Singer Anita of the swing era / TUE 3-1-22 / Hang on a sec in texts / 2010-13 HBO series set shortly after Hurricane Katrina / Eye layer containing the Iris / Actor Platt of Dear Evan Hansen

Constructor: Lisa Senzel and Jeff Chen

Relative difficulty: Easy (wink)

THEME: The BIG EASY (56A: Nickname for New Orleans, celebrated by the answers to the starred clues and suggested by the shaded squares) — a basic New Orleans trivia test (in celebration of MARDI GRAS) with a "big" "E" and a "big" "Z" at the end (the "big" letters are actually just 2x2 sections filled with the same letter four times—"E" in once case, "Z" in the other—but use your imagination...)

Theme answers:

• BAYOU (5A: *Gulf Coast waterway)
• GUMBO (1D: *Cajun stew)
• "TREMÉ" (13D: *2010-13 HBO series set shortly after Hurricane Katrina)
• BOURBON STREET 28A: *Main drag of the French Quarter)
• MARDI GRAS (34A: *Celebration with king cakes)
• ÉTOUFFÉE (37D: *Cajun shellfish-over-rice dish)
• LIVE JAZZ (40D: *Music heard at Preservation Hall)

Word of the Day: ALAIN Locke (64A: Harlem Renaissance writer Locke) —

Alain Leroy Locke (September 13, 1885 – June 9, 1954) was an American writer, philosopher, educator, and patron of the arts. Distinguished in 1907 as the first African-American Rhodes Scholar, Locke became known as the philosophical architect —the acknowledged "Dean"— of the Harlem Renaissance. He is frequently included in listings of influential African Americans. On March 19, 1968, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. proclaimed: "We're going to let our children know that the only philosophers that lived were not Plato and Aristotle, but W. E. B. Du Bois and Alain Locke came through the universe." [...] Locke was the guest editor of the March 1925 issue of the periodical Survey Graphic, for a special edition titled "Harlem, Mecca of the New Negro": about Harlem and the Harlem Renaissance, which helped educate white readers about its flourishing culture. In December of that year, he expanded the issue into The New Negro, a collection of writings by him and other African Americans, which would become one of his best-known works. A landmark in black literature (later acclaimed as the "first national book" of African America), it was an instant success. Locke contributed five essays: the "Foreword", "The New Negro", "Negro Youth Speaks", "The Negro Spirituals", and "The Legacy of Ancestral Arts". This book established his reputation as "a leading African-American literary critic and aesthete."

Locke's philosophy of the New Negro was grounded in the concept of race-building; that race is not merely an issue of hereditary but is more an issue of society and culture. He raised overall awareness of potential black equality; he said that no longer would blacks allow themselves to adjust or comply with unreasonable white requests. This idea was based on self-confidence and political awareness. Although in the past the laws regarding equality had been ignored without consequence by white America, Locke's philosophical idea of The New Negro allowed for fair treatment. Because this was an idea and not a law, people held its power. If they wanted this idea to flourish, they were the ones who would need to "enforce" it through their actions and overall points of view. (wikipedia)

• • •

There's not much to this, as a puzzle. It's an assortment of symmetrical arranged words related, with varying degrees of specificity, to MARDI GRAS (which is today, I'm guessing ... my brain is still on Pandemic Time, i.e. No Time, and the war in Ukraine isn't really helping my time/space awareness). Easy puzzle, easy trivia test, EZ. The one thing that elevates it slightly is that "EZ" gimmick at the bottom of the grid. The gimmick doesn't really work, visually. I thought maybe the newspaper version has just one "big" cell for the "E" and the "Z," but it looks like there are just four regular cells shaded gray. You have to draw your own "big" letters at the end. The app probably changes those cells to big cells at the end, along with some confetti visual effects and music and other bells & whistles nonsense. Just hypothesizing. Anyway, there are four "E"s and four "Z"s and the "big" is in your heart, if you even have one, you monster (this is me talking to me now). Still, I like the "Z" corner a lot. Normally when someone tries to cram a lot of Scrabbly letters into a small corner, the results are very much not worth it and I cry 'foul." But today, that little section is the most entertaining part of the puzzle by far. "BZZT!" is oddly charming, and then throw in LIZZO (an accomplished flutist) playing some LIVE JAZZ at Preservation Hall, and you've got a very FIZZy corner. They also managed to fit not one but two political liberation movements in there (civil rights, women's LIB). Yes, I'm quite taken with this corner. I also think BOURBON STREET over MARDI GRAS looks great as a big bold stack right at the heart of the grid. The rest of it doesn't get much above a connect-the-dots level of interest. But maybe the visual gimmick is enough. It's breezy, it's easy, the mood is nice and festive ... it's hard to be mad at a MARDI GRAS puzzle, is what I'm saying.

The fill skews crosswordesey due at least in part to the way the grid is built, i.e. with a ton of 3- / 4- / 5-letter answers. UVEA YURT and ALOU O'DAY and so on. The once-ubiquitous NEVE even makes a reappearance. Lots and lots of repeaters, but you can just fill them in and move on, and they don't really detract much from the main event, i.e. the theme (or, as I'm calling it today, the THEMÉ). 

Today I learned that the Gr. word for "cloud" is nephos (46A: What nephology is the study of => CLOUDS). I also learned that "nephology" isn't used much any more as a meteorological term. I was then reminded (by my own curiosity and googling) that "nephrology" is the study of the kidneys, and "phrenology" is a pseudoscience involving the measuring of cranial bumps—it's also a fantastic album by The Roots.

Maybe next year we'll get a king cake-themed puzzle and we'll have to find a BABY somewhere in the grid. I am deadly serious. And hungry. Please, constructors, get on this. [nevermind, it seems my wish has already come true]:

See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

P.S. BRB = "be right back" (29D: "Hang on a sec," in texts)

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