Thursday, October 19, 2023 David Distenfeld & Seth Weitberg

Working Title

Today's constructors are David Distenfeld and Seth Weitberg.  David's December 10, 2020 puzzle is the first one I ever reviewed for C.C. See if you Dr. Who fans can spot the mistake I made on the very first page.  And here's a capsule bio from Husker's review of David's first LAT themeless.  And today Seth Weitberg is making his LAT debut. 

Today David and Seth give us 4 theme clues about the different kinds of WORK that aspiring sports pros have to take on to support themselves while they're waiting for their big break, while still aggressively staying at the top of their game. Sometimes in order to make it they have to team up with a buddy, and sometimes, as we see in this Siskel and Ebert review of a film about a basketball star who partners with a martial arts expert things don't WORK out too well (Tomato Meter 11%) ...

Here Roger's review in writing.  Not to keep you in suspense any longer here's the reveal. I think this week's theme is a slam dunk (I hope! 😀)  ...

62A. Guard aggressively, and an apt description of 18-, 24-, 38-, and 50-Across: DOUBLE TEAM.  Double teaming is most often used against high scoring players, but it can have its disadvantages.  For all of you basketball noobs (e.g. MOI) here is an explanation of double teaming.

And of course it's an APT description of the themers, because the fill for each clue consists of DOUBLE TEAM names ...

18A. Works as a decoy vendor?: HAWKS DUCKS. 

The Atlanta HAWKS are an NBA basketball team.

The Anaheim DUCKS are an NHL hockey team.
 

Anaheim Ducks

Note here that the teams are not necessarily in the same sport, and thus you won't find an Atlanta Hawk double-teaming an Anaheim Duck.

24A. Works as a political consultant?: BILLS SENATORS.

The Buffalo BILLS are an NFL football team.

Buffalo Bills

The Ottawa SENATORS are an NHL Hockey Team (CSO to CanadianEh!).
 

Ottawa Senators

Give 'em an ESPY for the coolest logo!

38A. Works as a weatherperson?: BRAVES HURRICANES. 

The Atlanta BRAVES are a MLB NL baseball team.

Atlanta is up by one on the rest of the pack at this point.

We have two choices here ...

The Carolina HURRICANES are an NHL hockey team.

Carolina Hurricanes

and the Miami HURRICANES are an NCAA football team.
 

University of Miami

And a CSO to our Southeast contingent.

50A. Works as a fast-food cook?: BROWNS NUGGETS.

The Cleveland BROWNS are an NFL football team.
 

Cleveland Browns

The Denver NUGGETS are an NBA basketball team.

Denver Nuggets

This was a deceptively simple theme, but I'm sure it wasn't so easy to pull off.

Here's the grid ...

Here's the rest.

Across:

1. Improvise: AD LIB.

6. Woodstock supergroup, briefly: CSNY.  Crosby, Stills & Nash (CSN) was a folk rock supergroup made up of American singer-songwriters David Crosby, Stephen Stills, and English singer-songwriter Graham Nash. When joined by Canadian singer-songwriter Neil Young as a fourth member, they were called Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (CSNY). They are noted for their intricate vocal harmonies and lasting influence on American music and culture, as well as their political activism and often tumultuous interpersonal relationships.  Here's the title track for their album Déjà Vu.  You've probably heard it before ...

10. Where to find bands on bands: RADIO.  Here's the band for WBJC 91.5 FM.  They don't play much band music, but they did once play the overture to the soundtrack for The Last Emperor which was written by David Byrne of the new wave band The Talking Heads ...

15. Whooping __: CRANE.  For 50 years the USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Maryland ran a captive breeding program to help save Whooping CRANES from extinction.  We learned in school that they migrated every year to Texas.  We never saw them in Maryland, but were able to catch glimpses of them in a birding trip to the marshes of the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge in Texas near the San Antonio Bay.

Young Whooping Crane

16. Next in line: HEIR. 

17. Like most Ken dolls: BLOND.

18. [Theme clue]

20. Fielder's need: GLOVE. Teri and I are both left handers and my son is a right hander.  Only one of my grandchildren is left handed and she is into sports.  As a result of attending several Oriole games this past season she developed an interest in baseball.  She had a birthday recently, so we bought her this left-handed fielder's GLOVE ...

Left handed fielder's glove

21. Aliens, for short: ETS.

22. Layered dessert: TORTE.

23. Mineral deposits: ORES. Not all mineral deposits are ORES, but ORES contain mineral deposits.

24. [Theme clue]

28. Meat and potatoes, often: ENTREE.

31. __ canto: BEL.  Today's Italian lesson, BEL canto translates as "beautiful singing".   It designates an opera style characterized by a relatively small dynamic range, an exact control of the intensity of vocal tone, a demand for vocal agility, and clear articulation of notes and enunciation of words.   The three Bel canto composers par excellence are Gioacchino Rossini (1792-1868), Gaetano Donizetti (1797-1848) and Vincenzo Bellini (1801-1835).  Here's soprano Anna Netrebko showing us how it's done with Norina's aria Quel guardo il cavaliere ("That I look at the knight") from Donizetti's Don Pasquale ...

32. Sch. group: PTA.

33. Snoozer: BORE.  I hope Anna didn't BORE you with her vocal antics. 😀

34. "I feel you": SAME HERE.

38. [Theme clue]

43. Set of promotional materials: MEDIA KIT.

44. Dory pal: NEMO.  His name of course comes from the intrepid Captain NEMO, commander of the Nautilus submarine in Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, the basis for this thrilling 1954 movie ...

45. Fender accessory: AMP.

47. World's second-tallest bird: EMU.  The EMU belongs to a group of flightless running birds known as ratites, the most primitive of the modern bird families. The ratite family includes the kiwi, ostrich, cassowary, and rhea, all birds found only in the Southern Hemisphere. The emu is the second-largest living bird in the world (the ostrich is the largest).

Emu
    Dromaius, novaehollandiae

48. Souped-up ride: HOT ROD.  Hot Rod is also the name a 2007 American comedy film directed by Akiva Schaffer (in his directorial debut) and written by Pam Brady. The film stars Andy Samberg as amateur stuntman Rod Kimble, whose stepfather, Frank (Ian McShane), continuously mocks and disrespects him. When Frank becomes ill, Rod raises money for his heart operation by executing his largest stunt yet.  It scored only 39% on the Tomatometer, but I linked this because I'm a big fan of Ian McShane.

50. [Theme clue]

55. Capital once called Christiania: OSLO.  New to me.

56. Gas up?: BLOAT.

57. Sport with takedowns, for short: MMA.  Mixed Martial Arts.

60. Horned herbivore: RHINO.  Don't let one catch you eating any of their herbs!

Rhinoceros

62. [Theme reveal].

64. Toy truck brand: TONKA.  My youngest grandson is crazy about them. 
 

Tonka Mighty Dump Truck

65. Ski town outside Salt Lake City: ALTA.

66. Step in the shower?: RINSE.

67. Promise: SWEAR.

68. Cond. once called shell shock: PTSD.  Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  Very clinical sounding.  "Shell shock" is a much more vivid term.  My father was shell shocked during WWII.  Afterwards he was electro-shocked by "therapists".  He never talked about the war.

69. Car rental choice: SEDAN.

Down:

1. Icy Hot target: ACHE.

2. "Darn!": DRAT.

3. Statutes: LAWS.

4. Tats: INK.

5. Principal pal: BESTIE.

6. Boor: CHURL. 

7. Religious divisions: SECTS.  Revisions to ISMS.

8. Kicks with swooshes: NIKES.

9. Mos. and mos.: YRS.

10. "Notorious" SCOTUS justice: RBG.  Ruth Bader Ginsburg was "notorious" for being a formidable opponent in the court room.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

11. Participate in a meting?: ALLOT.  You can ALLOT A LOT, but not an ALOT.

12. Garage convenience: DOOR OPENER.  Our "convenience" no longer opens and it's on my to do list to fix.  Fortunately it was stuck CLOSED, not OPEN!

13. Flip: INVERT.

14. "Friday Night Lights" city: ODESSA.  Friday Night Lights is a 2004 American sports drama film co-written and directed by Peter Berg. The film follows the coach and players of a high school football team in the Texas city of ODESSA. The book on which it is based, Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream (1990) by H. G. Bissinger, followed the story of the 1988 Permian High School Panthers football team as they made a run towards the state championship ...

19. Big name in bananas: DOLE. 

24. Musical equivalent of two whole notes: BREVE.  In music, a double whole note (American), BREVE, or double note lasts two times as long as a whole note (or semibreve). It is the second-longest note value still in use in modern music notation. The longest notated note is the longa, which could be double or triple the length of a breve, although its use is most commonly found in early music.

Alternative Breve notations

25. Film critic Roger: EBERT.  See theme introduction.

26. Classic grape soda: NEHI.

27. Oscar winner Guinness: ALEC.  Sir Alec didn't win it for this film.  At this point he was still waiting for a promotion ...

28. Abate: EBB.

29. 55-Across's country: Abbr.: NOR.  Its capital is 55A.

30. Helpful item when it's time to bounce?: TRAMPOLINE.

34. Sheep in the "Wallace and Gromit" franchise: SHAUN.  Wallace and Gromit is a British stop-motion animated comedy franchise created by Nick Park and produced by Aardman Animations.  It's an acquired taste.  Here they are ...
 

Wallace and Gromit

The spinoff  SHAUN the Sheep is about an ovine who doesn't follow the flock - in fact, he leads them into all sorts of scrapes and scraps, turning peace in the valley into mayhem in the meadow (not unlike Wallace). In this episode from Season 1 entitled Snore Worn Shaun he has to deal with Shirley's sleep APNEA (counting sheep doesn't seem to help) ...

35. Puffin kin: AUK.   An AUK or alcid is a bird of the family Alcidae in the order Charadriiformes. The alcid family includes the murres, guillemots, auklets, puffins, and murrelets. The family contains 25 extant or recently extinct species that are divided into 11 genera.

Auks

Apart from the extinct Great Auk, all auks can fly, and are excellent swimmers and divers (appearing to "fly" in water), but their walking appears clumsy.

The Great Auk
James Audubon

36. X-ray kin: MRI. Magnetic Resonance Interferometer and a CSO to our magnetic Ray - O.  When he gets here he can PUNish us with an outlandish explanation for this complicated device.

37. Goes on and on: RANTS.

39. Paradise: EDEN.

40. Virtual people in a video game: SIMS.

41. Dashboard Confessional genre: EMO.  Here's Meatloaf back by popular demand ...

42. Square in a yard: SOD.

45. Cancels, as a launch: ABORTS.

46. 1990s series starring David Cross and Bob Odenkirk: MR SHOW.  Mr. Show with Bob and David, also known as MR SHOW, is an American sketch comedy series starring and hosted by Bob Odenkirk and David Cross. It aired on HBO from November 3, 1995, to December 28, 1998.   These guys are very funny, but a little edgy.  This skit is called "Lie Detector"...

One thing I learned from this clue was how to beep out words that Margaret wouldn't approve of 😀

48. Make good as new: HEAL.

49. River rompers: OTTERS.

51. Wilder role: WONKA.  Pure Imagination ...
 

52. Curved fastener: U BOLT.  Not the sprinter, but one of these ...

U Bolt

53. Surpluses: GLUTS.

54. Develop mold, say: GO BAD.

57. Darn: MEND.

58. Tamale dough: MASA.  Here's how to make your own.

59. "You said it!": AMEN.  Today's Hebrew lesson "āmēn" (אָמֵן) = "truth, certainty".

61. Dory mover: OAR.  See also 44A.

62. Kwik Seal maker: DAP.

DAP Kwik Seal

63. Get even with?: TIE.  I think this should just about TIE up this review!

Cheers,
Bill

And as always, thanks to Teri for proof reading and for her constructive criticism.

waseeley

Saturday, November 20, 2021, David Distenfeld

 Saturday Themeless by David Distenfeld

Dave's notes: Excited to be making my themeless, published debut with this puzzle. I'm a film producer and executive living in Los Angeles. This construction had a classic bottom-up approach, not unlike a colonoscopy. The seed entry was SLEEP AWAY CAMP - a genuinely formative place for me from ages 9-14. I went to Camp Kweebec, which was surprisingly not in Quebec, but rather Schwenksville, PA. 

My favorite clue that - Wait, we didn't come to a crossword blog to hear about ins and outs of the puzzle. Tell us more about the Camp Kweebec! Oh, I dunno if that's really appropriate here. Y'know I'm particularly proud of the clue 23-Across because - No, enough about the clues! We get it... "blonde" is a type of beer and beers have foamy heads, sooo clever, moving on. Back to camp! Rude, but okay fine. [Excited clapping] So, what were the memorable moments of your sleep away camp experience? Spare no details:

Sure, well...if I had to choose:

· Slow dancing for the first time ever to K-Ci & JoJo’s “All My Life”

· Getting stuck on the zip-line over the lake for two hours

· Kicking the game-winning goal during a shootout at age 9 – to this day the only goal I have EVER scored during a soccer game

· The annual trip to Zerns, a local flea market where incense, beef jerky and throwing stars could all be purchased under the same dusty tent

· Stealing a parking lot sign from Hershey Park to gift to the Head of Boys Camp

who for some inexplicable reason collected stolen signs and hung them on his cabin

· Any time that instructional swim was rained out

· Writing and performing a parody of “I Want It That Way” called “White France is Going All the Way” during the annual Battle of the Countries – my team was White France

· Playing high-stakes Simon Says led by the Head of Boys Camp who for some inexplicable reason always wore a pair of novelty boxers with fake plastic butt cheeks exposed in the front

· And of course, when they first started offering nachos with cheese at the nightly canteen

Lights, Camera
Crossword!

It was a truly special place befitting a truly special puzzle, or at the least the only puzzle the LA Times saw fit to run today, and I’ll take that!

All right, let's see what kind of puzzle David has, uh, produced for us.

Across:

1. Some Hispanic pals: AMIGAS - Failure to change genders slowed me down

7. Winnie-the-Pooh salutation: HALLO.

12. Barbara Eden and Barbara Walters: NONAGENARIANS - I wasted some time trying to make a connection between these two women. Of course it is that they are now both 90+ yrs old which is a "5 Down. Number that never goes down: AGE" (Hmm... AGE is going down in the fill here.)

15. Celiac sufferer's bar order: GLUTEN FREE BEER - Celiac disease - An immune reaction to eating gluten, a protein found in wheat, barley, and rye.

17. Singer Brickell: EDIE - EDIE and her husband Paul Simon reconciled in court after being arrested for a "domestic disturbance" in 2014. She said she started the "disturbance" and they left the court hand-in-hand to see their son play baseball.

18. Result of shooting at the sun: LENS FLARE - It can add a lot to a picture. (BTW, I say picture and not photo.)

20. Admits: LET'S IN - Paper tickets are passé

23. Blonde with a large head, perhaps: ALE.

24. One often hailed: CAB - Speaking of passé. Hailing UBER, et al. via your phone is much more common

25. Some plugs: ADS - Free TV isn't really free

26. "The King and I" setting: SIAM - Here we see a 1 Baht stamp from Siam and a 1 Baht stamp from Thailand after the name change in 1938.

29. Lyre-toting Muse: ERATO - ERATO could officially be the muse of crossword solvers

31. "Tuck me in" garb: JAMMIES.

34. Roast holder: OVEN.

35. Love-spoofing '30s-'40s film genre: SCREWBALL COMEDY - Nobody did it better than Cary Grant

39. Drove, with "off": TEED - FORE!

40. Slipshod: ILL MADE - An ILL MADE Nike left shoe (see his sock?) famously gave out on Zion Williamson.

41. Place to rest: OASIS.

43. ... and then __: SOME.

44. Sundance TV owner: AMC - A _ C/_ A N A M A was my only tentative entry but AMC for a TV franchise made sense. It also makes sense that Robert Redford was its founder.

47. Columbus sch.: OSU - Ohio State University 

48. Tubes: TVS - "What's on the tube?" originated when the TV screen was a cathode ray tube.

51. Reacted to a depression?: SAID AH - Fun cluing! Anyone have a "gag reflex"?

53. Aggressive demand: LEMME AT EM - It seems more effective than "Let Me At Them"

57. Award-winning Cooper: MINI.

58. Old-fashioned opening: DEAR SIR OR MADAM.

61. Summer destination for many youngsters: SLEEP AWAY CAMP - See all David's memories at the top.

62. Gets licked: LOSES.

63. Impersonate convincingly: PASS AS  - Speaking of getting licked, the Huskers can not PASS AS even a mediocre football team this year

Down:

1. __ Moss, Portia Doubleday's "Mr. Robot" role: ANGELA - Portia's IMDB

2. Like many sandcastles: MOLDED.

3. Native Alaskans: INUITS - Sure I thought it might be ALEUTS too.

4. Airport array: GATES - After all my trips to Orlando, I have used a great many of their gates

6. Harris, pre-VP: SEN.

7. Storied also-ran: HARE.

8. Duke's Cameron Indoor Stadium, e.g.: ARENA - This famous venue famously holds only 9,300 people and is a tough place to play 

9. "Sixteen Going on Seventeen" girl, in a show tune: LIESL - The character was LIESL Von Trapp and here she dances to that tune with her young Nazi boyfriend who eventually betrays the whole family in The Sound Of Music

10. Chem class charge: LAB FEE.

11. Like Nash's lama: ONE L.

13. Art Rooney Award org.: NFL - Awarded for outstanding sportsmanship on the field. Teddy Bridgewate won last year

14. Phenomenon carved by waves: SEA CAVE - We have visited the Isle Of Capri which is home to a famous SEA CAVE called The Blue Grotto

16. Not for kids: R-RATED.

19. Black shade: EBONY.

21. Witness' words: I SAW - John E. Bingham was a witness to Lincoln's assassination and in a dramatic letter wrote what HE SAW

22. Latin for "clouds": NIMBI - Makes sense

27. Humanitarian Clooney: AMAL - AMAL (née Alamuddin) is the wife of George Clooney

28. Paper makers: MILLS - Wood pulp on its way to be made into paper in a 1947 paper MILL in Florida

30. "The Eternal City": ROME.

31. Yoda trainee: JEDI.

32. Mariners' saint: ELMO - Saint Erasmus of Formia also known as St. ELMO. 

33. Hustles: SCAMS - If it sounds too good to be true...

35. Option if the bar is raised: STOOL - Just such a bar in the 1940's

36. Quit: CEASED.

37. Documents with a Key Skills section, maybe: RESUMES - 99+ examples

38. Classic concert halls: ODEA - ODEA and its vowels are a frequent cwd fill 

42. Assembly with speakers?: STEREO - Why does this guy pull up beside me at so many traffic lights?

44. Shoe brand with a three-stripe logo: ADIDAS.

45. Bahrain's capital: MANAMA - It's a 20 minute drive from MANAMA, Bahrain to Saudi Arabia on the King Fahd Causeway.

46. Bubbles and Bonzo: CHIMPS - Bonzo's co-star went on to bigger things 

49. They may be put on pedestals: VASES - VAYSES not VAHSES for me

50. R.E.M. lead singer Michael: STIPE - His IMDB

52. Apples for teachers, maybe: IMACS - The school where I sub has all Windows machines except for the media production classes. 

54. Place for a Santa sighting: MALL.

55. Aces have low ones, briefly: ERAS.

56. Shorten a plot: MOW - Fun cluing! 

59. Genre for Eve: RAP - Search for her lyrics if you must

60. One of four singers on 2001's "Lady Marmalade": MYA - This song, from the movie Moulin Rouge,  is famous for its sexually suggestive French chorus of "Voulez-vous coucher avec moi?", which translates into English as "Do you want to go to bed with me?" 

MYA, Pink, Christina Aguilera, Lil Kim