0426-23 NY Times Crossword 26 Apr 23, Wednesday

Constructed by: Aaron M. Rosenberg
Edited by: Will Shortz

Today’s Reveal Answer: Vertigo

Themed answers all refer to the excellent movie “VERTIGO”, and said answers are arranged in a dizzying pattern in the grid:

  • 58A 1958 film that is the subject of this puzzle : VERTIGO
  • 21A Dizzying camera technique invented for 58-Across : DOLLY ZOOM
  • 31A Structure climbed in the climactic scene of 58-Across : TOWER
  • 24D “Master of Suspense” who directed 58-Across : HITCHCOCK
  • 27D 58-Across co-star James : STEWART
  • 37D 58-Across co-star Kim : NOVAK

Bill’s time: 9m 07s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

16 Female hamster : DOE

The rodents known as hamsters are commonly kept as house pets. Male hamsters are called bucks, females are called does, and baby hamsters are known as pups.

21 Dizzying camera technique invented for 58-Across : DOLLY ZOOM

A dolly is a small platform on rollers, especially on a movie set. Apparently, it is so called because it’s supposed to look like a doll. No, it doesn’t. I don’t believe that …

23 Four Corners state with six corners : UTAH

When viewed on a map of the US, the state of Utah has six sides. It’s almost shaped like a rectangle, but there is a “bite” out of that rectangle in the northeast corner of the state.

The Four Corners region of the US surrounds the meeting point of the four states of Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah. The Four Corners is the only point in the US that is shared by four states.

26 Stingy sort? : WASP

While wasps are considered a nuisance by many, they are very important to the agricultural industry. Wasps prey on many pest insects, while having very little impact on crops.

29 Lecterns : PODIA

“Podium” (plural “podia”) is the Latin word for “raised platform”.

47 Ulysses S. Grant’s given name at birth : HIRAM

Ulysses S. Grant (USG) was born Hiram Ulysses Grant in 1822 in Point Pleasant, Ohio. At the request of Grant’s father, US Congressman Thomas L. Hamer nominated 16-year-old Ulysses to West Point. Hamer mistakenly wrote the young lad’s name as “Ulysses S. Grant”, and so that became the future president’s adopted name.

49 Chicago exchange, informally, with “the” : … MERC

The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (the “Merc”) started its life as the Chicago Butter and Egg Board in 1898. The Merc is the site for exchange of commodities, among other things.

50 Filmmaker Lee : ANG

Ang Lee made history at the 74th Academy Awards in 2002 when he won the Best Director award for “Brokeback Mountain.” He became the first Asian person to win the award and the first non-white person to win in the category.

51 Hatcher of “Desperate Housewives” : TERI

Teri Hatcher’s most famous role is the Susan Mayer character on the TV comedy-drama “Desperate Housewives”. I’ve never seen more than a few minutes of “Housewives” but I do know Teri Hatcher as a Bond girl, as she appeared in “Tomorrow Never Dies”. More recently, she portrayed Lois Lane on the show “Lois & Clark”.

The TV drama “Desperate Housewives” ran for eight seasons. During pre-production, the show was called “Wisteria Lane” and then “The Secret Lives of Housewives”. The “desperate housewives” lived on the fictional Wisteria Lane in the fictional town of Fairview in the fictional Eagle State. That’s a lot of fiction …

52 Bullets, e.g. : AMMO

The word “munitions” describes materials and equipment used in war. The term derives from the Latin “munitionem” meaning “fortification, defensive wall”. Back in the 17th century, French soldiers referred to such materials as “la munition”, a Middle French term. This was misheard as “l’ammunition”, and as a result we ended up importing the word “ammunition” (often shortened to “ammo”), a term that we now use mainly to describe the material fired from a weapon.

53 ___ Sutra : KAMA

The “Kama Sutra” is renowned for its descriptions of positions that can be used for sexual intercourse, but the sutra includes many other texts that deal with various matters of a sexual nature, including how to woo a woman, the conduct of a “chief wife”, the conduct of “other wives”, how to make money as a courtesan, and much more.

55 “Stubborn things,” per John Adams : FACTS

According to John Adams:

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.

Adams uttered those words when he was still a lawyer, and while representing the British soldiers who killed five civilians in what came to be known as the Boston Massacre.

John Adams was the second President of the United States. I must admit that I learned much of what I know about President Adams in the excellent, excellent HBO series “John Adams”, which is based on David McCullough’s 2001 biography of the same name. Having said that, I have also visited the Adams home in Quincy, Massachusetts several times. He was clearly a great man with a great intellect …

56 Possible focus of an M.R.I., in brief : ACL

The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is one of four major ligaments that support the knee. It is located in the center of the knee and connects the femur (thigh bone) to the tibia (shin bone).

58 1958 film that is the subject of this puzzle : VERTIGO

“Vertigo” is a 1958 Alfred Hitchcock film that’s based on a 1954 novel “D’entre les morts” (“From Among the Dead”) by Boileau-Narcejac. Jimmy Stewart stars as a retired San Francisco police detective who has developed an extreme fear of heights. Stewart’s character is hired to trail someone’ wife, played by Kim Novak.

67 Bill advocating for science : NYE

That would be “Bill Nye the Science Guy”. In addition to his career as a science educator, Nye is also a comedian. He performed stand-up comedy during his early years as an engineer.

69 Genre for the Mighty Mighty Bosstones : SKA

The Mighty Mighty Bosstones is a ska punk band that formed in 1983 in Boston. The band hosts an annual music festival in Boston around Christmas that is known as the Hometown Throwdown. The band’s frontman, Dicky Barrett, was the announcer for the late-night talk show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” from 2004 until 2022.

71 Vessel for a nursery rhyme trio : TUB

The nursery rhyme “Rub-a-Dub-Dub” dates back to at least 1798 when it was first published in London:

Rub-a-dub-dub,
Three men in a tub,
And how do you think they got there?
The butcher, the baker,
The candlestick-maker,
They all jumped out of a rotten potato,
‘Twas enough to make a man stare.

Down

2 Mr. in a 1983 Styx hit : ROBOTO

“Mr. Roboto” is a song on the 1983 album “Kilroy Was Here” by the Chicago band Styx. The first lines of the song are:

Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto,
Mata ah-oo hima de
Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto,
Himitsu wo shiri tai

which translates as:

Thank you very much, Mr. Robot
Until the day (we) meet again
Thank you very much, Mr. Robot
I want to know your secret

4 Sault ___ Marie, Mich. : STE

“Sault Ste. Marie” is the name of two cities on either side of the Canada-US border, one in Ontario and the other in Michigan. The two cities were originally one settlement in the 17th century, established by Jesuit Missionaries. The missionaries gave the settlement the name “Sault Sainte Marie”, which can be translated as “Saint Mary’s Falls”. The city was one community until 1817, when a US-UK Joint Boundary Commission set the border along the St. Mary’s River.

7 Noted Venetian marketplace : RIALTO

The Rialto is the financial and commercial center of Venice, and has been so for centuries. One of the most famous features of the area is the Rialto Bridge that spans the Grand Canal.

8 Award with a Best Play category : ESPY

The ESPY Awards, also known as the Excellence in Sports Performance Yearly Awards, were first presented in a ceremony in 1993. The ESPYs were created by ESPN as a response to the lack of sports coverage during the summer months. ESPN decided to create an awards show to help fill that gap.

9 The gamut : A TO Z

In medieval times, the musical scale was denoted by the notes “ut, re, mi, fa, sol, la”. The term “gamma ut”, shortened to “gamut”, was used to describe the whole scale. By the 1620s, “gamut” was being used to mean the entire range of anything, the whole gamut.

10 Cops, in slang : PO-PO

“To cop” was northern-English dialect for “to seize, catch”, and is still a slang term meaning “to get hold of, steal”. This verb evolved in the noun “copper”, describing a policeman, someone who catches criminals. “Copper” is often shortened to “cop”.

12 Bagel go-with : LOX

Lox is a brine-cured salmon filet that is finely sliced. The term “lox” comes into English via Yiddish, and derives from the German word for salmon, namely “Lachs”.

24 “Master of Suspense” who directed 58-Across : HITCHCOCK
27 58-Across co-star James : STEWART

Alfred Hitchcock was an English film director from Leytonstone, just outside London. A very good friend of mine is a close friend of one of his granddaughters, and met “Hitch” many times in her youth. She tells a very nice story of sitting in a restaurant with the family when someone came over to the table to say “hi”. That was Jimmy Stewart …

28 Indication of learnedness, for short : PHD

“Ph.D.” is an abbreviation for “philosophiae doctor”, Latin for “teacher of philosophy”. Often, candidates for a PhD already hold a bachelor’s and a master’s degree, so a PhD might be considered a “third degree”.

33 Allhallows ___ : EVE

All Saints’ Day is November 1st each year. The day before All Saints’ Day is All Hallows’ Eve, better known by the Scottish term “Halloween”.

34 Novelist Philip : ROTH

Author Philip Roth’s two most famous works are probably his 1959 novella “Goodbye, Columbus” for which he won a National Book Award, and his extremely controversial 1969 novel “Portnoy’s Complaint”. The latter title was banned in some libraries in the US, and was listed as a “prohibited import” in Australia. The controversy surrounded Roth’s treatment of the sexuality of the main character, a young Jewish bachelor undergoing psychoanalysis for his “complaint”.

37 58-Across co-star Kim : NOVAK

Kim Novak is a retired actress from Chicago who is perhaps best known for playing both Judy Barton and Madeleine Ester in the HItchcock classic “Vertigo” from 1958. Novak effectively retired from acting in the early sixties, making only a handful of appearances in the eighties and nineties.

40 Deer stalker : PUMA

The mountain lion is found in much of the Americas from the Yukon in Canada right down to the southern Andes in South America. Because the mountain lion is found over such a vast area, it has many different names applied by local peoples, such as “cougar” and “puma”. In fact, the mountain lion holds the Guinness record for the animal with the most number of different names, with over 40 in English alone.

42 Operation Overlord locale : NORMANDY

Normandy is a region in northern France that is named for the Normans, a people descended from Norse Vikings who arrived from Denmark, Iceland and Norway. The term “Norman” comes from “Norsemen, men from the north”.

The Allied Invasion of Normandy during WWII was given the codename “Operation Overlord”. The Normandy landings that kicked off the invasion on D-Day (6 June 1944) were given the codename “Operation Neptune”.

46 Way to travel, for many tourists : ON A VISA

A visa is usually a stamp in one’s passport, an indication that one is authorized to enter (and less often, to exit) a particular country. The word “visa” comes into English, via French, from the Latin expression “charta visa” meaning “paper that has been seen”, or “verified paper”.

54 Many-eyed giant of myth : ARGUS

Argus Panoptes was a monster of Greek mythology. “Panoptes” means “all-seeing”, so over time Argus has been described as having many, many eyes. Argus was noted for being alert, always keeping some eyes open when sleeping. This characteristic led to Argus being used for a vigilant person, and has been adopted as the name for many newspapers. After the monster died, the goddess Hera transferred Argus’s eyes to the tail of the peacock.

55 Guinness Book adjective : FIRST

“The Guinness Book of World Records” holds some records of its own. It is the best-selling, copyrighted series of books of all time and is one of the books most often stolen from public libraries! The book was first published in 1954 by two twins, Norris and Ross McWhirter. The McWhirter twins found themselves with a smash hit, and eventually became very famous in Britain hosting a TV show based on world records.

57 Display options, in brief : LEDS

A light-emitting diode (LED) is a specialized form of semiconductor that when switched on releases photons (light). LEDs were used in early digital watches, and are getting more and more popular even though their use in electronic equipment is fading away. LEDs are used as replacements for the much less-efficient tungsten light bulbs. I replaced all of my tungsten Xmas lights many years ago and saved a lot on my electricity bill.

61 Peanut product : OIL

I have to say it, but it drives me crazy. Peanuts aren’t nuts. They’re legumes, a plant in the bean and pea family. The flowers of the peanut plant last only one day and then wither. The fertilized ovary develops an elongated “peg” that grows downwards, pushing the ovary down into the soil. The ovary develops underground into a mature peanut pod containing between one and four seeds, which we call “nuts”. But they aren’t nuts. Did I say that already …?

63 Big Apple sch. with campuses in Abu Dhabi and Shanghai : NYU

The main campus of the private New York University (NYU) is located right in Manhattan, in Washington Square in the heart of Greenwich Village. NYU has over 12,000 resident students, the largest number of residents in a private school in the whole country. NYU’s sports teams are known as the Violets, a reference to the violet and white colors that are worn in competition. Since the 1980s, the school’s mascot has been a bobcat. “Bobcat” had been the familiar name given to NYU’s Bobst Library computerized catalog.

64 Interior secretary Haaland : DEB

Deb Haaland became US Secretary of the Interior in 2021, making her the first Native-American Cabinet secretary. However, she was not the first Native American to serve in the Cabinet. That honor went to Charles Curtis, US Vice President under Herbert Hoover.

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 Acronym in genetic sequencing : CRISPR
7 Collect : REAP
11 Sort : ILK
14 Steamy brew : HOT TEA
15 Part of an analogy : IS TO
16 Female hamster : DOE
17 One way to be marked : ABSENT
18 Result of extreme rage : APOPLEXY
20 How-___ : TOS
21 Dizzying camera technique invented for 58-Across : DOLLY ZOOM
23 Four Corners state with six corners : UTAH
25 It may punctuate a sarcastic remark : NOT!
26 Stingy sort? : WASP
29 Lecterns : PODIA
31 Structure climbed in the climactic scene of 58-Across : TOWER
35 To the ___ degree : NTH
36 Camel and sand, for example : TANS
38 Gave a wide berth, say : AVOIDED
40 Nickname for Francisco, often : PANCHO
43 Bow-shaped woodworking tool : FRET SAW
44 Unsettling cry to hear during a haircut : UH-OH!
45 Empty space : VOID
47 Ulysses S. Grant’s given name at birth : HIRAM
49 Chicago exchange, informally, with “the” : … MERC
50 Filmmaker Lee : ANG
51 Hatcher of “Desperate Housewives” : TERI
52 Bullets, e.g. : AMMO
53 ___ Sutra : KAMA
55 “Stubborn things,” per John Adams : FACTS
56 Possible focus of an M.R.I., in brief : ACL
58 1958 film that is the subject of this puzzle : VERTIGO
60 Goofing off : MONKEYING AROUND
65 Help : AID
66 Minor quarrels : DUST-UPS
67 Bill advocating for science : NYE
68 Thickness : PLY
69 Genre for the Mighty Mighty Bosstones : SKA
70 {2, 4, 6, 8}, e.g. : SET
71 Vessel for a nursery rhyme trio : TUB

Down

1 Flirt with, in a way : CHAT UP
2 Mr. in a 1983 Styx hit : ROBOTO
3 “What a shame” : IT’S SAD
4 Sault ___ Marie, Mich. : STE
5 Await resolution : PEND
6 Betray, in a way : RAT ON
7 Noted Venetian marketplace : RIALTO
8 Award with a Best Play category : ESPY
9 The gamut : A TO Z
10 Cops, in slang : PO-PO
11 Cry after being narrowly defeated : I DEMAND A RECOUNT!
12 Bagel go-with : LOX
13 Critical : KEY
19 Simmer setting : LOW
22 Bucketsful : LOTS
24 “Master of Suspense” who directed 58-Across : HITCHCOCK
27 58-Across co-star James : STEWART
28 Indication of learnedness, for short : PHD
30 “That feels goo-oo-ood!” : AAH!
32 One of 17 in New Orleans : WARD
33 Allhallows ___ : EVE
34 Novelist Philip : ROTH
37 58-Across co-star Kim : NOVAK
39 “Do we have the green light?” : IS IT A GO?
40 Deer stalker : PUMA
41 [I’m standing right here] : [AHEM!]
42 Operation Overlord locale : NORMANDY
43 Hallucination, e.g. : FIGMENT
46 Way to travel, for many tourists : ON A VISA
48 Prefix with demeanor or behavior : MIS-
54 Many-eyed giant of myth : ARGUS
55 Guinness Book adjective : FIRST
57 Display options, in brief : LEDS
59 Product in a snail-shaped dispenser : TAPE
60 Plan (out) : MAP
61 Peanut product : OIL
62 Chortle : YUK
63 Big Apple sch. with campuses in Abu Dhabi and Shanghai : NYU
64 Interior secretary Haaland : DEB

5 thoughts on “0426-23 NY Times Crossword 26 Apr 23, Wednesday”

  1. 13:00 no errors. Don’t think I’ve seen VERTIGO. Kept thinking of North by Northwest and the face of Mt. Rushmore. James STEWART? Any relative of James the Greek?

  2. 24:25 NW consumed an inordinate amount of time for me, was not familiar with “CRISPR”…..I am now….

  3. 24:11. All kinds of missteps too numerous to mention.

    Bill’s out partying in Europe like at the beginning of the year. Sounds good to me…

    Best –

  4. I too thought it was North by Northwest. Loved the VERTIGO movie. My mom used to tell me grandma was terrified watching that movie. Mom loved these movies.

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