do someone up —(coll.)
1. make a person look attractive; dress smb. up for the party, etc.:
- It’s not the actress herself I’m calling unattractive, but the way they “did her up.”
2. get the better of smb.; ruin a person financially:
- There was a pleasure in doing up a debtor which none but a creditor could know.
3. (UK, usually Passive) wear out a person:
- We have been working continuously now…. The stretcher-bearers are done up completely.
Note: The expression is not antonymous in meaning to the phrase do someone down—(UK coll.)
1. defeat smb. (often by unfair means):
- Mr. Stothard was using the Times to advance his own interests and do down his enemy.
2. speak ill of a person:
- No doubt the whispering voices praised him to the heavens while also doing down his opponents.
make someone up —(of an actor, etc.) apply cosmetics to a person’s face:
- The General was close upon eighty; but he was “made up” to represent a gentleman of about forty.