Hoskins sets the Tuesday challenge this week.
It’s Tuesday, so we always look out for a theme… and we didn’t have to look far.
During our student years we were big fans of 23d 14ac, so as soon as we had solved 16ac and 20ac, we realised we were going to enjoy Hoskins’ excellent puzzle even more than usual. All the trademark references to sex and drugs were there, along with the Queen. There are no less than fourteen thematic entries relating to 23d 14ac sketches and films, plus one of the members of the team featuring at 5d.
Congratulations to Hoskins for getting so much thematic content into the puzzle at the expense of only a couple of rather unusual words. We have the films ’19ac of 6d’ and ’23d 14ac and the 3d 28ac’, and the ‘Ministry of 18ac 13d’, the ’16ac 20ac’ and the ’22d 26d’ sketches as well as ‘7ac 7ac’ and ’25d’.
A D (daughter) in or ‘enthralled by’ BRAVO (hired killer – a new meaning for us)
NUDE (naked) round G (middle letter or ‘centre’ of Rugby) – a reminder of the ‘Nudge nudge, wink wink’ 23 / 14 sketch
WIN (triumph) D (500 in Roman numerals) – a typical ‘Hoskins’ definition
D (duke) + alternate or ‘occasional’ letters of lAdY
EVEN (flat) S O (first or ‘primary’ letters of seas and oceans)
N (first or ‘front’ letter of news) in or ‘hugged by’ an anagram (‘fools about’) of TWO RUDE
Hidden (‘covered up’) in super-hapPY THONg
E (drug) in or ‘smuggled by’ DAD (old man)
bILLY (Billy the Kid is one Billy) with the ‘b’ (bishop) replaced by or ‘made to look’ S (small)
LIE (story) ‘written’ round F (France)
PAR (usual) ROT (rubbish)
S (southern) + an anagram (‘must change’) of FEMALES
KIT (equipment) S (small) CH (children)
AM (in the morning) after J (joint, as in marijuana)
gAUNT (wasted) without the first letter or ‘out of head’
The parsing here had us in a bit of a quandary as at first it seemed to be an anagram (‘having trouble’) of ‘GIRL’ round A – but that doesn’t fit with ‘rare’. It seems more likely to be: G (girl, but we can’t find any references to this as an abbreviation) AIL (trouble) round or ‘eating’ R (rare – not in Chambers, but in Collins)
An anagram (‘broken’) of RELICS + bY (half-cut) – this is a new word for us
BAD around N (noon) + an anagram (‘shot’) of DEALER
IT (sex) with BAND (Led Zeppelin perhaps) in front or ‘not behind’
A homophone (‘as people have told us’) of HOLEY – Jesus’ hands had holes from where he was nailed to the cross.
A clue-as-definition: an anagram (‘engineer’) PENURY, A and D (first letter or ‘touch’ of depression)
I’D (Hoskins had) aLE (beer) without the first letter or ‘starter’
BRAIN (intellect) with the ‘a’ (first letter or ‘head’ of ‘another’) moved back or ‘lowered’ in a down clue
tEASE (flirt) tOFF (aristo) without or ‘removing’ the first letters or ‘tops’
W (with) A L (first letter or ‘bit’ of luck) K (first letter or ‘head’ of Kew) S (society)
An anagram (‘surprisingly’) of CLAIMANT IS – another new word for us
A SING (rat, as in inform on) after or ‘beneath’ (in a down clue) ER (‘Her Maj’)
An anagram (‘let loose’) of CASH LET’S
nUMBER (song) without the first letter or ‘not starting’ after L (first letter or ‘bit’ of lovely)
MON (Monday, a day – 10ac) + TodaY without the middle letters or ‘disheartened’
PA (personal assistant – ‘secretary’) in S M – a reference to another 23 / 14 sketch
Double definition
What a brilliant themed crossword! All done whilst sat in my comfy chair.
Superb! Hoskins back on form with a bang. Many thanks to him.
B&J have said everything I was going to say including my struggles to parse 28a and the same two new words for me.
Many thanks to them too.
28: If we consider ‘grail’ as ‘rare platter’, it becomes messier…
Is the clue missing ‘a’ before ‘rare’?
Good fun trying to identify all the MONTY PYTHON references. I’m glad that the theme wasn’t made obvious from the clues. Same comments as Rabbit Dave@2; maybe KVa@3 is right about a missing ‘a’ at 28a. I couldn’t get CLERISY at the end, which just seemed too unlikely a word despite the helpful wordplay and crossers.
Favourite was the non-thematic WIND – as you say, a typical Hoskins def.
Thanks to Hoskins and B&J
Could also include BANDIT in the theme, film by Gilliam included Cleese and Palin. Great fun. Th as nks Hopkins and B&J.
What a romp! It’s put me in a great mood for the day (and I’m going to the Apollo Theatre Company’s ‘Round the Horne’ this evening!).
Great clues throughout – my favourites were SILLY, WALKS (coincidentally) and MONTY. Like B&J and Rabbit Dave, I didn’t know BRAVO or CLERISY but they were clearly clued.
I’m with B&J’s parsing of GRAIL. It’s a while, I think, since we’ve met G and R as abbreviations for girl(s) and rare respectively but I remember seeing them a number of times in the past. I think G has been explained as a sign in a school, perhaps, and R as used in classifying stamps (or a waiter’s note on a steak order).
Huge thanks to Hoskins for the fun and to (lucky, as crypticsue would say) B&J for an excellent blog.
Great fun from Hoskins. Thanks for the blog, B&J; I’m sure you also spotted Eric IDLE, although you haven’t mentioned him.
Quizzy @7 You need to read the blog more carefully.
Hovis @8 Oops… mea culpa
Just splendid in every single respect. To have included that many themed words is a work of genius. Having recently experimented with setting, I’ve discovered how hard it is simply to assemble a grid at all, let alone incorporate so much and so naturally.
I suspect it may be coincidental but, having done a bit of Googling, there is a JAM link to Python too. Here. However, there is a more meaningful link: WIND in the Willows is a 1996 film featuring Jones, Idle, Cleese and Palin.
Thanks Hoskins and B&J
Splendidly Silly
Thanks both. By chance the first two clues I attempted gave me NUDGE and IDLE so I suspected I knew where we were heading from there. A pleasant memory of Arthur ‘two sheds’ Jackson (I think) is currently occupying my mind
Great fun. Even I spotted the theme and found it helpful. Strangely BRIAN made me think of the Australian philosophers sketch at first, but, of course, they were all Bruce.
Amazing crossword, and just about as funny as the original. SILLY has now become one of my favourite clues of all time.
Didn’t register the theme but that’s not unusual, plus the fact that MP never appealed to me – sorry, but there it is!
Hoskins will know how I felt about his clue for HOLY, we’ve been down that route before today, but he did rather fool me with the hired killer whom I hadn’t come across previously and didn’t find in my admittedly brief searches.
Thanks to Hoskins, looks as though you’ve brought pleasure to many contributors with this one!
I don’t believe it! I know Tuesday is theme day, I was (and still am) a great fan of Monty Python, and I totally failed to spot that that was the theme.
Dormouse@16 – Oh Dear! Were you hibernating?
Dormouse @16: when it comes to tea tray moments, that takes a fairly large biscuit!
Lumber clerisy crossers held me up but a fun easy to spot (sorry Dormouse) theme. Thanks bloggers and Harry. Good grief i see from your recent blog it’s 10 years since you took over from me here.
Many thanks to the reviewsome-twosome and to all who commented and solved. Hope to see y’all next time around two weeks this Sunday, but until then its cheers and chin chin from me. 🙂
Very late to this party but I had to register my delight. Thanks to all.