Did anybody else, besides me, confidently slap in SSNS for [Unshared numbers]?
Lewis, Didn't we all? I don't know about you, but then I made a MOUE.
@Lewis I was debating between SSNS and PINS. SOLI didn’t come to mind until I Got most of the letters
@Lewis The MOUE / SOLI / TUDE / STRICH zone was my last four clues and had me looking up famous Elaines - only got the rest once I found the ST for our lady who lunches.
@Lewis I had PINS, since your SSN is frequently shared. It would be pretty useless if you didn't share it
@Lewis Wouldn’t SSNS require an abbreviation marker?
@Lewis Absolutely. And having always thought EVEL KNIEVEL's stunts were ridiculous, I couldn't quite remember how to spell his name. I must've spent five minutes on that area of the grid.
I found this puzzle to be a more or less ordinary solve. The theme, however, was overwhelmingly uninteresting to me.
@Dan I would have found it more interesting if they were actual anagrams. Letter banks just don't do it for me.
No one below boomer age knows who Sal mineo and Elaine stritch are. And Moue? Really? Forgivable were it not for the clues NOT being anagrams. Thumbs down!!!
@A I'm way below boomer age and I definitely know who both of them were.
@A Yeah I saw that coming. For the record every boomer knows MOUE too from Audrey Hepburn’s iconic expressions. Thats the one and only reference I have for it.
@A I couldn’t resist commenting that in reading the very popular young adult Ranger’s Apprentice series books by Australian author, John Flanagan, published over the last 20 years, he uses MOUE often to describe the facial expressions of his characters. Very effective at bringing their faces to the imagination. (I am a boomer, and the word is still alive and well.) 😆
@A Ok. But that’s all part of doing puzzles. They are hard at times. You learn things. Also, trivia plays into it. I’m sure there are many young movie and broadway buffs out there who know who these two people are.
@A Elaine Stritch appeared on Broadway in A Little Night Music with Bernadette Peters in 2011. Not yesterday, but not several decades ago, either.
@A I agree! No references earlier than 1980! Old pop culture is stupid! And tough vocabulary? Letter bank challenges? What is this, a puzzle?! Boooo!
@A Is there a rule for determining whether the name of a particular deceased famous person will be known by anyone under baby-boomer age?
@A I'm a millennial, and I know SAL MINEO. I didn't know ELAINE STRITCH, but I could guess her with the crosses. Also, as has been explained *repeatedly* in the column and the comments, the theme of the puzzle is a letter bank, which is similar to an anagram. The Spelling Bee is a letter bank game. The letter bank also appears frequently in cryptic crosswords.
@A I could have worked on this for hours without ever getting “moue” or “mineo/ Amon”. Definitely thought it was “amAn ra”.
@A By the same token, no one above Gen Z age knows who Nas is. It all depends on your perspective, doesn't it.
@A Came here to say this - googled both of them and thought - “I still don’t know who these people are.” Used lookups for both of those answers and feel no remorse over it. If I wanted to do a crossword with trivia from 1971 I could go back to the archive.
So, first came the inspiration – finding actors’ names whose letters were in other famous people’s names. That’s bringing letter-bank themes, which have been done before, to a new place. Excellent idea! Then came the grind – inputting hundreds of actor’s names into a program that found pairs of names that worked, and hoping to find names with letter counts that would make the answers symmetrical in the grid. After that, came more inspiration, coming up with a punny revealer that landed perfectly. Finally, more work – making it all work in a Sunday-sized grid. Oh, I’m grateful, Daniel, for a fun romp through this puzzle, and I love how the theme not only helped fill in the theme answers, but it caused me to think in a different and fun way to get from the clue name to the answer name. But I’m also grateful for all you put into the making of this. It sure paid off for me. Thank you, sir!
@Lewis Constructors routinely use computer programs to make the puzzles we all enjoy. Anyone who rails against using computers to construct a puzzle only need try solving puzzles from the era when puzzles were necessarily constructed without computer assistance to see that they allow far more creativity.
Anagram-adjacent themes are not my effort, er I mean, forte, am I doing this right? So instead, some less famous razors: CROSSROAD’s razor: the tail-gater that you pull over to let pass will turn off at the very next crossroad. GEORGE FOREMAN’s razor: the simplest solution is the correct one, i.e., name them all George. Norman Reedus’ razor: for any obscure public figure, there is always another more obscure.
@Cat Lady Margaret If you knew who NORMAN REEDUS is, you'd know he desperately needed a razor as Darryl in The Walking Dead.
@Cat Lady Margaret Love that GEORGE FORMAN razor!!
@Cat Lady Margaret Mike Tyson's razor: "Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth."
"Someone left the cake out in the rain I don't think that I can take it 'Cause it took too long to bake it And I'll never have that recipe agaaaaaaaain, oh noooooo" I had to stop mid-solve to enjoy this disco gem from DONNA SUMMER (no auto-tune, kids!)... <a href="https://youtu.be/hDD7t2Mj_aQ?is=VTsQxmkOSHL1EMkI" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/hDD7t2Mj_aQ?is=VTsQxmkOSHL1EMkI</a> I caught on to the gimmick early on, with HENRI MATISSE and DONNA SUMMER, but TIL it's called "letter bank." Fun! I tried it with my own name and found out that my surname is a letter bank for KING KONG. Oh well, we can't all be glamorous stars with letter bank names for other glamorous stars... I do like a more flowy kind of Sunday such as this was, not too crunchy. It makes for a more pleasant solve for me, such as this was, and not an endless slog because of the sheer size of the puzzle. And I was very impressed by the plethora of themers the constructor fit in the grid. Incredible! Thank you, Mr. Grinberg! [Hearty applause] :-)
@sotto voce May I whisper a bravo, Mr. Ginkgo King?
@sotto voce Today I learned that MacArthur Park has a disco cover! I only knew about the original by Richard Harris (who also played Dumbledore from the first two Harry Potter movies, fun fact!) and the instrumental cover by Maynard Ferguson. I always thought the song was unique in its style, so it makes sense that there are so many covers of it!
@sotto voce And I tried to anagram my previous name and found it anagrammed perfectly to SICK HAZE IN L.A. I should have kept that last name when I remarried, and not only because it's a horrible name...
@sotto voce C'mon! Your name also holds GEORGE SOROS. You're rich!
@sotto voce MacArthur Park is often considered one of the worst songs ever written (see Dave Barry) - probably because people found it sappy and over-sentimental (and the “cake in the rain” thing) - but I would’ve given up one of my uh… arms to have written that Jimmy Webb song. Longest word in my letter bank is BOOTLICKER (and BOLOMETRIC).
this isn't a puzzle about garnering meaning from the clues it's a trivia puzzle - it's Jeopardy not a crossword puzzle no thank you
@acjones I’ve been doing the NYT crossword for over 40 years and have always thought trivia was a big part of the crossword.
@acjones I give myself a look-up on Disney characters later than Snow White (or sports figures if the crosses don’t help), but the rest of it unraveled and re-raveled so remarkably quickly, I don’t REALLY understand your evident antipathy. The theme seemed not about knowledge, but about letting go of perfection and trying what seemed to fit. And that was ten long answers! I love Jeopardy too, though I don’t “work” on trivia: I’m chuffed to get five or six responses per board. I was chuffed to finish this ONE in well under 40 minutes. I asked Siri about JAFAR late in the game. I know, but it’s getting late, and it’s a puzzle! I manage to enjoy my progress, despite my lack of perfection.
@acjones How long have you been solving? The very first clue/answer ever—1A on 2/15/42–was both a proper name and trivia. You could look it up. <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=2/15/1942" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=2/15/1942</a> Expecting something to be what it isn’t is a fool’s errand.
@acjones Trivia is a part of crosswords. If you don't like trivia, go find something else to do. There is no trivia in the sudoku.
Great puzzle. As an Aussie however, i find the spelling of UIE insulting. Lol. Chuck a uey, mate.
@Sam In Crossworld, it’s whichever spelling fits.
@Sam Mostly UEY in USA too, I believe. Don't make a MOUE.
So, here are two random names that use the same characters. Meh.
I am not remotely picky about Sunday themes, but jeez…famous people whose names happen to be anagrams of other famous people? We’re really scratching the bottom of the barrel here. And I don’t expect to be challenged on Sundays, so I didn’t exactly have a problem with the Monday-level fill in this one…and hey, at least that left me feeling patient during the last few minutes I spent getting the TU in TUDE/MOUE/ELAINESTRITCH. I tend to just refrain from posting anything when I don’t like a puzzle, but I’ve gotta say, this one felt as uninspired and uninteresting as any I can remember. Hopefully others like it more 🤷♂️
I’ve always had the outspoken opinion that anagram themes need a reason for being beyond a catchy revealer. In other words; the anagrammed entries should have something to do with the clues. Otherwise it solves just like a themeless where you have no clues for some of the entries, since most people aren’t going to do the anagrams in their head. Maybe this meets me half way, since both clues and entries are celebrities. I still think that’s not quite enough, because there are so many names to pick from and they are otherwise unrelated. I think these were all pretty famous, at least, although SAL MINEO and ELAINE STRITCH are probably more in my wheelhouse than most. Then of course, this is a word bank, not an anagram, which decreases points for difficulty and the likelihood that people will use the letters to solve. Much less of a wow factor for me. So, all said and done, I would review this, based on solving enjoyment, as I would a themeless; and here we’re back to the sad fact that most Sundays are clued at a Tuesday level at best. For me this was just an exercise in filling in letters and if the across wasn’t a gimme the down usually was. Too bad, because the idea and the execution were still clever. Unrelated, I have a new crossword posted in Crosshare. It’s a Thursday level. Be forewarned, based on early reviews it’s a toughy, but I hope you enjoy it; as always honest feedback is appreciated. <a href="https://crosshare.org/crosswords/A8PziGVW3EYesn4uMvBp/standing-room-only" target="_blank">https://crosshare.org/crosswords/A8PziGVW3EYesn4uMvBp/standing-room-only</a>
SP, You're looking here for more of a connection than just stars word-banked from stars. Related, I was looking for a connection to the "things" in your Crosshare puzzle.
@SP Great puzzle! I finished it in about 40 minutes including some interruptions. The random placement of the trick squares was a little disconcerting but it was clued really well. I signed in with Google but couldn't figure out how to leave a note.
@SP Dude. You make good puzzles.
@SP I'll give it a try but I'm not hopeful 😃
@SP found this puzzle more straightforward than the one you mentioned recently…
@SP This was way too hard for me to finish without help, but at least with reveals and checks it was doable, in the end, and somewhat enjoyable (unlike your previous puzzle). I got the theme on my own, but sadly being unfamiliar with some proper names I was forced to use reveals, which spoiled one themed square for me (thankfully this happened after I had already typed in the other 5 theme entries). What I really dislike about the two of your creations I've attempted so far is the obscene amount of trivia, in both the clues and answers. It makes the puzzles unfairly difficult to people whose life experience didn't involve them learning specific yet random things. Many of the entries in this puzzle could have been clued without referring to factual knowledge, by relying on misdirection instead. Again you have a typo in the grid, one that hindered my solve, making me think there might be a themed square there somewhere. The clue should read "Recalls Data", not "Recall Data". I disliked the Iron curtain clue. The answer is true for a single one out of the eight iron curtain countries. I've been annoyed by Americans and other Westerners thinking Poland was one of the 73 acrosses way too many times to not be ticked off by your clue. How would a Canadian like "North American territorial division" solving to "US state" as if there were one country on the whole continent?
@SP Good puzzle, but too difficult for me. Put down and came back many times, finally had to check puzzle. Ditto today's NYT puzzle. Certainly wasn't Tuesday-level clueing for me.
@SP Thanks for capturing so nicely my feelings about the theme. I started this over a bowl of ice cream around 9:30 Saturday night. I did maybe a third of it before deciding I didn't have the brain power to decipher all the anagrams (which is what I thought they were until I read a review of the puzzle). Coming back to it at 6 this morning, I would have finished in a decent time but for my difficulties in the SOLI/EVEL KNIEVEL area (see my response to Lewis) and my ineplicable spelling of REEBOc (I know better), which took a long time to find. I'm looking forward to solving "Standing Room Only."
@SP I thought your puzzle was very enjoyable. It was fun figuring out the trick and the revealer was perfect. The clue for 28 A was a favorite. Looking over my recent NYT Thursday solve times, this took longer than most, but not as long as the toughest ones. I don't really see any reason why a puzzle like this wouldn't be published by the NYT. It would certainly be welcomed by me.
@SP I enjoyed that. Thank you for sharing. There are comments I want to leave about your puzzle. But obviously don’t want to give anything away. It was pretty smooth sailing. But I couldn’t crack the very NW. for a specific reason. A worthy Thursday in my book. Cluing was tough. In a knowledge base way. But I got through it via crosses. Disappointed in myself that I had to auto check at the end to finish the NW. 85% on me. 15% on you? Anyway. Please share your creations. Thanks
@SP Just solved your most recent crosshare puzzle. First off: dude, absolutely loved it 😍 The only nit I’d pick is the grammatical mismatch in 43D. But that cost me only a couple minutes — and mostly just because the rest of the grid was of such high quality that I was slow to suspect an error on the constructor’s part by the time I was poring over the leftovers. Furthermore, I wouldn’t push even slightly hard on the above, because the great majority of my “last several minutes agonizing on the last couple squares” phase was spent on the 14A/3D crossing, and I have absolutely zero nits to pick there: I watched A Streetcar Named Desire literally two weeks ago, and yet somehow couldn’t get past “mart” as my last rebus square for an embarrassingly long time. This was definitely an NYT-level puzzle.
@SP I liked it (am definitely on Team Rebus). Clueing seemed fair, midweek NYT level? I got most of it fairly quickly but kicked myself for giving up on 5A/7D even after staring at SPOILER ---RIETTA. I know European history! I knew the myth but kept wanting ARIADNE even though she IS the spider, not its creator.
Wow, bit taken aback by the negative comments. I thought it was a fun theme, if a tad on the easier side of Sunday. Didn’t quite understand the connections at first, despite having MATISSE and MINEO. Now, how do I know SAL when I literally have no idea who he/she is? The wonders of the attic of my mind. Eventually I figured it was basically the Bee; a set of letters in one name to be used, potentially more than once, to reach a second name. Plus they’re all stars in one genre or another. Cool. It’s still raining in the UK and I couldn’t be happier, even though Alpaca poo weighs a ton when wet. (Apologies to those eating breakfast, it’s mid afternoon here, almost time for tea).
@Helen Wright Sal Mineo was a teen star in movies like Rebel Without A Cause. He also played Dov Landau in Exodus. (Oscar-nominated for Best Supporting actor for both.) He was tragically murdered at age 37. Here's a clip of a famous scene that might jog your memory! <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBSEu6j27jo" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBSEu6j27jo</a>
Nitpick - the Italian plural for wine is vini, not vinos.
@JT Right, in Italian. But English adopts foreign words and then butchers them to agree with, well, English. Hence, the plural of vino in English is vinos. 🤷🏻♀️
@JT true, but the Crossword very often slaps an S on something to pluralize it in cases where the correct plural is something else entirely. It used to bother me to no end, but now I have gotten in the habit of checking to see if slapping an S on something will work with the crossing word!
One of those divas you read about might display a bad SOLI TUDE.
This was a slog but I finished it with no lookups. I didn't understand the letter bank concept but as I progressed I figured out that the answers were approximate anagrams of the clues. I was not familiar with NORMAN REEDUS, ELAINE STRITCH, BREE LARSON, REGINA KING, NADIYA HUSSAIN or ALANA HAIM. Still, I persisted, letter by painful letter, and made it through. I like challenging puzzles but I didn't enjoy this one as much as yesterday's.
@VN I found this one delightful and I needed no look ups. But the Saturday! That one felt "sloggy" and I needed sixteen cheats. We are all different! It's good there's such a variety of puzzles!
The not-quite-anagram theme reminded me of Sir Robin's introduction in Monty Python's Holy Grail: "Sir Robin the Not-Quite-So-Brave-As-Sir-Lancelot, who had nearly fought the Dragon of Angnor, who had nearly stood up to the vicious Chicken of Bristol, and who had personally wet himself at the Battle of Badon Hill." At least the Monty Python thing was funny! Today's theme, however, just seemed meh. Then there was UIE... No, just no. Will it be spelled oouieyeyey the next time we see the word? The fill featured perhaps three instances of misdirection, with everything else clued boringly directly at a Monday level. I personally found this to be a very unsatisfying puzzle.
@Andrzej Thank you for the Monty Python bit—hadn’t thought of that in a while. And I am in total agreement with you on “uie”—always drives me nuts when this comes up in its various forms. I found myself a tad irritated that the anagrams were “off” —even after quickly solving the revealer—so I read the notes when I finished and learned about the extra letter thing. Kinda feels like cheating to me, but it would have been a bear trying to come up with true anagrams, I guess. Oh well. Thanks again for the trip down memory lane…
@Andrzej I agree completely. If only there had been more mathematics!
@Andrzej You Monty Python callout amused me more than anything else about the puzzle, thanks!
If I had to describe this puzzle from the solving standpoint, I would call it a "close but no cigar" anagram puzzle. From what I've done of it -- less than a third -- I can see that the answers are all the same letters as the clues, but one letter longer. I read Rex's explanation and I don't understand a word of it. Doesn't really matter much to me. From a solving standpoint, it didn't take a lot of crosses to see what name each theme answer would be. And, bingo, my job was done. Nothing to keep my brain engaged. Bored and uninterested, I stopped. It's too bad -- and I'm sorry, Daniel. I can't even imagine how much work and how much effort must have gone into creating this. Best of all, you "amazed" Will Shortz -- and I don't think it's all that easy to amaze him after all these many years. Unfortunately, your excitement at coming up with the clues and answers was not mirrored by excitement on my part in figuring them out. Only proving once again that a good creative experience and a good solving experience are two entirely different animals.
This was a slog, not a fan I know a decent amount of words and trivia, and it's not that often I see an answer in a NYT crossword where I'm just totally unfamiliar with the word. Happened a number of times today. SOLI TEMPUS RECTO MOUE NERUDA (natick with RECTO...ugh) ELAINESTRITCH NADIYA Hussein Bleh.
@LW Now you know them! Onwards and upwards
@LW Do yourself a big favor and get to know Elaine Stritch today. What a talent! 🎭
Absolutely wonderful puzzle. Not big on celeb names so had to reveal many of the themed answers. Other than that though, I thought this flowed nicely and the harder entries were helped by the crosses, as it should be. Great job!
Wow, surprised by the comments. So many mehs, but I thought it was elegant. And since you can now watch any movie you want anytime you want (with the price of a subscription🤷🏻♀️) I highly rec looking up some of Sal Mineo’s great movies, (Rebel Without A Cause) & I’m sure one can find Elaine Stritch doing Sondheim to perfection❣️
@Mae RE: Sal Mineo; If you haven't seen "Exodus" you're missing out. Sure, it's three and a half hours long, but well worth it. (And educational, as well.)
My decades solving anagrams in British crosswords was to my advantage today - you just get a feel for it, even though famous people is my bête noir. I did know a few of the names, assumed SAL was a woman but found out it was SALvatore. BREWER and NAVE were good - I just wish more of the clues were like that, rather than just names and synonyms. Nice to see Pablo NERUDA get a mention, a favourite. I didn't find the crossword overall to be too difficult. Please, help me with NBA for 'heat setting'.
@Jane Wheelaghan Miami Heat is an NBA team
Heat in [Heat setting, in brief?] is a veiled capital.
@Jane Wheelaghan I had MIA for the "setting" as it is a place. A sports league is not quite that, IMHO.
Grant, The ? on the clue was because a league is not quite a setting.
@Jane Wheelaghan I figured you would have an edge today. I saw early on that they weren't anagrams and happily threw that idea away. The thought of writing down the clues and crossing out letters as I used them didn't appeal to me.
Fun puzzle with a few tough crossings (moue/soli). What a great collection of unconnected people you don't expect to see in one place: Sal Mineo, Donna Summers, Brie Larson, Evel Knievel. (Nice COMPANY for Elaine Stritch). And then throw in Funny Girl and Gigi!
@Jeff B MD I was put off by the puzzle's clue rating FUNNY GIRL as a comedy. It was more of a biography than a comedy; sure, there were funny moments-- Fanny Brice WAS funny--but it was more of a tragedy. Plus: what was "funny" back then would not pass muster now.
Mr and Mrs Grinberg, You done good. My love of the puzzle, my unwillingness to miss a single day, and my love of constructing comes from my parents. Whether you are word-nerds as well, or simply supported an odd hobby, enjoy this Grinberg Sunday! The joy of watching our kids thrive? Ain’t nuthin better.
As a weirdo with synaesthesia, I found this delightful: the colours in the clues easily matched up with the colours of the answers. It was only the slightly different colour intensities that made me notice that they were not exact anagrams! A very fun puzzle.
@jlib27 That's cool. Really cool.
@jlib27 Having synaesthesia doesn't make you weird; it makes you special. It's remarkable that your superpower helped you figure out the gimmick. Cool! (And if I were the constructor, I'd be thrilled to know my puzzle was experienced in colors!)
Enjoyed this but got stuck on MOUE and SOLI. To paraphrase mean girls, stop trying to make SOLI happen!
So, not anagrams, just "here are a bunch letters, some of which you can use try and spell someone's name," and nothing about the clue relates to the entry? Okay....
@Mike Those letters but no other letters. If you read the column, you would see that it's called letter banking. Not that you have to like it, of course, but it is still a theme. They were actual anagrams nothing about the clue what it likely related to the answer either.
NE corner was unsolvable for me. Also SOLI crossed with MOUE and TUDE (rUDE anyone?) … that coupled with needing to flyspeck the whole thing left me feeling pretty disappointed.
@Brett The informally in the clue for TUDE indicates some type of slang or shortening for the answer.
Easy solve but I do not understand the theme.
@Tom stars that share same letters as other stars, I believe.
Tom, WRITTEN IN THE STARS (as the puzzle title says).
@Tom "Recurring characters" -- so you are using only letters from the clue in the answer.
@Tom The clue and answer are made from a common set of letters, aka a "letter bank."
As I like to do with a Sunday puzzle, I wander around and enjoy reading the clues and getting the words I’m fairly sure of in place, while letting the theme come to me. Then, once I got past the “it’s not quite an anagram” stage, names began to fall into place. MORGAN FREEMAN just had to be GEORGE FOREMAN. My last challenge was recalling SAL MINEO and how to spell the god. Really enjoyed the variety of names. Great fun!!
SOLI again. I can say I've seen it in the wild, though not as clued. In a jazz big-band arrangement, when the whole saxophone section stands up and blows a chorus in harmony, the many bars of rest in the trumpet charts will be labeled 'Sax SOLI'. So it means something like a 'group solo' instead of the plural.
Daniel, as far as I'm concerned, your entire family can raise a toast to you for this super clever and zig-zagging delight. Yes, it went faster than I would've liked for a Sunday, but, never having heard of a letter bank, I marveled at the combinations! Hard to choose a favorite, but because I just watched the video yesterday of the 1970 cast album recording of COMPANY, which includes Elaine Stritch's inimitable version of "Ladies Who Lunch," her combo with Christian Slater wins the day for me. Bravo and thank you!
Done in by UIE in the end. Bad me for not checking the cross. Just wanted to be done, so no flyspecking. No problem with the names, though many will be unhappy. I was amused that the stars often turned into stars of the opposite sex. Hope that Daniel did not need a SATANIC mechanic to finish this. RIP Tim Curry. <a href="https://youtu.be/ZCZDWZFtyWY?si=wkMEDk9DLO6M-_p2" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/ZCZDWZFtyWY?si=wkMEDk9DLO6M-_p2</a>
Everyone complaining that they don't know the legend Elaine Stritch should be grateful for finally learning of her. I also recommend her song “Are You Having Any Fun?” for everyone in a MOUE after today's puzzle.
@Billy It is funny that two clues that upset people were really easy for me today. I had problems with other things. We all have different strengths. I loved seeing LIAM NEESON and MORGAN FREEMAN as clues.
@Billy you said it! Anyone who doesn't know her ... rush to hear her sing I'm Still Here. You're welcome.
To quote The Dude: "Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man."
It’s almost always pleasant to work one’s way through a Sunday NYT crossword. Some are better than others, of course. The concept that “some famous people have the same letters in their names as other famous people” is a quite a bit on the lame side, but Sunday mornings aren’t supposed to be grueling.
@retired, with cat I take it that it doesn't delight you when two completely unrelated words are pangrams in a single Spelling Bee (e.g. COLORATURA and CALCULATOR).
Now that I understand that BEA ARTHUR and BABE RUTH are both built out of the same A-B-E-H-R-T-U stockpile I realize that letter-banking is not particularly interesting to me. My solve time on this roughly doubled while I wondered what was wrong with my completed puzzle. Then I thought, "maybe Barolos e Brunellos are not VINES"... et OLIVIA!
I usually like or love Sunday puzzles but this one really wasn't for me. On the one hand, some of these actors were unknown to me, on the other hand, not even all were actors (Matisse), so the theme was also lost on me.
Quite a few of them are not actors. They are all STARS in their respective endeavors.
@Felix All of the personages in the clues (where it is written) are indeed movie or TV stars. The answers didn't have to be.
I got a little nervous. Famous people? Not my forte! As it turned out, the crosses did the trick, and even *I* at least recognized the names as they started to emerge. I actually found myself putting some in with just a few crosses. What are they famous for? I don't know, but the names all sound familiar. Fast fun today. Nice job, Daniel! CROSS ROAD Blues is my musical takeaway today: <a href="https://youtu.be/3Fu-k5TD2S4?si=g0h07eby9ciaKWhS" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/3Fu-k5TD2S4?si=g0h07eby9ciaKWhS</a>
I am surprised by how many didn’t enjoy this puzzle…not criticizing those who weren’t fond of it, as de gustibus and all that, just sincerely surprised as this one was fun for me. Finished 40% under my average. Delighted to see a debut of ELAINE STRITCH.
@Joe Thank you for the Latin. I didn't know it, but expect I'll have use for it. Probably during my next family trip. (Two siblings will whip out their phones to search and the third will know what it is.)
I thought this was quite fun. I always enjoy church architectural terms, and NAVE was perfect. I also was happy to see PEORIA, because that is where I picked up my puppy years ago. It was a long day's drive, and I was exhausted when I got home. And then, having a puppy, I was exhausted for a year.
I let a two month streak go and checked the puzzle to correct the spelling of a few of the many, many, many names in the puzzle. Not my favorite puzzle, but an unusual challenge, which I do appreciate!
The median age for understanding some of these clues must be 65. Plus some VERY obscure words for some clues. An interesting puzzle but not one I liked at all.
@Geomo If you look at the photo of today’s constructor: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=8/30/2026" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=8/30/2026</a> you’ll notice he’s got a ways to go before he’s in the Medicare cohort. Maybe you don’t like the puzzle, and that’s fine. And certainly, some names skew older than others. But just as many oldies will have trouble with ORLANDO BLOOM and BRIE LARSON as youngsters will have with ELAINE STRITCH and SAL MINEO.
@Steve L Per the constructor's notes, he used an online wordlist doohickey to find his pairings, so relative age doesn't enter into it. Unknowns for everybody!
@Geomo Hand up: I’m 65 and found the celebrity word banks delightful. But I have to go look up that song “Are You Having Fun?” by Elaine Stritch. Got one proper name from the wordplay column(reality TV) and forgot the name of the villain from Aladdin. Congrats to the constructor.
Spent about half an hour flyspecking around Sal Mineo and Elaine Stritch (never heard of either) until I realized Costner didn't play GARP and PGA green wasn't it Really had to work for the gold star on this one
@Ian I had the same problem. Didn’t enjoy it.
No matter how much the NYT Crossword may insist - I cannot accept "SOLI" as an acceptable plural of "solo."
@Sam - NYT Crossword just uses legitimate dictionary definitions. Most of the time. Do you not have access to a dictionary? SOLI is a perfectly cromulent plural. You should really try to expand your lexicon if you want to become a proficient solver.
its not a crossword puzzle it's a Jeopardy episode for beginners.
That was fun, and a pretty quick solve! Managed to get some of the themed clues without fully comprehending why they were not perfect anagrams, and then the revealer helped, though I had not encountered letter banks before - another one for the crossword solving memory bank. Funny thing about jumbo shrimp and PRAWN - in India, where I grew up, I thought the distinction was river vs saltwater creatures. And talking of things Indian, chukker, that Caitlin refers to in her column, is a hindi word meaning circle (from the sanskrit chakra, meaning wheel).
@ST very interesting re chukker! Thanks for sharing 😊
@ST Hey there, paisan! I grew up in what is now Mumbai. Back in the 1970s my friends and I used to go to the docks to meet the fishing boats coming in and buy giant fresh PRAWNs, almost the size of small lobsters.
@ST Ah, so then a chukka in polo is literally a round.
116 Down: This cinephile prefers TCM and not TMC
In my (real life) experience, most do. In the puzzle, wait for the crosses: TMC 40, TCM 38.
@youdontknome "Criterion" for me. Hard to fit into three spaces, though. Maybe I should have tried it as a rebus.
@youdontknome I thought it stood for The Movie Channel.
[RED] Surprised so many don't seem to get letter banks. Doesn't everyone here play Spelling Bee? If not, why not? DR DRE (No, this doesn't quite work, but Red was Morgan Freeman's CHARACTER in Shawshank Redemption.)
@mad drum bus I have no idea why, but I cannot stand the Bee. I tried. Hated every second. And I’m the nerdiest word-nerd I know. I think it just feels so random. Like scattered letters in a field of tall grass. Just keep picking up a few, jumbling them around… repeat…repeat…repeat. But so many love it, it’s a black licorice thing, I guess!
@mad drum bus I never heard of a letter bank and had no idea that's what the Bee was. I quit the Bee quite a few years ago because I didn't enjoy it. Your friend, RAVE PS Any relation to Red drum?
@mad drum bus Nope, don't care for the Bee. Too arbitrary.
@NYCC and @Aver Apologies accepted. Honestly I'm not sure why I enjoy it but I do. How else would I ever have learned 43 different words for "stew"?
@mad drum bus I quit doing the bee because my brain wouldn’t let it go and I’d spend HOURS off and on all day trying to think of words and I just couldn’t commit that much of my life to it!