Inquisitor 1282: 5 DOWN by Kruger

Wordplay in each of several clues yields a single extra letter which (omitting one keyword) spell out a phrase that was an integral part of 5 Down. The influence of this unclued entry has affected eight answers but, taking the phrase into account, another entry (which might otherwise be considered thematic) has been unaffected and must be highlighted.

Apart from some “normal” clues, we had to locate an unspecified number of clues that had extra letters in the wordplay, spelling a thematic phrase with a key word omitted and eight other clues related to the thematic entry down the middle of the grid which had to be treated in some way, plus the rather strange ninth item.

After solving quite a number of the normal clues, but none of the others, I had ?H??LL???TY and spotted “THE FULL MONTY”, an excellent British film of 1997 concerning a group of unemployed Sheffield workers who set up a “Chippendale” style group of male strippers. The title relates to their intention to go one further than the Chippendales by removing ALL clothing. 

An interesting side issue is the origin of the phrase “The Full Monty”, meaning complete, or the whole thing. The origin in Chesterfield (later Sheffield) of Montague Burton’s tailoring business led to a three piece suit being referred to as The Full Monty. I like this explanation much more than reference to Field Marshal Montgomery’s breakfast.

The film won an Oscar for its score, which included a version of the Tom Jones hit “You can leave your hat on” to which the group stripped in the final scene – finally throwing away their concealing hats.

I had considerable difficulty with the extra wordplay letters, and even more with the thematic words, but eventually found that the extra letters spelled YOU CAN LEAVE YOUR . . .ON.

After searching fruitlessly for hat-related letters in the extra words, I finally found that 32D was TULIPANTS (= turbans) and we had four spaces to enter TULI, so the PANTS had been removed!! My search now shifted to other items of clothing that could have been removed and there were 6A UNDY(?), 26A BOOTS,27A CARDI, 1D SHIRT, 10D VEST, 26D TIE, 31D HOSE and 32D PANTS, the required eight items. The question mark by UNDY is because Chambers only has it in the plural (undies) and it refers to women’s underwear, which couldn’t have been removed by male strippers! The wordplay for 6A would work if it were UNDIES, but then the singular definition (medley) would be wrong. See comment #2 below from Kruger.

I searched the grid for the ninth item which is “unaffected” and found SO WHAT at 20A (to be highlighted) which has its HAT still ON!

Excellent crossword by Kruger giving hours of fun and a souvenir of a good film.