Opera with a baritone Iago / WED 6-25-2025 / Rite place at the rite time? / 2008 romantic drama starring Joaquin Phoenix and Gwyneth Paltrow

Constructor: Ben Zimmer and Zach Sherwin

Relative difficulty: Hard (21:46)

THEME: CENTRAL AC — Eight answers in the grid (four across, four down) have their central two letters, AC, in their own box

Theme answers:

• [Historic agreement of 1215] for MAGNA CARTA
• [Expansive parcels] for TRACTS
• ["Dream a Little Dream of Me" singer of 1968, familiarly] for MAMA CASS
• [Healthful snack brand] for TERRA CHIPS
• [Onomatopoetic breakfast trio] for SNAP CRACKLE POP
• [Source of prophecy] for ORACLE
• [907, for a high one] for AREA CODE
• [Popular stocking stuffer?] for SANTA CLAUS

Word of the Day: TETRA (Flashy fish) —

The Characidae and their allies are distinguished from other fish by the presence of a small adipose fin between the dorsal and caudal fins. Many of these, such as the neon tetra (Paracheirodon innesi), are brightly colored and easy to keep in captivity. Consequently, they are extremely popular for home aquaria. [wiki]

• • •

Good morning everyone, and welcome to another Malaika MWednesday!! (Although I am writing this at nighttime on Tuesday-- it's been a fantastic night in Brooklyn.) Zach Sherwin! He is a comedian / songwriter who does a show called "The Crossword Show" which I was lucky enough to contribute to back in 2023. I don't think I've ever solved one of his crosswords, but he has solved many of mine! So it's fun to have the tables a little bit turned.

Incredibly apt puzzle today, as NYC is getting obliterated by a heatwave. I have a very high tolerance for heat (+ live in a very dense, cool, pre-war building with high ceilings and a courtyard) and have resisted installing my AC unit for soooo long... but today (or rather, Tuesday) was the day that I cracked. 105 degrees is simply too hot to tough it out!! (So maybe the puzzle wasn't quite apt for me personally, as I have had CENTRAL AC for exactly two years out of the past twelve.)

Very interesting to see a rebus puzzle on a Wednesday! I think on Wednesdays, the rebus squares should have circles. But I also think that generally every puzzle should be slightly easier than how it was published, so maybe ignore me. This played hard for me in terms of cluing though! I finished three-quarters of this puzzle in about ten minutes, and then used over ten minutes just aimlessly guessing in the top-left corner. Those two stacked long answers (MAGNA CARTA and ALBATROSS) both had trivia clues that just didn't click for me, plus Bobbsey Twins trivia (NAN), space trivia (PLASMA), and referring to a TAMALE as a treat which just felt weird. It's a food item! Would I call a sandwich a treat, or an empanada a treat?

The theme itself was executed well. It's interesting to see how an idea for a theme can get implemented in different ways-- I think that this could have very well been a Monday puzzle with four long across answers that had AC at their center and no rebus at all. Adding the rebus made it a Wednesday level. I wish there had been a bit more of a rationale for why they were squished together in a box (I was expecting a revealer like "AC unit"), but I guess we wouldn't have gotten the down answers if the AC's weren't rebusified. 

Stay cool everyone!!!

Bullets:

• [Flanged girder] for IBEAM— I read this clue over and over again and thought "those can not possibly be words. Are those words." Well, let me tell you, they are words!! "Flanged" means that it has a ridge on the end, and a "girder" is a piece of a framework.
• [Miscellaneous collection] for RAGBAG — Really??? Not "ragtag"???? What on earth!! 
• [Bit of gear for Vermeer] for PALETTE — Was so stuck here thinking that the entry would be something super-specific to Vermeer and my hours spent rereading the YA book Chasing Vermeer would finally pay off but alas no
• ["Quickest way to Harlem," in song] for A TRAIN — This is the best train in NYC, in my opinion (so fast!! Manhattan Brooklyn Queens!! Beach!! JFK!!!!) but this entry took a bit to click because I associate the A with Washington Heights
• [Rite place at the rite time?] for ALTAR — Very good clue

xoxo Malaika

P.S. One of my crosswords was published today! It's small and themeless and you can solve it here.

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Amazon speakers introduced in 2014 / MON 2-28-22 / Hometown proud supermarket / Francis of old TV's "What's My Line?" / 1990s cartoon series featuring Yakko Wakko and Dot / Baby-boomer series that starred Ken Olin

Constructor: Zach Sherwin and Andrea Carla Michaels

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium 

THEME: honestly, I have no IDEA — looks like the first three letters of each theme answer ... repeat ... somewhere else in that answer ... is that really it??? The letters don't ... do anything or mean anything or ... anything? Wow, OK:

Theme answers:

• OKEFENOKEE (18A: Swamp in "Pogo")
• "ANIMANIACS" (24A: 1990s cartoon series featuring Yakko, Wakko and Dot)
• "THIRTYSOMETHING" (39A: Baby-boomer series that starred Ken Olin)
• WORDSWORTH (55A: Poet William who wrote "The Prelude")
• CHINCHILLA (63A: South American rodent with soft, dense fur)

Word of the Day: Jeannette RANKIN (40D: Jeannette ___ first woman elected to Congress) —

Jeannette Pickering Rankin (June 11, 1880 – May 18, 1973) was an American politician and women's rights advocate, and the first woman to hold federal office in the United States. She was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as a Republican from Montana in 1916, and again in 1940. As of 2022, Rankin is still the only woman ever elected to Congress from Montana.

Each of Rankin's Congressional terms coincided with initiation of U.S. military intervention in the two World Wars. A lifelong pacifist, she was one of 50 House members who opposed the declaration of war on Germany in 1917. In 1941, she was the only member of Congress to vote against the declaration of war on Japan following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

A suffragist during the Progressive Era, Rankin organized and lobbied for legislation enfranchising women in several states including Montana, New York, and North Dakota. While in Congress, she introduced legislation that eventually became the 19th Constitutional Amendment, granting unrestricted voting rights to women nationwide. She championed a multitude of diverse women's rights and civil rights causes throughout a career that spanned more than six decades. (wikipedia)

• • •

It's not uncommon for me to find the Monday puzzle a little dull, or a little corny, but it is nearly unheard of for me to find it completely thematically inscrutable. I simply have no idea what the theme is supposed to be. If the full extent of the theme is simply "the first three letters of each answer repeat themselves within the answer," then I haven't seen a theme so startlingly unworthy of publication in a long, long time. There's no wordplay ... the repeated three-letter strings don't make words, or sounds, or ... anything. They Don't Do Anything. In each case, there are just three random letters ... that then repeat. Is that ... unusual? Strange? It seems so ordinary, so banal, that I can't imagine anyone's ever thinking it would amount to theme material, and I really Really can't imagine an editor's thinking "yes! I get a hundred submissions a week but this! This is the one." What in the world is happening? Maybe, maybe if there had been a revealer, some snappy concept, something that would make the repeated letter strings make any kind of sense, then the concept would've been tolerable—good revealers often turn seemingly unremarkable answers into a really tight and interesting set. But this ... what is this? I pity the Monday-level puzzles that were rejected to make room for this one. I don't normally read the other blogs, but since my friend Rachel writes for NYT's own "Wordplay" blog on Monday, I thought I'd jump over there and at least make sure I wasn't missing anything ... and I was not. Also, she didn't "get" the theme either—this is telling. I did enjoy reacquainting myself with Jeannette RANKIN, but the pleasure pretty much started and ended there.

The fill in this puzzle is also pretty miserable. ECHOS was the biggest wince of the day (product placement + awful brand-name alt-plural spelling) (54D: Amazon speakers introduced in 2014). But mostly the problem was the crosswordesiness. Lots and lots and lots of good (not actually good) old repeaters: ALAI and ARLENE Francis ("of old TV") and ACTI OLE ACELA ELENA etc. There's even the original kealoa*, i.e. LOA (65D: Mauna ___ (Hawaiian volcano)). AWS as a plural is AWkward (51D: "How cute!" sounds), as is TWO-HIT, which isn't really that noteworthy a thing (a "two-hitter," that is) (48D: Like some well-pitched games). A six-hit game might be "well pitched" too (better pitched than some TWO-HIT games), but you're not gonna see SIX-HIT in the grid (I hope). What else? Oh, CHI is an answer (32D: Ho ___ Minh City) even though CHI is one of the crucial repeating theme elements (see CHINCHILLA). That kind of duplication is less than ideal. It really is stunning how unready for prime time this is. I'm genuinely baffled. Andrea has crafted many delightful Monday-level themes over the years. I just don't get the appeal of this one at all.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

*kealoa = short, common answer that you can't just fill in quickly because two or more answers are viable Even With One or More Letters In Place. From the classic [Mauna ___] KEA/LOA conundrum. See also, e.g. [Heaps] ATON/ALOT, ["Git!"] "SHOO"/"SCAT," etc.

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