Something often seen with trunks / SAT 3-19-2022 / It means "father of" in Arabic / Like part of a dress affected by static cling, say / British pop star with more "Ed Sullivan Show" appearances than the Beatles / Silent film star known as the "Man of a Thousand Faces" / Along with the anteater, one of two animals in the order Pilosa

Constructor: Ryan McCarty

Relative difficulty: medium, maybe medium-hard? idk


THEME: none

Word of the Day: SAM (___ Taylor-Johnson, director of "Fifty Shades of Grey") —

Samantha Louise Taylor-Johnson OBE (née Taylor-Wood; 4 March 1967) is a British filmmaker and photographer. Her directorial feature film debut was 2009's Nowhere Boy, a film based on the childhood experiences of the Beatles songwriter and singer John Lennon. She is one of a group of artists known as the Young British Artists.

...

Taylor-Johnson directed the film adaptation of E. L. James' best-selling erotic novel, Fifty Shades of Grey, made by Universal Pictures and Focus Features. She was chosen from a list that included Angelina Jolie, Steven Soderbergh, Ryan Murphy, Joe Wright, and Gus Van Sant. Taylor-Johnson was in pole position to direct Fifty Shades Darker (the sequel to Fifty Shades of Grey), but decided to walk away from the much-discussed franchise after she was involved in a number of disagreements with author E.L. James. In June 2017, Taylor-Johnson said that she regretted directing the first film. 

• • •

Once again, it's me, occasional indie constructor Christopher Adams, stepping in for a weekend of guest blogging. You may know me from such places as the recently expanded AVCX, where I'm one of the editors for the AVCX+ puzzle. Well worth subscribing if you're not already⁠, and lots of bangers so far—including one co-constructed by today's constructor, Ryan McCarty.

Given the byline, I expected a wide open middle (just like most puzzles at his website, including one from Thursday that I quite enjoyed), and this didn't disappoint on that front. But it's probably because it's in the NYT, and not on a blog (or through the AVCX+, where we're committed to showcasing constructor's voices and personalities), that I didn't enjoy this one anywhere near as much.

Comparing, to, say, the above-linked blog puzzle (seriously, go solve that, this blog post will still be here waiting for you when you're done), the central chasm just doesn't feel as fresh. Not that there's anything wrong with it; it just feels like exactly the sort of thing that would fit in the Times. Like, there's two old white dudes (LON CHANEY and DAVE CLARK, the latter of whom I've *never* heard of, and doubt most solvers my age or younger will know) anchoring those downs, along with PUNISHERS, which...eh, it's not the worst as far as roll-your-own -ER(S) forms go, and by definition *something* has to be the worst entry here, and it's perfectly serviceable in terms of holding the rest together (especially the across entries, which were much more fun comparatively speaking), but nobody's writing home about PUNISHERS.

I refuse to link to anything involving DAVE CLARK or DAN Levy (who I *cannot* stand), but here's John OLIVER [17A: Comedian John who is said to resemble a love child of Harry Potter and Owl from "Winnie-the-Pooh"] ranting about Ticketmaster.

Anyway, the above is not to say I didn't like this; I did, but it's not my favorite. And outside of the center, the fill is largely "yup, gotta fill out these corners, with minimal flexibility thanks to the center". Not much stood out here in terms of fill—maybe MODERN FIT, but that's arguably more center chasm than corner, as well as CHOCULA. But also some stuff like US VISAS, THE PO, GRIPPE, etc. that felt more meh than yeah.

Cluewise, a lot of it felt ho-hum—in going through those corners just now, I was struck by how much seemed to be pretty straightforward, if perhaps a little difficult due to vagueness. I absolutely loved the clue for OLIVER (and would love to see the citation for that clue) but otherwise two question mark clues ([Act huffy?] for PANT and [Came out of the blue?] for CHEERED UP), the occasional fun fact ([Currency whose name means, literally, "round"] for YEN, e.g.), and the one sneaky bit of wordplay ([Schoolmaster for the classroom, e.g.] for ANAGRAM) were about the only clues I actually enjoyed.

TL;DR the NYT stifles voices; this is a perfectly cromulent puzzle if you're Will Shortz worried about all the sweet, sweet cash you will personally rake in reprinting this for people who buy books of crosswords in airport bookstores, but otherwise, you can get puzzles with just as good (and, almost always, better) fill from the same constructors from other outlets, except the clues actually sound like they were written by a real human being. Support your local indie constructors.

[ETA: in the previous paragraph I made a tongue in cheek joke about money from reprints; I was under the impression (from discussions with other constructors, etc.) that this was a major income source for Will, and have since been informed by a reliable source that this is not the case and Will does not personally make money from these reprints. This note is to both apologize for that error and make that clear to anyone reading this; my general point about the concern for evergreen puzzles that can be solved years and years from now, sometimes (imo) to the detriment of the solving experience in the here and now, still stands, though.]

Olio:

• THE PO (Italy's longest river) — No. Stop putting THE in crossword entries where it doesn't belong. PO is the name of the river. I don't care that people might say the THE in the real world; that doesn't make it any less of a bullshit crossword entry.
• ANAGRAM (Schoolmaster for the classroom, e.g.) — No trouble plunking this one in; it helps that I've seen this anagram before, and at a certain point, between constructing and solving enough puzzles, you kinda just get a sixth sense for anagram clues like this.
• TYPOS (Unwanted autocorrection) — guess how many typos (autocorrected or otherwise) I made in writing up this post; closest answer wins* a prize**. [disclaimer: there is no prize, nobody wins]
• ABU (It means "father of" in Arabic) — Had BIN here first, but quickly checked the downs because it could also be IBN, and BIOLAB seemed to confirm that change, but nope, neither IBN nor BIN were right.
• GENE (Good name for a biologist?) — In general, not a fan of these clues; they're almost always "homophone of [other word]" clues in disguise. (And, for what it's worth, this clue kinda dupes BIOLAB.)
• SAM (___ Taylor-Johnson, director of "Fifty Shades of Grey") — As far as I can tell, this is the only explicit female representation in the grid, and it references a film that the director was nominated for a Razzie for (and that she regrets directing), instead of her other, better, more known work.

Yours in puzzling, Christopher Adams, Court Jester of CrossWorld

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