0608-15 New York Times Crossword Answers 8 Jun 15, Monday

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CROSSWORD SETTER: Peter A. Collins
THEME: Man at the End of the Film … each of today’s themed answers can precede the word “MAN” in a movie title:

38A. Word that follows each shaded answer to complete a film title : MAN

16A. Seizure in a driveway, maybe : REPO (giving “REPO MAN”)
17A. Glass slipper wearer in a fairy tale : CINDERELLA (giving “CINDERELLA MAN”)
25A. Valentine’s Day message : I LOVE YOU (giving “I LOVE YOU, MAN”)
32A. Out of juice, as a battery : DEAD (giving “DEAD MAN”)
46A. Fe, in chemistry : IRON (giving “IRON MAN”)
53A. 26-mile race : MARATHON (giving “MARATHON MAN”)
64A. Job done with a wrecking ball : DEMOLITION (giving “DEMOLITION MAN”)
66A. Drought ender : RAIN (giving “RAIN MAN”)

BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 5m 35s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across

5. City across the bay from St. Petersburg : TAMPA
The Florida city of Tampa has been known as the Big Guava since the seventies. The term is imitative of New York’s “Big Apple”, and refers to the unsuccessful search for the reported wild guava trees that were once hoped to be the basis of a new industry for the area.

10. Lose in a dice game, with “out” : CRAP
“To crap out” is to make a losing roll on the first throw in a game of craps.

If one considers earlier versions of craps, then the game has been around for a very long time and probably dates back to the Crusades. It may have been derived from an old English game called “hazard” also played with two dice, which was mentioned in Geoffrey Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” from the 1300s. The American version of the game came here courtesy of the French and first set root in New Orleans where it was given the name “crapaud”, a French word meaning “toad”.

14. Mine, in Marseille : A MOI
“À moi” (literally “to me”) is the French for “mine”.

Marseille (often written “Marseilles” in English) is the second largest city in France, after Paris. Marseille is also the largest commercial port in the country. I used to live nearby, and it’s a lovely, lovely place.

16. Seizure in a driveway, maybe : REPO (giving “REPO MAN”)
“Repo Man” is a 1984 sci-fi comedy film starring Emilio Estevez and Harry Dean Stanton. I tried watching this film, but had to give up. That said, “Repo Man” is considered a great film by those in the know …

17. Glass slipper wearer in a fairy tale : CINDERELLA (giving “CINDERELLA MAN”)
The folk tale about “Cinderella” was first published by French author Charles Perrault in 1697. The storyline of the tale may date back as far as the days of Ancient Greece. A common alternative title to the story is “The Little Glass Slipper”.

“Cinderella Man” is a 2005 Ron Howard film starring Russell Crowe in the title role, as heavyweight boxing champion James J. Braddock.

22. Les ___-Unis : ETATS
“Les États-Unis d’Amérique” is what French speakers call “the United States of America”.

23. Pugs and poodles : DOGS
The pug is a breed of dog of Chinese origin. Our current family pet is a boxer/pug cross, a good-looking mutt!

The standard Poodle breed of dog is considered to be the second most intelligent breed, after the Border Collie. The name “poodle” comes from a Low German word meaning “to splash about”, reflecting the original use of the breed as a water retriever.

25. Valentine’s Day message : I LOVE YOU (giving “I LOVE YOU, MAN”)
Saint Valentine’s Day was chosen by Pope Gelasius I in 496 AD to honor various martyrs with the name Valentine. However, the saints’ day was dropped by the Roman Catholic church in 1969, by Pope Paul VI. Try telling that to Hallmark though …

“I Love You, Man” is a 2009 comedy starring Paul Rudd and Jason Segel in a “bromance”. The lovely Rashida Jones co-stars, adding some female interest.

27. Illegal substance for athletes : STEROID
Steroids are found commonly in nature, with familiar examples being cholesterol and testosterone. The controversial class of drugs called anabolic steroids (known informally as “roids” or simply “steroids”) are artificially produced chemicals designed to mimic the effect of the male sex hormone, testosterone. They are termed “anabolic” as they build up cellular tissue (particularly muscle) in a process called anabolism. Taking anabolic steroids can be termed “juicing”, and the aggressive behavior that can be a side-effect is known as “roid rage”.

30. (5 x 3) – (7 x 2) = ? : ONE
(5 x 3) – (7 x 2) = 15 – 14 = 1

31. Personal ad abbr. : SWM
Single white male (SWM)

32. Out of juice, as a battery : DEAD (giving “DEAD MAN”)
“Dead Man” is a 1995 movie starring Johnny Depp that is described as a “psychedelic western” by director Jim Jarmusch. “Dead Man” was also the last film for screen legend Robert Mitchum, who died in 1997.

33. Mexican city across the border from San Diego : TIJUANA
Tijuana is the largest city in the Mexican state of Baja California, and lies just across the US-Mexico border from San Diego. Tijuana is also the most westerly of all Mexican cities. A lot of Tijuana’s growth took place in the twenties as tourists flocked south of the border during the days of prohibition in the US. One of the many casinos and hotels that flourished at that time was Hotel Caesar’s in the Avenida Revolución area. Hotel Caesar’s claims to be the birthplace of the now ubiquitous Caesar Salad.

36. Witch trials city : SALEM
Salem is a seaport on the Massachusetts coast. It is noted as the location of the Salem Witch Trials of 1692, an event that the city commemorates during the run-up to Halloween every year in October.

46. Fe, in chemistry : IRON (giving “IRON MAN”)
The Latin word for “iron” is “ferrum”, which gives us “Fe” as the metal’s chemical symbol.

The “Iron Man” series of films is based on the Marvel Comics superhero. Actor Robert Downey, Jr. stars in the title role. The first movie in the franchise came out in 2008, and I confess to have seeing none of them. However, I have heard that the 2013 release “Iron Man 3” is quite good, with co-star Gwyneth Paltrow playing a more meaty role.

47. Nile snake : ASP
The asp is a venomous snake found in the Nile region of Africa. It is so venomous that the asp was used in ancient Egypt and Greece as a means of execution. Cleopatra observed such executions noting that the venom brought on sleepiness without any painful spasms. When the great queen opted to commit suicide, the asp was therefore her chosen method.

53. 26-mile race : MARATHON (giving “MARATHON MAN”)
The marathon is run over 26 miles and 385 yards, and of course commemorates the legendary messenger-run by Pheidippides from the site of the Battle of Marathon back to Athens. The actual distance run today was decided in 1921, and matches the length of the modern-day Marathon-Athens highway.

“Marathon Man” is a 1976 suspense film based on a 1974 novel of the same name by William Goldman. The film stars Dustin Hoffman and Laurence Olivier. There was a reported exchange between Olivier and Hoffman while shooting. Hoffman told Olivier that he had just finished some scenes where his character had supposedly been awake for three days and three nights. Olivier asked him how he handled the filming, and Hoffman responded that he himself had stayed for the three days and three nights. Olivier famously responded, “Why don’t you just try acting?”

56. Actress Chaplin of “Game of Thrones” : OONA
Oona Chaplin is an actress from Madrid in Spain. Chaplin is getting a lot of airtime these days as she plays Talisa Maegyr on HBO’s hit fantasy series “Game of Thrones”. Oona is the granddaughter of Charlie Chaplin, and is named for her maternal grandmother Oona O’Neill. the daughter of playwright Eugene O’Neill.

57. Nail file material : EMERY
Emery is a very hard type of rock that is crushed for use as an abrasive. Emery paper is made by gluing small particles of emery to paper. Emery boards are just emery paper with a cardboard backing. And emery boards are primarily used for filing nails.

63. Alaskan city on the Seward Peninsula : NOME
Nome, Alaska has over 3,500 residents, the majority of whom are Native American. The next largest ethnic group in Nome is the white population. The origin of the name “Nome” isn’t well understood, it seems. One theory is that was a misunderstanding of the local Inupiaq word for the phrase “Where at?”

The Seward Peninsula in Alaska is a remnant of the land bridge that once connected Alaska with Siberia during the last Ice Age. The peninsula is named for Secretary of State William Seward who negotiated the purchase of Alaska from Russian.

64. Job done with a wrecking ball : DEMOLITION (giving “DEMOLITION MAN”)
“Demolition Man” is a 1993 sci-fi, action movie starring Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes. Stallone and Snipes play a police officer and a crime lord who awake in the year 2032 after being cryogenically frozen for almost 40 years. They find that society is virtually crime free.

66. Drought ender : RAIN (giving “RAIN MAN”)
“Rain Man” is an entertaining and thought-provoking film released in 1988 starring Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman. It’s all about a self-possessed yuppie (Cruise, appropriate casting!) who discovers he has a brother who is an autistic savant (Hoffman). Hoffman won the Best Actor Oscar for his performance, and “Rain Man” won the Best Picture award.

67. Last Oldsmobile model : ALERO
The Oldsmobile Alero was the last car made under the Oldsmobile brand. The Alero was produced from 1999 to 2004.

70. Windows forerunner : MS-DOS
MS-DOS (short for Microsoft Disk Operating System) was the main operating system used by IBM-compatible PCs in the eighties and for much of the nineties.

71. “___, crackle, pop” : SNAP
Snap, Crackle and Pop are three elves employed as the mascots for Kellogg’s Rice Krispies. The trio first appeared in an ad campaign in 1933, although the phrase “snap, crackle and pop” had been used for the cereal for some time in radio ads. By the way, the elves are selling “Rice Bubbles” in Australia, and the elves have different names in other parts of the world (like “Cric!, Crac! and Croc! in Quebec).

Down
3. Fait accompli : DONE DEAL
“Fait accompli” is a French term, literally translating as “accomplished fact”. It is used in English to mean “a done deal”.

8. Noted watering hole in Beverly Hills : POLO LOUNGE
The Polo Lounge is a famous dining spot in the Beverly Hills Hotel. It was used back in the thirties to display a national champion polo team’s trophy, which is how the lounge got its name.

9. Grp. of docs : AMA
American Medical Association (AMA)

12. Judd who directed “Knocked Up” : APATOW
Judd Apatow is best known for producing the TV series “Freaks and Geeks” and “Undeclared”. Not my cup of tea …

13. Play ___ (feign sleep) : POSSUM
The idiom “playing possum” means pretending to be dead. The phrase is used in recognition of the behavior of the Virginia Opossum that does just that, plays dead as a defense mechanism. We often use the term “possum” colloquially for the opossum species that live here in North America, but in fact, the true “possums” are marsupials native to Australia.

18. Therefore : ERGO
“Ergo” is the Latin word for “hence, therefore”.

26. Bon Jovi’s “Livin’ ___ Prayer” : ON A
Jon Bon Jovi was born John Francis Bongiovi, Jr., and he is the leader of the band that took his name, Bon Jovi.

27. Radical ’60s org. : SDS
Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) was an activist group in the sixties. The SDS organized the largest student strike in the history of the United States on 26 April 1968, with about a million students staying away from class that day. The “Students for a Democratic Society” name was revived in 2006 with the foundation of a new US-based student organization with left wing beliefs. Today’s SDS was founded by a pair of high school students from Greenwich Village, New York.

28. Tetley product : TEA
Tetley was founded by Joseph Tetley in Yorkshire in 1837. Joseph and his brother used to sell salt door-to-door from a pack horse and started to distribute tea the same way. They became so successful selling tea that they relocated to London. Notably, Tetley’s was the first company to introduce tea bags in the UK, back in 1953.

29. Old pulp reading : DIME NOVELS
The genre of literature called “dime novels” originated with books from the 1860s called the “Beadle’s Dime Novel” series. Some of those books cost a dime, but many went for 15 cents.

34. Pricey sports car, informally : JAG
Jaguar started out as a manufacturer of sidecars for motorcycles back in 1922, when the company was known as the Swallow Sidecar Company (SS for short). The company changed its name to Jaguar after WWII, because of the unfortunate connotations of the letters “SS” in that era (i.e. the Nazi paramilitary organization).

37. Country crooner Robbins : MARTY
Marty Robbins was a country singer-songwriter from a suburb of Phoenix, Arizona. Off the stage, Robbins was an avid fan of NASCAR and participated in quite a few races, with six finishes in the top ten.

40. Peaceful, as the simple rural life : ARCADIAN
Arcadia was a mountainous region of Ancient Greece, well known for the innocence and contentment of its people who lived a simple, pastoral life. Arcadia has been used ever since as the name of a place offering peace and simplicity.

42. Rank above midshipman: Abbr. : ENS
Ensign (Ens.)

45. Bay Area airport inits. : SFO
San Francisco International Airport (SFO) serves as the main base of operations for Virgin America, and is also the maintenance hub for United Airlines. SFO was the site of a 2013 crash of an Asiana Airlines Boeing 777 that resulted in three fatalities.

47. Egyptian king of the gods : AMEN-RA
Amun (also Amon, Amen and “Amun-Ra”) was a god in Egyptian mythology. Amun lends his name to our word “ammonia”. This is because the Romans called the ammonium chloride that they collected near the Temple of Jupiter Amun, “sal ammoniacus” (salt of Amun).

48. Coconut-flaked Girl Scout cookies : SAMOAS
The Girl Scouts of America (GSA) was a scouting organization that only existed from 1910 until about 1913. I am not sure that the GSA ever sold cookies. The Girl Scouts of the United States of America (GSUSA), which was founded in 1912 and still exists today, does sell Girl Scout Cookies every year.

49. Incubator baby, informally : PREMIE
A “preemie” (sometimes “premie”) is a preterm or premature birth.

52. “Forgive me, Father, ___ have sinned” : FOR I
“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned” are words traditionally spoken in the rite of confession in the Roman Catholic faith.

59. Bullfight bull : TORO
In Spanish, the bull (el toro) might be charging at a bullfight.

61. Tiny bit : IOTA
Iota is the ninth letter in the Greek alphabet. We use the word “iota” to portray something very small as it is the smallest of all Greek letters.

64. Beaver’s construction : DAM
Beavers build dams so that they can live in and around the slower and deeper water that builds up above the dam. This deeper water provides more protection for the beavers from predators such as bears. Beavers are nocturnal animals and do all their construction work at night.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Pill bottle contents, informally : MEDS
5. City across the bay from St. Petersburg : TAMPA
10. Lose in a dice game, with “out” : CRAP
14. Mine, in Marseille : A MOI
15. Adage : AXIOM
16. Seizure in a driveway, maybe : REPO (giving “REPO MAN”)
17. Glass slipper wearer in a fairy tale : CINDERELLA (giving “CINDERELLA MAN”)
19. “Oh, were it not so!” : ALAS!
20. Control the wheel : STEER
21. ___-mo replay : SLO
22. Les ___-Unis : ETATS
23. Pugs and poodles : DOGS
25. Valentine’s Day message : I LOVE YOU (giving “I LOVE YOU, MAN”)
27. Illegal substance for athletes : STEROID
30. (5 x 3) – (7 x 2) = ? : ONE
31. Personal ad abbr. : SWM
32. Out of juice, as a battery : DEAD (giving “DEAD MAN”)
33. Mexican city across the border from San Diego : TIJUANA
36. Witch trials city : SALEM
38. Word that follows each shaded answer to complete a film title : MAN
39. Roofing material : SLATE
43. Cake batter ingredients : RAW EGGS
46. Fe, in chemistry : IRON (giving “IRON MAN”)
47. Nile snake : ASP
50. Took part in a 53-Across : RAN
51. Special ___ (movie budget expense) : EFFECTS
53. 26-mile race : MARATHON (giving “MARATHON MAN”)
56. Actress Chaplin of “Game of Thrones” : OONA
57. Nail file material : EMERY
58. Brewery container : VAT
60. Half-diameters : RADII
63. Alaskan city on the Seward Peninsula : NOME
64. Job done with a wrecking ball : DEMOLITION (giving “DEMOLITION MAN”)
66. Drought ender : RAIN (giving “RAIN MAN”)
67. Last Oldsmobile model : ALERO
68. Has supper : EATS
69. On the ocean : ASEA
70. Windows forerunner : MS-DOS
71. “___, crackle, pop” : SNAP

Down
1. Non-Windows computers : MACS
2. Give off : EMIT
3. Fait accompli : DONE DEAL
4. Fries or coleslaw, typically : SIDE ORDER
5. Roofing material : TAR
6. x and y, on a graph : AXES
7. Prefix with liter : MILLI-
8. Noted watering hole in Beverly Hills : POLO LOUNGE
9. Grp. of docs : AMA
10. Container for oranges : CRATE
11. Track races with legs : RELAYS
12. Judd who directed “Knocked Up” : APATOW
13. Play ___ (feign sleep) : POSSUM
18. Therefore : ERGO
22. 2, 4, 6, 8, etc. : EVENS
24. Canine command : SIT
26. Bon Jovi’s “Livin’ ___ Prayer” : ON A
27. Radical ’60s org. : SDS
28. Tetley product : TEA
29. Old pulp reading : DIME NOVELS
34. Pricey sports car, informally : JAG
35. Estranges : ALIENATES
37. Country crooner Robbins : MARTY
40. Peaceful, as the simple rural life : ARCADIAN
41. Preschooler : TOT
42. Rank above midshipman: Abbr. : ENS
44. Baby’s cry : WAH!
45. Bay Area airport inits. : SFO
47. Egyptian king of the gods : AMEN-RA
48. Coconut-flaked Girl Scout cookies : SAMOAS
49. Incubator baby, informally : PREMIE
52. “Forgive me, Father, ___ have sinned” : FOR I
54. Big rock concert venue : ARENA
55. Appointed : NAMED
59. Bullfight bull : TORO
61. Tiny bit : IOTA
62. Police rank: Abbr. : INSP
64. Beaver’s construction : DAM
65. The “L” in L.A. : LOS

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One thought on “0608-15 New York Times Crossword Answers 8 Jun 15, Monday”

  1. It's a bitunusual to have such a West Coast themed grid, films, Hollywood night life. Not a complaint, just an observation.

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