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Skewered Indonesian dish / TUE 1-28-25 / Wagner heroine / Old-fashioned prelude to a duel / Mononymous Irish singer / Old TV series featuring the creepy main character Barnabas Collins / Virus first discovered in 1976 / "Honor Thy Father" author
Tuesday, January 28, 2025
Constructor: Dan Margolis
Relative difficulty: Easy
THEME: Types of rye bread, with a twist
Theme answers:
- 17-A: The 68 participants in the N.C.A.A. March Madness tournament, e.g. = SEEDED TEAMS
- 28-A: Michelangelo's David and the Venus de Milo, for two = MARBLE STATUES
- 47-A: Purim or Rosh Hashanah = JEWISH HOLIDAY
- 61-A: Old TV series featuring the creepy main character Barnabas Collins = DARK SHADOWS
Word of the Day: DARK SHADOWS (61A)
Dark Shadows is an American gothic soap opera that aired weekdays on the ABC television network from June 27, 1966, to April 2, 1971. The show depicted the lives, loves, trials, and tribulations of the wealthy Collins family of Collinsport, Maine, where a number of supernatural occurrences take place.The series became popular when vampire Barnabas Collins (Jonathan Frid) was introduced ten months into its run. It would also feature ghosts, werewolves, zombies, man-made monsters, witches, warlocks, time travel, and a parallel universe. A small company of actors each played many roles; as actors came and went, some characters were played by more than one actor. The show was distinguished by its melodramatic performances, atmospheric interiors, numerous dramatic plot twists, broad cosmos of characters, and heroic adventures. Unusual among the soap operas of its time, which were aimed primarily at adults, Dark Shadows developed a large teenage audience and a dedicated cult following. By 1969, it had become ABC's highest-rated daytime series.
The original network run of the show amassed 1,225 episodes. The success of the series spawned a media franchise that has included two feature films (House of Dark Shadows in 1970 and Night of Dark Shadows in 1971), a 1991 TV remake, an unsprouted 2004 remake pilot, a 2012 film reboot directed by Tim Burton, and numerous spin-off novels and comics. Since 2006, the series has continued as a range of audio dramas produced by Big Finish Productions, featuring members of the original cast including David Selby, Lara Parker, and Kathryn Leigh Scott.
Matt Gaffney here filling in for Rex, who's cloud-surfing behind a hot-air balloon over Nova Scotia as I write these very words (I'm guessing).
SEEDED, MARBLE, JEWISH, and DARK are all descriptors of well-known types of rye bread. And then we get an unusually-placed revealer at 68-/69-A: [With 69-Across, courtroom directive ... or, homophonically, what the starts of 17-, 28-, 47-and 61-Across are] = ALL RISE (i.e. "ryes")
So that's a decent theme -- tight set and as far as Google knows it hasn't been done before, plus the revealer ties it up nicely in a bow.
P.S. hey, Rex here. Just wanted to add a few notes while I've got time this morning.
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85 comments:
Thanks Matt! Succinct and clarifying (I didn’t understand the theme until I read your comment),
Wow, record brief writeup, Matt! "Well known types of rye bread"... I'll have to take your word for that; I may have heard of "dark rye" but none of the others.
I did this down clues only and it started slow but ended up very well; I didn't have to "cheat" at all. Which is actually remarkable, considering I had no idea what the relation between the theme answers was, since I didn't read any across clues so missed the tricky 68/69 across revealers. I thought DARK SHADOWS must be the revealer but had not the slightest idea how. TEAMS, STATUES, HOLIDAY?... nope, nothing.
Typeovers: DRUG USE before STEROID for "Olympics no-no"... right idea; not specific enough. And CACHE before STASH (hey they rhyme) for "Secret store".
Thanks for the explanation. I was completely in the dark about this one!
Easy. No WOEs, and my only overwrite was Afar before AWOL at 53D, quickly corrected. Fun Tuesday.
Easy. No erasures and no WOEs.
“decent theme — tight set” work for me, plus cute with an amusing reveal, liked it.
Very easy. Solved downs-mostly (with a bit of peeking at across clues) and still matched my record time. Came here to see what the theme was. Nice!
Growing up in east Texas, I remember the old lady down the street who would always drop everything to watch “Dark Shadders.”
There was a Seinfeld episode where Jerry “mugs” an elderly woman on the street to grab a loaf of Marble rye. It was the last one left at the bakery/deli, and he had TRIED to buy it from her for a hefty profit but she refused.
I've only ever seen it as ET ALIA, not ET ALII, so I was very confused why I filled everything in and wasn't done.
Slowed me way down to have to go through every clue a second time before I figured out what was wrong.
Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth (and no one had cell phones), it seemed like all of the girls in my middle school would watch Dark Shadows after school, so I started watching just to have an “in” with them. So I can welcome back my old friends Quentin and Barnabas - I haven’t thought about you guys in forever. I wonder how many in the younger demographic will have an issue with that one.
Dark Shadows had a big teen following because it aired at 4pm - I’d hurry home every day after school to watch it in Junior Higj.
My best solve time ever. Yawn.
I had DADA for Pop before SODA, which slowed me down a little (misspelled SLOSHES, which in my mind had gained an imaginary P and become SpLaSHES.
Fun to remember DARKSHADOWS : )
Good lord I lived in NYC for 10 years and even
I don’t know this much about rye breads. Completely inscrutable theme (appreciate the explanation here) and the fill was fine. Solved it like a themeless. Seems way too niche a topic to center a theme around though.
"SEEDED, MARBLE, JEWISH, and DARK are all descriptors of well-known types of rye bread". No, no they are not. And for this reason, the theme was a total fail for me.
On the other hand, any puzzle with DARK SHADOWS is a winner in my book.
Typical Tuesday but to me a very old fashioned one in many way puzzle. And please. I am not elderly. I am retired and enjoying no longer working 80 hour work weeks. These are the golden years. Life is good.
After “SEEDED” and “JEWISH” I was thinking “rye”, then that terrific revealer practically made me stand and applaud. Just a wonderful theme experience.
RISE by itself could have worked as the revealer, but ALL RISE adds a terrific layer – nice move!
EASE is a fitting answer, IMO. The NE and SW corners had to be given very easy clues because they are almost completely disconnected from the rest of the grid, and the whole puzzle, to me, felt traditionally Tuesday-easy, after several recent difficult-for-Tuesday puzzles.
As I scanned the grid, I liked the near-dupes AWE/AYE and EARN/EARL, and the cross of AYE and EYE. Lovely answers in SNOUT and SLOSHES.
Sweet to see Dan back after four years. His last puzzle, a Sunday (12/13/20) had a scintillating wordplay theme as well.
Thank you, Dan, for a great “Oho!” moment at uncovering the revealer, and for stimulating my taste buds by bringing a bread I love to the fore!
Kicking off a puzzle with WAGNER the day after Holocaust Remembrance Day almost made me throw this one in the proverbial trash (even though it’s an app). But when you have the rest of it, seems like a coincidence. Bad move though.
Perfectly enjoyable though easy puzzle! Love the theme....love rye bread too!!
I only know dark rye as pumpernickel
I'm surprised at the number of people in the comments who hadn't heard of these types of rye. Maybe it's a regional thing, because on the East Coast, I can find each of these varieties in the bread aisle of a typical grocery store.
Hey All !
What a strange write-up by Rex and Matt.
Thanks, Matt, for the explanation of ALL"RyeS". Har, was thinking when you bake bread, it RiSEs. Said to self, "That's it?"
Just need some corned beef and 1000 island dressing to make a Reuben. Hold the sourkraut, however.
Decent TuesPuz. Succinct Theme. Themers that are 13's, which always net you extra Blockers. It's just the nature of 13's. Today there are 42, regular max is 38.
Fill SOSO, but OK(IE) going around all the theme material. Not many words that start with M and end with J.
That's about it. 😁 Happy Tuesday!
No F's (AWOL!)
RooMonster
DarrinV
Nice write up. Will be interesting to see how long HARRIS remains clued like this before obscurity claims her.
Never heard of seeded or Jewish Rye? Where are you from?
ROOSTS at 40D, with ROOTS at 41A strikes me as inelegant, at least.
The NE and SW corners were just about their own puzzles, they were so segmented. Good thing they were quite easy!
Agreed on the preponderance of crosswordese today.
Sorry your knowledge of this type of bread has gone AW-RYE.
It's a recipe for disaster when you mix fast hes and SLOSHES. One of the ladies is likely to take HERBAL and go home.
Who was the French saint of performance-enhancing drugs? STEROID.
How could you possibly compose a puzzle with this theme and not slip in some reference to the city with a marina?
With yesterday's 2.0 = CEE brouhaha, and today's C-worthy, I feel that this "C" gimmick has dragged on so long that it's like a semester at C.
What did the distraught shoe designer say to his boss after it was pointed out that there were no holes for laces? I fell like EYELET you down.
Guessing the revealer before reading the clue, I thought it would be ALL RYES. Damn close, and it could have been clued to work equally well. Anyway, the theme wasn't crumby at all. Thanks, Dan Margolis.
Can someone send @Z a special invitation drop his hackles for a day to pop on over from the Squid & Tentacles to this puzzle sliced and buttered just for him?
I was lost interpreting All Rise with "seated" as the first homophone. Wandered in the dark then came here.
Puzzle well put together and nice revealer. One of the easiest solves for me in recent memory. There are many Monday mornings , especially in the midst of northern winter, in which I would love to arise to this puzzle! But I'll take it this Tuesday, a long with 2 inches of fresh powder
Ack, I guess that was a little brief in retrospect. Fill was unnecessarily ratty all over as Rex points out, but NYT fill is usually of uneven quality depending on the constructor so...
Oh yes they are if you grew up with New York bakeries. And this is the New York Times puzzle after all.
I was thinking "types of rye bread" after three themers but the ALL RISE revealer was a nice surprise. No problems at all with this one except for SIP before NIP, easily fixed.
Today's unknown names were ALI and OWEN as clued. Also found out there are tv shows (?) called "Beef" and "Inside Man".
Happy to see EASE in a puzzle that had RISE as part of a revealer, as there were a lot of E's in there too.
Nice theme and a great revealer, DM. Maybe Doesn't Make my all-time Tuesday list, but still lots of fun, for which thanks.
I typed out but then deleted an idea I had to make this one a really crazy Thursday puzzle: spin the grid 90 degrees so all the theme entries are vertical, but then the theme entries need to be entered *upwards* in the grid from bottom-to-top, giving ALL RISE two functions.
After the first two themers, I started leaning towards types of bread, but not specifically ryes. I kept waiting for the revealer to be “order in the court” based on the old joke, so completely missed the pun in the revealer
Very quick solve (easier than Monday's puzzle, I thought). The theme was totally lost on me, because I never translated ALLRISE into rye bread until reading the column.
For days like this was the Rex Parker blog invented.
So I tried to figure out what the theme was as soon as I had the first two theme answers. Absolutely nothing occurred to me. I tried it again when I had three theme answers. Nothing. And -- look! -- there's even a fourth theme answer where I thought the revealer would go! And still nothing.
I got to ALL RISE -- which was oh-so-casually slipped in at the bottom. Did the scales then fall from my eyes? I regret to say, Dear Reader, that they did not.
Cute theme that went right over my head. Thank you, Rex, for this blog. The nagging curiosity might have killed me.
I like that the revealer extends into the SE corner where there are 2 "Boggle-style" RYES and a singular RYE hidden in the EYELET/SERENE stack.
Estatuas de mármol serenas con sombras oscuras.
Can you imagine 🦖 in a hot air balloon? Medium-Challenging (from an ups only perspective). Why these trees? The FLOATING IN SILENCE reveal was spot on. OREOS.
So much RI humor in one puzzle. We're up to five words in German.
Shout out to @ROO TS and @RO TS, the more gender fluid avatars of @RooMonster.
In the style of @egs (sorta):
Optometrist's excuse why none of her patients could read the top line of the eye chart. I SOLD E.
What the kid from Sixth Sense said when the ghosts were playing a pickup game. I SEE DED TEAMS.
The pope told St. Mar he couldn't worship Wednesday, so MAR BLEST A TUES.
The legs and the thighs had bruises because the DARKS HAD OWS.
Loop-i-clues (?) ©️ @okanaganer
-HERBAL SNOUT: Nose that's been in the weeds.
-DARK SHADOWS BOA: How to make alley residents look cute.
-EYE LE TALL: Gawk at Frenchman in heels.
-BABA SEER: Eggplant purchaser.
-AWOL OREO: Cookie under the fridge.
-OKIE PLANET: When the takeover of idiots is complete.
-DANDER MENU: What my dog serves up daily.
People: 7
Places: 1
Products: 2
Partials: 9
Foreignisms: 2
--
Gary's Grid Gunk Gauge: 21 of 78 (27%)
Funnyisms: 2 😕
Tee-Hee: NIP. ROD. NUDE.
Uniclues:
1 One striving for the heights alone.
2 Dude with lip hair north of Texas.
3 Gym for pigeons.
4 That fuzzy feeling in your head you mistake for your intelligence at work.
1 UNWED LADDER (~)
2 OKIE STASH USER (~)
3 PLANET ROOSTS
4 NEURO DANDER
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: "Written this day in my little brown booklet I bought at the art shop / I used all the road on my way to the market and caused some to flat stop / Some raged and some hopped and complained I'm a flop and were begging for you / to bring them the strop." LANE HOG MOLESKIN ODE.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Et Alii is used when referring to multiple people, if at least one is male. Et Alia for groups of things. Et Aliae for groups of female people.
When I got to RISE and read its clue, I didn't notice that the clue covered two consecutive answers, so I was a bit puzzled. Yes, the first words are all kinds of bread, and bread rises -- but something needed more spelling out. Much later I came to ALL, notice that the bottom row could be read "ALL RISE SERENE," and only then noticed that ALL RISE was actually the revealer -- and yes, all the first words do rise, so that was OK.
I had to look up SATAY to confirm that it was, indeed, an Indonesian dish. There are very few Indonesian or Malaysian restaurants here in Boston, but a huge number of Thai restaurants, and they really introduced the SATAY concept to the local scene. Whatever nationality, it's a delicious dish.
I heard a lot about DARK SHADOWS in its heyday, but somehow never got around to watching it, so I had no idea about Barnabas Collins, and needed more crosses than usual to get it.
Aside from all that, I thought it was a pretty easy puzzle, I just zipped right through it, while leaving ALII/ALIa to work itself out from the crosses.
Like @Roo, I was perfectly content with the idea that they were all types of bread, so they ALL RISE prior to baking. I think I was half-way through the comments before I realized the pun on "ALL Ryes." OK, good one. Is MARBLE half rye and half something else, or is it a light and a dark rye? But OK either way.
@Kitchef, I wish you'd explain your objection more fully -- are you saying that one of these breads is not actually rye? Which one?
Oops, I meant @kitshef in my previous comment. Sorry!
OK, I just had nine comments on the NYT puzz from 7/14/23 from this blog pop up on my email. Anyone have an explanation for this that does not involve the supernatural?
I think this theme was to figure out who lives in Metro New York and who doesn’t.
I thought all rises referred to the effect of yeast! Didn’t give it much thought!
I wondered about that but a search seems to suggest it is slightly different but I didn’t check out why…
@Dr.A 7:57 AM
Wagner was dead for three decades prior to the rise of the Nazis. I know they subsequently cherry picked his oeuvre and it's now associated with those horrors, but it doesn't seem fair to hate him for their collective psychoses.
I’ve never even been to NYC but easily recognized all four types of rye bread. Puzzle seemed extremely easy otherwise. ELDERLY is a rather judgmental word I associate more with extreme old age, not necessarily one’s retirement years. FWIW, I choose to faithfully follow the philosophy of:
Dr. Seuss’ Cat In The Hat On the Golden Years
I cannot see
I cannot pee
I cannot chew
I cannot screw
Oh My God What can I do?
My memory shrinks
My hearing stinks
No sense of smell
I look like hell
My mood is bad--can you tell?
My body's drooping
Have trouble pooping
The Golden Years have come at last
The Golden Years can kiss my ass.
Ouch! Did you have to place ELDERLY (6D), right next to DIE (5D)? I barely had any appetite left for my OREO (3D).
I just noticed ELDERLY is also right next to ABSTAIN. I don't think Dan is looking forward to his golden years. Is this a puzzle or a novel about prostate surgery?
@burtokd - Funny response - AW-RYE :)
@Gary 👍 @DrA What is the accepted waiting time?
Cute idea. After SEEDED and MARBLE, I thought "cake!" - never mind that it's "seed cake," not "seeded." But JEWISH corrected me. DNF, though, as I wrote in ALL Ryes and didn't check crosses.
@Gary Jugert 9:42 am: "Loop-i-clues"... I like it!
This felt very lazy to me. The theme was fine but the fill was very boring. Earn, earl, and ease all right next to one another made me audibly groan.
I did this so quickly I knew I'd have to search for a typo which is where I'm off to now. Pretty easy for anyone from New York.
The only thing I know about DARK SHADOWS is that it was on when I came home from school but never watched it,
Thanks, Dan :)
I didn't even read the clue for 68A when solving - the far SW filled in from the downs. And when I did read it, it wasn't carefully enough because I started saying the starts of the themers homophonically, trying to get them to mean something court related. The only one that kind of worked was SEEDED (Please be seated?)
Oh, it was the ALL RISE that was the homophone. I still wouldn't have gotten it, not knowing that SEEDED or JEWISH were types of rye bread. But once explained, I can appreciate the idea.
Super easy today, much faster than yesterday. Thanks, Dan Margolis!
Gave m&e a rye smile, at least...
staff weeject pick: DAR. = {Cousin of ABU and DES??}.
Primo weeject stacks, NE & SW.
some faves: PLANET. HERBAL. CATNAP. ABSTAIN.
Next planet discovered should definitely be called Serena.
Thanx, Mr. Margolis dude. Funny revealer.
Thanx, Mr. Gaffney dude. Man of few words.
Thanx, @RP, for sendin that there extra comment from The Cloud.
Masked & Anonymo5Us
... and, for some core exercises ...
"Hard Core Runt" - 8x8 12 min. themed runt puzzle:
**gruntz**
M&A
Pleased to see by the early comments that I was not the only one who was slow to get the theme. I did eventually recognize that they were all types of ryes.
And no, you do not have be from NY to know them. Although I can't remember actually reading /hearing "seeded" rye, there certainly are ryes with and without seeds.
This puzzle took a wry twist.
@Gary J, I see your point. I just think it's more complicated than that. Wagner was already controversial in his own lifetime, not just for the audacity of his music, but for his beliefs, politics and lifestyle. His written works reveal his hostility to Jews, and (some of) his musical works cast the Nietzschean Übermensch in terms of Teutonic mythology, a portrayal that can quite easily be read as belief in racial superiority. I think we shouldn't be surprised that he remains controversial to this day.
Oops - I'm so sorry - Thanks, DAN!
Hand up for knowing that ryes can come with or without seeds, but not having heard them identified that way. But, perhaps like you, I live a very long way from NYC.
Also, today I learned that some people drop the "d" from marbeled rye. Not recognizing MARBLE as an adjective, I shrugged my shoulders and carried on without recognizing the theme until coming here.
If you knew ISOLDE, TALESE and DARK SHADOWS (which I did, even though I never watched it), this was a very easy puzzle. Faster for me than yesterday's.
Ha! My very first TV credit was Dark Shadows in 1966.
I love all ryes, and I loved this puzzle, even with its plethora of crosswordese, which all just seemed like crunchy seeds in my favorite type of rye.
@jberg - I assume they are all rye, but really don't know. It's the 'well-known' that I question. Ask me to name a type of rye bread, and I don't even have a guess. I would never have guessed there were types of rye.
I finished most of it quickly, but had absolutely no idea for DAR/ALII/OKIE. What in the name of obscurity are they doing here on a Tuesday? Naticks like this ruin the entire puzzle, which was already very lackluster. Why does the NYT seem to think everybody speaks Latin?
Anonymous 8:27 AM
People are often surprised by what other people don’t know on this blog. I am also surprised by what other people know but I don’t. While I know what rye bread is I don’t like it at all Perhaps that’s why I didn’t get the ryes/rise pun. I have heard the term Jewish rye but I didn’t know off hand that marble is a rye.
Just because you know all about the ins and outs of rye bread doesn’t mean that everyone on this blog does. No reason to be condescending.
Rather surprised that Rex didn't mention perhaps the most infamous loaf of marble rye in history: the one Jerry stole in a thuggish street mugging from an elderly lady (she bought the last one remaining at the bakery and refused to give it up to Jerry) in the "Seinfeld" season 7 episode "The Rye."
No, but I did very early…
❤️
Anthony in Texas and Anonymous.
As a practical matter, outside of crosswords I have rarely seen anything else but alia. However, the editors do permit alli according to the needs of the puzzle so I always leave the last letter blank till I do the cross.
An annoying bit of crosswordese.
that is worth remembering.
Anonymous 7:12 AN
There was a condescending comment from an an anonymous above that everyone should know about rye bread. Well I don’t like rye bread and didn’t get the pun But to say that it is not theme worthy is way over to the other extreme. Rye bread is not niche by any stretch of the imagination.
Max W
The frequent commenter here , Lewis, finds combos like roots and roost the exact opposite of inelegant including when they are right next to each other. I tend to agree with him. Crosswords involve wordplay. Why can’t such combos be part of it?
There was a 2012 Tim Burton movie which did about $80m in the States, so that should do a little something for name recognition.
Don’t like rye, didn’t get the pun. But liked the puzzle anyway. Liked it more than the blogger. Easy puzzle. The old option showed up. ALII. I was not happy to see it again but I did leave it blank till I saw the cross.
Nothing else bothered me.
Nouns are used as adjectives all the time
Also people drop ed all time because they find it hard to say. That’s how language works. So I find nothing wrong with the term marble rye or ice tea for that matter.
No big surprise seeing so many here get caraway with the rye breads
A very easy Tuesday but I got a big kick out of it despite all the crosswordese. I loved how the revealer was kinda snuck in there and was NOT a long answer, I think there's an art to that. Yes, it was comprised of two answers, but with a total of only seven letters. Good stuff.
Growing up in Manhattan and being Jewish must have helped as I got the theme fairly quickly and very much liked the punny revealer.
What's with LSD? It seems to be popping up almost as much as it did at the (many) Grateful Dead shows I've attended. So long as you can continue the cutesy cluing for "trips", I guess it'll be around for a while.
I agree with @Dr.A that the timing of having Wagner in 1A today is unfortunate, but I also realize that the fill you need is the fill you need to make things work.
Even with that, a fun and satisfying romp for me.
Very cool, neighbor!
I didn't even have a TV during the time when DARK SHADOWS ran long ago in the previous century. I was able to piece it together from crosses but that didn't help deciphering the theme. I don't know beans about rye bread so it was lost on me. Kept me from being in AWE after seeing the ALL RISE explanation.
I did notice, and not in a good way, that the themer letter count symmetry needed some finagling to make it work. Either we get three POC (plural of convenience) themers when SEEDED TEAM, MARBLE STATUE and DARK SHADOW all need a letter count boost or there's a SOC (singular of convenience) when there's only room for one JEWISH HOLIDAY.
I don't think of 6D ELDERLY as being "In one's golden years", as clued. I think of it as being more "In one rusty iron years".
@Beezer HE STOLE MY MARBLE RYE! {shut up, you old bag!) i was disappointed rex was away today solely because i thought for sure i would come here and see that youtube clip embedded in the writeup. at least i got to read it in the comments straight away, so thank you :)
who would turn down $50 for a $6 loaf of rye?
-stephanie.
NEA next to NAE! Elegant! 😐
We get a revealer about ALL Ryes but no Whistlepig, High West, Knob Creek... Harrumph.
Solved this faster than any other I've ever done. Nearly 11 minutes faster.
'Spaceship Earth" , see R. Buckminster Fuller. Make sure to have spare time.
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