LA Times Crossword Answers 26 Nov 12, Monday

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
1. Ed of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” ASNER
Ed Asner is most famous for playing the irascible but lovable Lou Grant on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” and on the spin-off drama “Lou Grant”. Off-screen, Asner is noted for his political activism. He served two terms as president of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) and was very involved in the 1980 SAG strike. When “Lou Grant” was cancelled in 1982, despite decent ratings, there was a lot of talk that the cancellation was a move by the network against Asner personally. In fact one of Asner’s activist colleagues, Howard Hesseman (who played Johnny Fever), found that his show “WKRP in Cincinnati” was also cancelled … on the very same day …

16. “Arsenic and Old __” LACE
I suppose that most famously “Arsenic and Old Lace” is a Frank Capra film, released in 1944. The movie was based on a 1939 stage play by Joseph Kesselring. The film stars Cary Grant as a completely madcap and frantic Mortimer Brewster. Grant was only the fourth choice for the role, after Bob Hope, Jack Benny and Ronald Reagan. That’s quite an eclectic mix of actors …

17. Mischievous girl in classic comics LITTLE LULU
“Little Lulu” is a comic strip that ran weekly in “The Saturday Evening Post” every week from 1935 until 1944. The title character migrated into product advertising in the forties and fifties, pushing Kleenex tissues and Pepsi-Cola in magazine ads.

21. Rajah’s spouse RANI
A ranee (also spelled rani) is the female equivalent of a raja in India.

24. Grilled fish in Japanese unadon EELS
Unadon is the Japanese word for “eel bowl”. Unadon is actually a contraction of “unagi no kabayaki” (grilled eel) and “donburi” (rice bowl dish).

26. “Exodus” actor Sal MINEO
Sal Mineo’s most famous role was John “Plate” Crawford, the kid who was in awe of the James Dean character in “Rebel Without a Cause”. Sadly, Mineo was murdered in 1976 when he was just 37 years old. He was attacked in the alley behind his Los Angeles apartment and stabbed through the heart. When an arrest was made it was discovered that the murderer had no idea that his victim was a celebrity, and that his plan was just to rob anyone who came along.

“Exodus” is the 1960 film of the Leon Uris novel of the same name. Paul Newman heads the cast, and Sal Mineo had a supporting role playing Dov Landau.

28. Florida NBA team, on scoreboards ORL
The Orlando Magic were formed in 1989 as an NBA expansion team. A local paper was asked to run a competition to suggest names for the new team and the community came up with its four top picks of “Heat”, “Tropics”, “Juice” and “Magic”. A committee then opted for “Orlando Magic”. A good choice I think …

31. Jack LaLanne, for one FITNESS GURU
Jack LaLanne was a pioneer in the field of fitness and nutrition and was sometimes called “the godfather of fitness”. LaLanne was also a bodybuilder and actually beat 21-year-old Arnold Schwarzenegger in competition, when LaLanne was 54-years-old …

42. Actress Amanda PEET
The actress Amanda Peet studied acting with the celebrated Uta Hagen at Columbia University. Peet has appeared in a number of successful films including “The Whole Nine Yards” and “Syriana”. I remember her best from what I thought was a great TV show (but no one seemed to agree!) called “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip”.

43. Put the kibosh on ENDED
“Kibosh” is something that constrains or checks. “Kibosh” looks like a Yiddish word but it isn’t, and is more likely English slang from the early 1800s.

47. 1984 South African Peace Nobelist DESMOND TUTU
Desmond Tutu is a South African, a former Anglican bishop who was an outspoken opponent of apartheid. Tutu won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009, among other distinguished awards.

50. Williams with a .344 lifetime batting average TED
As well as playing for the Boston Red Sox, Ted Williams served as a pilot in the Marine Corps in World War II and the Korean War.

51. High-altitude nest AERIE
An aerie is the nest of an eagle.

54. Slap-on-the-forehead cry D’OH!
“The Simpsons” is one of the most successful programs produced by the Fox Broadcasting Company. Homer Simpson’s catchphrase is “D’oh”, now such a famous exclamation that it has been included in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) since 2001.

56. The “height” part of a height phobia ACRO-
Our prefix “acro-” comes from the Greek “akros” meaning “at the top”. Examples are “acrophobia” (fear of heights) and “Acropolis” (“city at the top”).

64. “Star Trek” role for George Takei HIKARU SULU
Mr. Hikaru Sulu was of course played by George Takei in the original “Star Trek” series. Takei has played lots of roles over the years and is still very active in television. Did you know that he appeared in the 1963 film about President Kennedy’s WWII career called “PT-109”? Not only did Takei play the helmsman on the Starship Enterprise, he played the helmsman steering the Japanese destroyer that ran down John F. Kennedy’s motor torpedo boat.

66. Late-night Jay LENO
Jay Leno was born James Leno in New Rochelle, New York. Jay’s father was the son of Italian immigrants, and his mother was from Scotland. Leno grew up in Andover, Massachusetts and actually dropped out of school on the advice of a high school guidance counsellor. However, years later he went to Emerson college and earned a Bachelor’s degree in speech therapy. Leno also started a comedy club at Emerson college in 1973. Today Jay Leno is a car nut and owns about 200 vehicles of various types. You can check them out on his website: www.jaylenosgarage.com.

67. Genesis garden site EDEN
According to the Book of Genesis, Adam and Eve lived in a garden “in” Eden, with Eden being geographically located by reference to four rivers including the Tigris and the Euphrates. Some scholars hypothesize that Eden was located in Mesopotamia, which encompasses much of modern-day Iraq.

68. Scrabble pieces TILES
The game of Scrabble has been around since 1938, the invention of an architect named Alfred Mosher Butts. Butts determined the optimum number of tiles for each letter and the appropriate point value of each tile by analyzing letter distributions in publications like the “New York Times” …

70. Big name in ice cream EDY
Dreyers’ ice cream sells its products under the name Dreyers in the Western United States, and Edy’s in the Eastern states. The company’s founders were William Dryer and Joseph Edy.

71. Monica of tennis SELES
Monica Seles has a Hungarian name as she was born to Hungarian parents in former Yugoslavia. Seles was the World No. 1 professional tennis player in 1991 and 1992 before being forced from the sport when she was stabbed by a spectator at a match in 1993. She did return to the game two years later, but never achieved the same level of success.

Down
1. Rights protection gp. ACLU
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has its roots in the First World War when it was founded to provide legal advice and support to conscientious objectors.

4. Makeup maven Lauder ESTEE
Estée Lauder was quite the successful business woman with a reputation as a great salesperson. Lauder introduced her own line of fragrances in 1953, a bath oil called “Youth Dew”. “Youth Dew” was marketed as a perfume, but it was added to bathwater. All of a sudden women were pouring whole bottles of Ms. Lauder’s “perfume” into their baths, while using only a drop or two of French perfumes behind their ears. That’s quite a difference in sales volume …

6. Musketeer motto word ALL
“One for all, all for one” is a motto that is often written in Latin as “unus pro omnibus, omnes pro uno”. Famously, it is the motto of Alexandre Dumas’ Three Musketeers. It is also the motto used by the country of Switzerland.

The “Three Musketeers” were Athos, Porthos and Aramis, and their young protégé was D’Artagnan. A musketeer was an infantry soldier who was equipped with a musket. Funnily enough, Alexandre Dumas’ “Three Musketeers” really didn’t use their muskets and were better known for their prowess with their swords.

12. Borscht ingredient BEET
Borscht is a beetroot soup that originated from Ukraine. Borscht can be served both hot and cold.

15. North African capital for which its country is named TUNIS
Tunisia is the most northerly country in Africa. The country takes its name from the capital city of Tunis.

18. Mama Cass’s surname ELLIOT
Cass Elliot was one of the four singers in the Mamas and the Papas, a sensational group from the sixties. Elliot was performing sold-out concerts in London in 1974 when she was found dead one morning, having had a heart attack. She was only 32 years old. Eerily, she died in the same flat (on loan from Harry Nilsson) in which the Who’s drummer, Keith Moon, would die just four years later.

22. Clouseau’s title: Abbr. INSP
Inspector Jacques Clouseau is of course the wonderful detective in “The Pink Panther” series of films. The definitive player of the role was English actor Peter Sellers. Clouseau worked for the Sûreté, the detective branch of the French National Police.

25. D-Day city ST LO
Saint-Lô is a town in Normandy that was occupied by Germany in 1940. Saint-Lo stood at a strategic crossroads and so there was intense fighting there during the Normandy invasion of 1944. After the bombardment, very little of the town was left standing.

27. Nile Valley country EGYPT
From ancient times right up to 1970, the annual flooding of the Nile was a significant event in Egypt. The flooding allowed the deposition of fertile silt far beyond the banks of the river, helping the region’s agriculture. However, the flooding was unpredictable. So the Aswan Dam was built in the sixties and from 1970 the flooding was brought under control.

29. TV sports pioneer Arledge ROONE
Roone Arledge was an executive at ABC. Arledge made a name for himself in sports broadcasting and then took over ABC News in 1977, a position he held until his death in 2002.

33. Christopher of “Superman” REEVE
The actor Christopher Reeve was most associated with his portrayal of Superman in the late seventies and early eighties. Reeve became paralyzed from the neck down when he fell from a horse in a jumping event in 1995. He passed away in 2004.

34. “¿Cómo está __?” USTED
“¿Cómo está usted?” is the more formal way of asking, “How are you?” in Spanish.

41. Too violent for a PG-13 RATED R
The Motion Picture Association of America’s (MPAA) film-rating system is purely voluntary and is not backed by any law. Movie theaters agree to abide by the rules that come with the MPAA ratings in exchange for access to new movies.

44. Nickelodeon explorer DORA
“Dora the Explorer” is a cartoon series shown on Nickelodeon. Part of Dora’s remit is to introduce the show’s young viewers to some Spanish words and phrases.

53. Cow on a carton ELSIE
Elsie the Cow is the mascot of the Borden Company. Elsie first appeared at the New York World’s Fair in 1939, introduced to symbolize the perfect dairy product. Elsie was also given a husband named Elmer the Bull. Elmer eventually moved over to the chemical division of Borden where he gave his name to Elmer’s Glue.

60. Beekeeper played by Peter Fonda ULEE
“Ulee’s Gold” is a highly respected film from 1997 in which Peter Fonda plays the title role of Ulee. Ulee’s “gold” is the honey that Ulee produces. It is a favorite role for Peter Fonda and he has shared that playing Ulee brought to mind his father, Henry Fonda, who himself kept a couple of hives. So if you see Peter Fonda in “Ulee’s Gold” you’re witnessing some characteristics that Peter saw in his father.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Ed of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” ASNER
6. “Mystery solved!” AHA
9. Spear STAB
13. Picked CHOSE
14. Artist’s studio site LOFT
16. “Arsenic and Old __” LACE
17. Mischievous girl in classic comics LITTLE LULU
19. Fairy tale menace OGRE
20. Display for the first time, as a product UNVEIL
21. Rajah’s spouse RANI
23. Until this time YET
24. Grilled fish in Japanese unadon EELS
26. “Exodus” actor Sal MINEO
28. Florida NBA team, on scoreboards ORL
31. Jack LaLanne, for one FITNESS GURU
35. Tries to make it alone GOES SOLO
37. Funereal stacks PYRES
38. Unaccompanied LONE
39. Baggage handler, e.g. TOTER
42. Actress Amanda PEET
43. Put the kibosh on ENDED
45. Idle INACTIVE
47. 1984 South African Peace Nobelist DESMOND TUTU
50. Williams with a .344 lifetime batting average TED
51. High-altitude nest AERIE
52. Lavish bash FETE
54. Slap-on-the-forehead cry D’OH!
56. The “height” part of a height phobia ACRO-
58. Dress to the nines DOLL UP
62. __ hygiene ORAL
64. “Star Trek” role for George Takei HIKARU SULU
66. Late-night Jay LENO
67. Genesis garden site EDEN
68. Scrabble pieces TILES
69. Bustle TO-DO
70. Big name in ice cream EDY
71. Monica of tennis SELES

Down
1. Rights protection gp. ACLU
2. Knee-to-ankle bone SHIN
3. Misbehaving child’s punishment NO TV
4. Makeup maven Lauder ESTEE
5. Raised sculptures RELIEFS
6. Musketeer motto word ALL
7. Time of day HOUR
8. On fire AFLAME
9. __-mo replay SLO
10. Cry that starts a kid’s game TAG! YOU’RE IT!
11. Ranch division ACRE
12. Borscht ingredient BEET
15. North African capital for which its country is named TUNIS
18. Mama Cass’s surname ELLIOT
22. Clouseau’s title: Abbr. INSP
25. D-Day city ST LO
27. Nile Valley country EGYPT
28. Eyed lewdly OGLED
29. TV sports pioneer Arledge ROONE
30. Pitches in LENDS A HAND
32. Cry that conflicts with 10-Down NOT IT
33. Christopher of “Superman” REEVE
34. “¿Cómo está __?” USTED
36. Boss’s “We need to talk” SEE ME
40. Sufficient, in slang ENUF
41. Too violent for a PG-13 RATED R
44. Nickelodeon explorer DORA
46. Figures made with scissors CUTOUTS
48. Ornamental wall recess NICHE
49. Put down DERIDE
53. Cow on a carton ELSIE
54. Birdbrain DOLT
55. After-school cookie OREO
57. Gave the green light OKED
59. Quiet spell LULL
60. Beekeeper played by Peter Fonda ULEE
61. Kisser PUSS
63. Lav of London LOO
65. “__ questions?” ANY

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