reduce somebody to tears
make somebody cry

But now it turns out that his wife could reduce him to tears.

"The speech went on for four hours, and I was reduced to tears after about 30 minutes," she said.

Have any of your contestants ever been reduced to tears?

"You will be thrilled to learn that the high point of the evening was when I reduced her to tears."

She tells the artists to leave or sometimes reduces them to tears.

Many if not most of my students were reduced to tears and silence.

Barber said she had seen the play once already, and been reduced to tears.

If he didn't watch out, he'd reduce his sister to tears.

Twice tonight he'd just failed to reduce a woman to tears.

The sympathy in his eyes would reduce her to tears.