Train in the Washington-Baltimore area / SUN 10-13-24 / Texter's shrug / Attack, medieval-style / ___ Le Gallienne, star of 1920s Broadway / ___ Owl, one of the superheroes in "Watchmen" / Flood-prone area

Constructor: Gary Larson and Doug Peterson

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "Manual Dexterity" — familiar phrases clued as hypothetical titles for "manuals" of various types, where the first part of the phrase is a rough synonym of "Understanding" ...

Theme answers:

• KNOWING THE SCORE (23A: Title for a tutorial on musical composition?)
• GOING OVER THE TOP (41A: ... a primer on playing dreidel?)
• PICKING UP STEAM (57A: ... a volume on vapor dynamics?)
• LEARNING CURVES (83A: ... a step-by-step guide for throwing breaking balls?)
• GETTING YOUR GOAT (97A: ... a handbook on raising kids?)
• TACKLING DUMMIES (120A: ... a D.I.Y. manual on other D.I.Y. manuals?)

Word of the Day: EVA Le Gallienne (91A: ___ Le Gallienne, star of 1920s Broadway) —

[in title role of Peter Pan]

Eva Le Gallienne (January 11, 1899 – June 3, 1991) was a British-born American stage actress, producer, director, translator, and author. A Broadway star by age 21, in 1926 she left Broadway behind to found the Civic Repertory Theatre, where she served as director, producer, and lead actress. Noted for her boldness and idealism, she was a pioneering figure in the American theater, setting the stage for the Off-Broadway and regional theater movements that swept the country later in the 20th century.

Le Gallienne devoted herself to the art of the theater as opposed to the show business of Broadway. She felt strongly that high-quality plays should be affordable and accessible to all people who wanted to see them. She ran the Civic Repertory Theatre for seven years (1926–1934), producing 37 plays during that time with a company whose actors included Burgess Meredith, John Garfield, Norman Lloyd, J. Edward Bromberg, Paul Leyssac, Florida Friebus, David Manners, Josephine Hutchinson, Alla Nazimova, Joseph Schildkraut, and Leona Roberts. [...] Le Gallienne starred as Peter Pan in the production that opened at the Civic Rep on November 6, 1928. The flying effects were superbly designed, and for the first time Peter flew out over the heads of the audience. The critics loved "LeG," as she became known, and more than a few favored her performance over that of Maude Adams, the first to play the role on Broadway. The Civic Repertory Theatre presented Peter Pan 129 times. [...] Le Gallienne was a lesbian, and was as open about her love of women as it was possible to be in her day. Robert Schanke, who published a biography of Le Gallienne in 1992, claimed that she struggled with her sexual orientation throughout her life. But, such assertions are contradicted by Le Gallienne's own letters and diaries, in which she wrote confidently about her romantic relationships with women. (wikipedia)

• • •

Blew through this with very little sense of what was happening. It took a while to register that these were hypothetical manual titles—the puzzle title didn't really register, so all I could see was a bunch of punny stuff happening. But you have a fairly tight and consistent theme here: the themers are all gerund phrases where the gerund can be a rough synonym of "understanding" and the object of the gerund is some noun that has (for the purpose of the pun) changed its original meaning (e.g. you have to reimagine the meaning of SCORE, THE TOP, etc.). On a very technical level, there's a certain amount of inconsistency when it comes to the pun changing the meaning of the terms in the base phrase. For instance, the KNOWING in KNOWING THE SCORE doesn't change meaning in the pun, only THE SCORE does, whereas the GOING OVER in GOING OVER THE TOP definitely changes meaning. The objects of the gerunds all change meaning in the puns except STEAM, which remains water vapor in the base phrase and the pun phrase. Ideally, both gerund and object of gerund change meaning in the pun, and that's what happens ... mostly. Well, two-thirds of the time. I told you this was all "very technical"! I think because the theme isn't terribly exciting, the technical inconsistencies are standing out to me. I will say that punwise, I really liked GOING OVER THE TOP, and I loved the punchline—that final themer is far and away the best themer, in that it's kind of a meta-themer, and it (appropriately) gets the place of honor there at the very end (bottom) of the puzzle. DUMMIES™ is a very popular series of instructional reference books, and yes, we all know it as the "FOR DUMMIES" series, but (technically!) the brand name is just "DUMMIES." Hey, according to wikipedia: "A spin-off board game, Crosswords for Dummies, was produced in the late 1990s." Anyone own that? (I'm almost certain Shortz does, but anyone else!?).

[That does, in fact, look dumb]

As for difficulty or sticking points today ... my printed-out / marked-up grid has almost no ink on it, which means nothing (much) happened. Nothing of note. There were no weirdnesses or slow patches or anything. I winced at the "word" ACTUATE (36A: Put into motion), but I don't have any other strong negative feelings. I don't have too many strong positive feelings either, though I do think a lot of the longer non-theme phrases are really solid. OIL CHANGE, "BELIEVE ME," INGRATES, SWAN SONG, LIMO RIDE, CUE CARDS. The puzzle's got good, if not particularly sparkly, bones. It just didn't make much of an impression on me one way or the other ... though there are a few moments that stood out. The very elaborate clue on NONE, for instance (31A: How many elements of the periodic table have the letter "J" in their names). This is the most useless trivia of all time—I love it! Why not? Make it strange! It's not like that clue slowed me down—only NONE FOUR FIVE and NINE would even fit in the space, so it's not like this clue's going to hold you up for very long ... any answer but NONE would've hardly seemed worth the clue. I guess at N-NE you could've thought, "I dunno, might be NINE," but come on: you can't name one ('cause there aren't any), and you think there might be NINE? Implausible. Calling attention to boring answers by making them super-hard: boo. Calling attention to them by making them weird as hell: hurray! 

[61D: Water brand whose name is an adjective in reverse (EVIAN)]

Other answers that stood out include TILT AT (as in windmills, as in Don Quixote, which technically isn't "medieval," though DQ is certainly imitating knights from the medieval romances he reads, so ... it works) (100D: Attack, medieval-style) and SAAG paneer (high-fived myself for remembering that one without any help from crosses) (25D: ___ paneer (Indian dish)). Earlier today, in a different puzzle, I also remembered that ALOO (on an Indian menu) meant "potato"—two for two with the Indian menu terms, despite not having had Indian cuisine in what feels like an awfully long time. NAAN (flatbread) ROTI (also flatbread) DAL (lentils) LASSI (yogurt drink) ATTA (flour)–these are your Indian food crossword staples, but occasionally you get a SAAG (spinach or other leafy green) or an ALOO (potato) or a BIRYANI (a seasoned rice dish) (three appearances, though one of those was spelled BIRIYANI, just FYI). PANEER, a type of curd cheese, has not yet appeared in the NYTXW, but now you're prepared for when it (inevitably) does.

Bullets:

• 50A: On which Maya Rudolph has played Kamala Harris, in brief (SNL) — "On which" is such a weird way to start a clue. Could you really not afford the ink (or real estate) it would take to write "Show on which..."? 
• 91A: ___ Le Gallienne, star of 1920s Broadway (EVA) — the one true "WTF" of the day. But relative obscurities are highly tolerable when they don't hold me up for that long, and when they end up being as fascinating as EVA Le Gallienne (see "Word of the Day," above). She was cover-of-Time big. Fame is bizarrely fleeting, even for the very famous. A few generations, and poof. Gone. Think about this the next time you're tempted to say, to someone much younger than you, "How could you not know ___?" 
• 104A: It's going around (ORBITER) — one of the few clues that took some work on my part. Nice misdirection, in that the clue looks like it wants a disease of some kind, but no, just something ... going around ... another thing (presumably a heavenly body of some sort). 
• 10A: Train in the Washington-Baltimore area (MARC) — Maryland Area Rail Commuter. News to me. The only MARC I know is painter MARC Chagall and painter Franz MARC. OK, I know a few more, but I had to look them up to remember. 

[Blue Horses, by Franz MARC (1911) (It's at the Walker in Minneapolis!? How exciting (to me). Definitely making a point of seeing this baby next time I'm in the Twin Cities (December!). I've been to Mpls dozens of times, how have I never been to the Walker? Crazy]

• 1D: Texter's shrug (IDK) — after IRL yesterday and IDK today, I feel like I should hold a mini-textspeak tutorial (like the Indian food tutorial, above). Maybe soon... (these tutorials are as much for myself as they are for you, frankly)
• 59D: King maker? (SERTA) — they (presumably) make "king"-sized mattresses.
• 
  116D: ___ Owl, one of the superheroes in "Watchmen" (NITE) — First, love the reference to one of the greatest works of sequential art ever produced. One of my favorite books of the 20th century (that includes all books, not just comics). Second ... well, sorry (not sorry) to bring this up, but ... uh, technically ... I mean technically technically ... NITE Owl (like Batman) is not a superhero. He's just a guy. No superhuman powers. See, the whole point is that the Watchmen are just ordinary humans who are inspired (by comics) to become masked crimefighters IRL. Eventually, because of a laboratory accident, a nuclear scientist (Dr. Jon Osterman) is radically transformed into a being (later named Dr. Manhattan) who does have superpowers, but those powers are so super that they actually make him scary af—beyond human comprehension, and ultimately uncontrollable—so the whole notion of what "super" means, and how "power" is used, really gets called into question by ... OK, see, I told you it was technical. Nevermind. Sure, NITE Owl is a "superhero," whatever, man. Close enough. 

See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]