Guardian Cryptic 27,123 by Crucible

by

Found this quite tricky…

…there is a nice theme around shows, mostly pantomime: ALI BABA, SNOW WHITE, CINDERELLA, BEAUTY and THE BEAST, the WIZARD of Oz and SINBAD and PETER PAN – thanks michelle – are all named characters, while DAME, PAGE [e.g. Buttons] and BABE [child characters] are more general roles. There’s also EVITA – “She showed” – the musical, and ODEON – “Show place” – a theatre.

21dn was a new word for me, and I wasn’t too keen on the repetition of PE as an abbreviation. Favourite was 16ac. Thanks, Crucible.

Across
9 ITINERANT One can rave about English Rover (9)
I=”One” plus TIN=”can” plus RANT=”rave”, around E[nglish]
10 EVITA She showed some initiative after revolution (5)
=Eva Peron [wiki]. Hidden/”some” and reversed/”after revolution”, in [initi]ATIVE
11 DISPUTE Duke is placed next to earl in row (7)
D[uke] plus IS, plus PUT=”placed”, plus E[arl]
12 GRENADE Cook agreed to keep new pineapple (7)
=a nickname for a GRENADE. (agreed)*, around N[ew]
13 REEDY Mike abandons correct piping (5)
RE[m]EDY=”correct”, minus M[ike] – M in the phonetic alphabet
14 WHIPPED UP Galvanised party with joint exercises first (7,2)
D[emocratic] U[nionist] P[arty] in Northern Ireland; after: W[ith] plus HIP=”joint” plus P[hysical] E[ducation]=”exercises”
16 LET IT ALL HANG OUT Relax and laugh a little, not hysterically (3,2,3,4,3)
(laugh a little not)* edit thanks to quenbarrow – removed a typo in anagram fodder
19 ANSWERERS Poles used to be right among Anglo-Saxon respondents (9)
N[orth] and S[outh]=”Poles”, plus WERE R[ight]=”used to be right”; all inside A[nglo] S[axon]
21 ODEON Show place, extremely old dilapidated one (5)
the extreme letters of O[l]D, plus (one)*
22 DUNGEON Horse has gone off to get cooler (7)
=slang for jail. DUN=”Horse”, plus (gone)*
23 ALI BABA Briefly excuse sailor with a show person (3,4)
ALIB[i]=”Briefly excuse” where excuse is a noun; plus AB[le seaman]=”sailor”, plus A
24 MOATS Ditches old bird on way back (5)
MOA=an extinct “old bird”, plus ST[reet]=”way” reversed/”back”
25 SNOW WHITE Show person in show with wet pants (4,5)
(in Show wet)*
Down
1 CINDERELLA One stops peaceniks before fully mounting show (10)
I=”one”, stopping up inside CND=Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament=”peaceniks”, plus ERE=”before”, plus ALL=”fully” reversed/”mounting”
2 MISSPENT Dismiss Penthouse centrefold that’s wasted (8)
Hidden in the centre of [Dis]MISS PENT[house]
3 BEAUTY Show person former airline task bar first (6)
B[ritish] E[uropean] A[irways]=”former airline”, plus [d]UTY=”task bar [the] first [letter]”
4 BABE Show person unfinished racket (4)
Babel=a confused sound, so BABE[l]=”unfinished racket”
5 STAG NIGHTS Rutter orchestrated things for prenuptial dos (4,6)
STAG=”Rutter”, plus (things)*
6 PETER PAN Gym painter decorated, ignoring current show (5,3)
P[hysical] E[ducation]=”Gym”, plus (painter)* minus I=symbol for electric current in physics
7 WIZARD Show person one Zulu in charge (6)
I plus Z[ulu] – Z in the phonetic alphabet – all inside WARD=”charge”=a person in one’s custody
8 PAGE Show person mature under pressure (4)
AGE=”mature” under P[ressure]
14 WILDERNESS Bush left in more spacious cape (10)
L[eft] in WIDER=”more spacious”, plus NESS=”cape”=headland
15 POTENTATES People of power head south, drinking old red wine (10)
PATE=”head” plus S[outh], all around O[ld] and TENT=Spanish “red wine”
17 THE BEAST Show person area in ancient city above Troy (3,5)
A[rea] in THEBES=ancient city, plus T[roy]=unit of weight
18 OPERATIC Histrionic 8 inducted into bizarre erotica (8)
P[AGE]=”8″ down, inside (erotica)*
20 SINBAD Show person‘s choice of rides in Badminton (6)
hidden in [ride]S IN BA[dminton]
21 OJIBWA Simpson is back initially with a Native American (6)
=see [wiki]. OJ=”Simpson” [wiki], plus the initials of I[s] B[ack]; plus W[ith] plus A
22 DAME Show person, lawyer and writer (4)
D[istrict] A[ttorney]=”lawyer” and ME=Crucible=”writer” of this clue
23 AGOG Like child at show, past caring at the end (4)
AGO=”past”, plus the end letter of [carin]G

40 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 27,123 by Crucible”

  2. There is also PETER PAN.

    I was helped by the theme, but I also found this to be tricky. I gave up on 4d BABE and could not parse some of the Britishisms like BEA in BEAUTY and DUP in WHIPPED UP. I only got as far as parsing the HIPPE bit of that clue.

    Thanks Manehi and Crucible.

  3. Note typo in 16a setting-out of anagram. But thanks to both for very neat work. 21d unfamiliar name but clearly clued, so only one answer possible given the crossers.

  4. I didn’t really enjoy this as much as a lot of recent puzzles, but hey-ho, it was a bit of fun. Liked DUNGEON, WILDERNESS, AGOG and SNOW WHITE. Thanks to Crucible and manehi.

  5. I can’t say I enjoyed the theme but kudos to Crucible for fitting in so many show references. I did find some of the clueing a bit tedious – in addition to the repetition of PE there is also W(ith) twice. Speaking of W, does this puzzle hold the record for the most appearances of that letter? 5 by my count.

    Just a couple of questions – how does REEDY = piping, and, for MISSPENT, what is the fold doing in centrefold, apart from improving the surface?

  6. Well it was ok , the theme was obvious. But some clumsy cluing and surfaces i thought. ‘Show person former airline task bar first’ is an almost unreadable sentence. About as get as you can clumsy.

  7. Matrixmania @5

    Collins:
    reedy
    (?ri?d? )
    adjective
    Word forms: reedier or reediest
    1.
    (of a place, esp a marsh) abounding in reeds
    2.
    of or like a reed
    3.
    having a tone like a reed instrument; shrill or piping

  10. Thank you Crucible and manehi.

    This was enjoyable, but I failed to fully parse some answers, in particular WHIPPED UP and POTENTATES. I did wonder if “BABEs in the Wood” could be another pantomime, but I think the clue only refers to the little actors.

    Fortunately muffin is not here, ALIBI for “excuse” is one of his pet hates if I remember rightly.

  11. I ignorantly assumed it was Elaine, too. I wouldn’t have got it otherwise. Page as in pageboy as a show person is pretty weak, I think.

  13. I generally like a theme but I found this one a bit painful. It helped with CINDERELLA, ALI BABA and SNOW WHITE which I got just from cross checkers plus theme and only parsed afterwards. But, as others have observed, it did make for some ugly cluing.

    That said, you have to admire the number of dramatic references Crucible has worked in. And I liked WILDERNESS, DUNGEON and (first time I’ve encountered this in a crossword) OJIBWA. ITINERANT is very smooth. ANSWERERS parses well though the surface could be smoother and, whilst STAG NIGHTS was fairly obvious, I did enjoy the surface there.

    I’m sure they’re in the dictionary but I didn’t, personally, like the definitions for AGOG or OPERATIC.

    Thanks to Crucible and to manehi for the explanations

  14. Thanks both. Enjoyed this.
    It’s possible that BABE refers to the musical that derives from the “sheep-pig” film

  17. One of those days when a puzzle found tricky by some seems straightforward to me, especially when the theme tumbled. Not a boast – it merely makes up for the numerous occasions when I’m bamboozled by a puzzle that others romp through.

    BABE as a generic child actor seems unsatisfactory. Maybe Crucible had in mind the musical film Babe, about a pig who wants to be a sheepdog? Not sure if there’s a stage version.

  19. Ithink BABE is one of those in the wood, since the shows are all staged ones, but I didn’t get it. I also thought PAGE was Elaine rather than a vague generic pantomime character, but I see it can’t be. WIZARD is another vague one unless it’s Oz.

    By the way, our local ODEON fitted the description in the clue for years. I used to attend Saturday morning pictures there.

  22. Panto isn’t part of the culture here, so the theme baffled me a bit. For a time I thought it was Disney movies–which works a lot better than you think it might, with this wizard being the only obvious one. But Babe wasn’t a Disney movie and there’s no prominent page or dame in any of them.

    So it was harder for me than it should have been, but I got there on the end.

    On the other hand, I bunged in OJIBWA as soon as I had an O. So they did us colonials that favor.

  23. A little tricky maybe, but the theme definitely helped. MISSPENT was last in.

    Thanks to Crucible and manehi

  24. Oh come on Trailman @ 21; admit it you enjoyed every moment!!

    I did not enjoy the thoroughly nugatory theme one bit. But there were some good clues!! Thanks Crucible and manehi

  26. I liked some of this, but the struggle was often caused by the number of components, rendering the clues inelegant. Like 14a: w hip pe dup, for example. And the surfaces didn’t flow. I got all bar babe.

  28. Tough until the theme tumbled. Then a steady plod. Babe was last in when we twigged the ‘racket’. Thanks to everyone

  29. The theme helped to make this both enjoyable and entertaining, although I acknowledge that it seemed to get in the way of the wordplay or the surfaces in a few of clues, as others have pointed out.

    I for one was glad that the setter kept to familiar names for his chosen theme, especially as my knowledge doesn’t go beyond the familiar ones.

    I liked the anagram in the long answer across the middle (LET IT ALL HANG OUT).

    4d BABE was my LOI. More often than not I give up on ‘weak’ clues such as this, where you have ‘–A–E’, or something like it, and one doesn’t know what the subtracted letter is or whether the answer is the shorter or the longer word. However, I got lucky and thought of BABEL first, and then BABE made it right.

  30. Mark @13 – OJIBWA seemed distantly familiar, and sure enough, Paul used it in 2013:
    Paul 26074: Brave old giant not quite standing to punch shattered jaw (6)

    One previous appearance:
    Orlando 22508: Native Americans from Ohio refuse to go on to Washington (6)

  32. beery @30
    Thanks for the search result – I enjoy these snippets that you send our way, whether requested or not.
    I don’t remember any of these previous occurrences, and the word was new to me today. The clueing made it solvable, though, as has been remarked already.

  33. I found this a pleasant enough solve without any particularly rewarding aha moments. I thought ITINERANT worked well, and maybe I’ll remember to see “can” as a noun future. And 21d provided the new word of the day. Thanks Crucible and manehi

  34. I quite enjoyed this although I struggled with some of the parsing. AGOG was LOI and was a guess, as was PAGE- and I admit I thought of Elaine!
    I got the theme early as a result of getting SNOW WHITE and ALI BABA. I liked MOATS,DUNGEON and OJIBWA- I was particularly pleased to get the latter.
    Thanks Crucible

  35. beery hiker @30: Thanks for that. Not an old chestnut, then… As per Alan B @32, I enjoy hearing of previous occurrences – though doubt if I’d have solved either of the two clues you note. You must have one heck of a database.

  36. There was not a clear theme in this puzzle. One moment it looked like musicals, then films, then book characters etc.

  38. The comments above show that there were mixed emotions about this crossword.
    To be honest, I was actually a bit surprised because, for me, this was a lovely (albeit somewhat lightweight) offering from Crucible.
    I am someone who is very sensitive to ‘ugly cluing’ (as mentioned in one or two comments) but I am afraid that I didn’t see any today.
    From the first one in (DISPUTE) to the last (BABE), it was an enjoyable daytrip to Fairyland.
    Difficult? Well, I found it relatively easy for this setter.
    No major hold-ups.
    We are all different, aren’t we?

    I would also like to take the opportunity to recommend Crucible’s Genius puzzle.
    I never do these crosswords (I thought one had to sign up for them) but this time I had a go.
    It is probably not the hardest of Geniuses but – wow – what a joy it was to solve.
    Perhaps, at times, we should forget about Jumbos & Alphabeticals when Christmas and Easter arrive.
    For me, this would have been a perfect seasonal puzzle.
    Last December I wasn’t able to print off Maskarade’s crossword.
    Therefore I took with me a special alphabetical by Barmecide (available on Alberich’s website).
    A simply stunning alphabetical which I also wholeheartedly like to plug here.
    To be clear, I did not say anything negative about Maskarade’s crosswords.
    It’s not one or the other but one and the other!

    Thanks to manehi & Crucible.

  39. Thanks all
    Quite entertaining
    Last in was shot although I couldn’t get babe.
    I took page as someone who shows people around, especially in old hotels.

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