This phrase is used to intensify the meaning of verbs such as
bore or charm or kid or scare or talk. For example,
That speech bored the pants off us, or
It was a real tornado and scared the pants off me. Playwright Eugene O'Neill used it in
Ah, Wilderness! (1933): “I tell you, you scared the pants off him,” and Evelyn Waugh, in
A Handful of Dust (1934), had a variation, “She bores my pants off.” [Colloquial; early 1900s] Also see
bore to death;
beat the pants off.