぎる, which I think is a good general solution given your original question, but for the sentence you specifically asked about, this is a more or less direct translation which should do the trick.