LA Times Crossword Answers 5 Dec 14, Friday

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CROSSWORD SETTER: Marti DuGuay-Carpenter
THEME: “Longier” Answers … each of today’s themed answers is a well-known, two-word phrase. But, there is a letter “I” inserted in the first word to form a comparative adjective that suits the clue:

17A. Baseball, vis-à-vis jai alai? POKIER GAME (from “poker game”)
27A. GE range, vis-à-vis an Easy-Bake toy? TOASTIER OVEN (from “toaster oven”)
44A. SpongeBob’s underwear, vis-à-vis Mickey’s? BOXIER BRIEFS (from “boxer briefs”)
59A. Jeep, vis-à-vis a Cadillac? BUMPIER CAR (from “bumper car”)

BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 11m 55s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across

1. SEC nickname BAMA
The athletic teams of the University of Alabama (“Bama”) are nicknamed the Crimson Tide, a reference to the team colors of crimson and white.

The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an athletic conference comprised mainly of schools in the southeastern US. The SEC was founded back in 1932 with a roster of thirteen schools, ten of which are still members of the conference.

14. Islamic leader IMAM
An imam is a Muslim leader, often the person in charge of a mosque or perhaps a Muslim community.

15. What recon may provide INTEL
A reconnaissance (recon) may provide intelligence (intel).

16. Famille member PERE
In French, a father (père) is a member of the family (membre de la famille).

17. Baseball, vis-à-vis jai alai? POKIER GAME (from “poker game”)
“Poky” means slow, dawdling or puttering.

Baseball might be described as a slower (pokier) game than jai alai.

19. Award for Jessica Tandy OBIE
The Obies are the “Off-Broadway Theater Awards”. The Obies are presented annually and the recipients are chosen by “The Village Voice” newspaper.

Actress Jessica Tandy was famous for having played very American roles, but she started out her career as an English actress. Tandy’s first marriage was to the marvelous English actor Jack Hawkins, but the couple divorced in 1940 and Tandy moved to New York. There she met Canadian actor Hume Cronyn whom she married in 1942. Cronyn and Tandy were jointly honored with a special Lifetime Achievement Tony Award in 1994. Tandy won the Best Actress Oscar in 1989 for playing the title role in “Driving Miss Daisy”.

21. Short time, shortly NSEC
“Nanosecond” is more correctly abbreviated to “ns”, and really is a tiny amount of time: one billionth of a second.

26. “Hooked on Bach” company K-TEL
K-Tel was founded in 1962 in Winnipeg, Manitoba by one Philip Kives. K-Tel’s recipe for success was the sale of inexpensive goods with a simple sales pitch and mail-order distribution.

I know that a lot of people detested the “Hooked on Classics” albums, but to be honest, I found them to be a lot of fun. But then again, I liked disco! The original “Hooked on Classics” album was recorded in 1981 by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra from London. The music was a selection of recognizable extracts from the world of classical music played over a continuous, disco beat.

27. GE range, vis-à-vis an Easy-Bake toy? TOASTIER OVEN (from “toaster oven”)
A GE range has a warmer (toastier) oven than an Easy-Bake toy oven.

Kenner Products of Cincinnati, Ohio introduced the Easy-Bake Oven in 1963 and they are still produced today, but now by Hasbro.

36. “A Challenge for the Actor” author HAGEN
“A Challenge for the Actor” is a very successful textbook used in acting classes that was written by actress and teacher Uta Hagen.

Uta Hagen was a German-born American actress. Hagen married Jose Ferrer in 1938, but they were divorced ten years later after it was revealed that she was having a long-running affair with Paul Robeson. Her association with Robeson, a prominent civil rights activist, earned her a spot on the Hollywood Blacklist during the McCarthy Era. This forced her away from film, but towards a successful stage career in New York City.

39. Hemingway and others PAPAS
Apparently, the author Ernest Hemingway picked up the moniker “Papa” on the birth of his first child (as one might expect!). Hemingway seemed to the like the nickname, and welcomed its use outside of the family, and his admirers obliged.

40. Letters on a cross INRI
The letters written on the cross on which Jesus died were “INRI”. INRI is an acronym for the Latin “Iesus Nazarenus, Rex Iudaeorum”, which translates into English as “Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews”.

41. Tulsa sch. ORU
Oral Roberts University (ORU) is a private school in Tulsa, Oklahoma. ORU was founded relatively recently, in 1963 by the late televangelist Oral Roberts. The campus includes a Prayer Tower at its center, a spectacular glass and steel structure designed by architect Frank Wallace. The tower includes an observation deck, and is a popular tourist attraction.

42. Shell rival MOBIL
Mobil was founded as part of the the breakup of Standard Oil in 1911. The company was originally called Socony (Standard Oil Company of New York). Socony merged with Magnolia Petroleum Company in the thirties and adopted Magnolia’s Pegasus emblem, and it has been used ever since. Mobil merged with Exxon in 1999 but the Mobil brand and Pegasus emblem are alive and well.

Royal Dutch Shell is the largest energy company in the world and is headquartered in the Hague, in the Netherlands. The company was formed in 1907 with the merger of the Royal Dutch Petroleum Company and Shell Transport and Trading company of the UK. The two companies merged in order to compete globally with the biggest US oil company of the day, John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil. Shell Oil Company is a US-based subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell that is headquartered in Houston, Texas.

43. Ryan of “Bones” O’NEAL
Actor Ryan O’Neal got his big break in the sixties on television. He appeared in the prime-time soap opera “Peyton Place”, opposite fellow newcomer Mia Farrow. Then in 1970 he landed a starring role in the hit movie “Love Story”, which established him in Hollywood. O’Neal was an amateur boxer before he turned to acting, and established a respectable record Golden Gloves competitions. These days, O’Neal has a recurring role on the TV show “Bones”, playing the title character’s father.

“Bones” is a TV crime drama in which the title character is a forensic anthropologist. I quite like the show as the lead characters, Dr. Temperance “Bones” Brennan and FBI Special Agent Seeley Booth, have a give and take relationship that is reminiscent of characters often played by Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy.

44. SpongeBob’s underwear, vis-à-vis Mickey’s? BOXIER BRIEFS (from “boxer briefs”)
The cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants would wear “squarer” (boxier) underwear than Mickey Mouse.

48. Certain evergreen seed NUTMEG
The fruit of the nutmeg tree yields two very different spices. What we call “nutmeg” comes from the seed of the tree. “Mace” is the dried covering of the seed.

52. One taking a shot CAMERA
The original “camera” was a vaulted room, which is the meaning of the Latin term. In the 1600s, the term “camera obscura” was coined to describe a “darkened room”. This was usage was extended to describe an optical device made from a room with a small hole in one wall. Light from the scene outside passes through the hole and projects an image onto the inside walls of the room. The smaller the hole, the sharper is the image. Camera obscuras also came in smaller sizes, in the form of darkened boxes instead of rooms. These boxes developed (pun!) into our modern “cameras”.

58. “Sin City” actress ALBA
Actress Jessica Alba got her big break when she was cast in the Fox science fiction show “Dark Angel”. Alba had a tough life growing up as she spent a lot of time in hospital and so found it difficult to develop friendships. As a youngster she twice had a collapsed lung, frequently caught pneumonia, suffered from asthma, had a ruptured appendix and a tonsillar cyst. On top of all that she acknowledges that she suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder as a child. It seems that she has really turned her life around …

“Sin City” is a 2005 thriller movie that is based on a series of graphic novels by Frank Miller. Miller also co-directs the film. “Sin City” has a large ensemble cast that includes Bruce Willis, Jessica Alba, Benicio del Toro, Clive Owen and Mickey Rourke. The author Frank Miller even plays a role himself.

59. Jeep, vis-à-vis a Cadillac? BUMPIER CAR (from “bumper car”)
A Jeep might be expected to provide a rougher (bumpier) ride than a Cadillac.

63. Its second movement translates to “Play of the Waves” LA MER
“La Mer” is a lovely group of three symphonic sketches for orchestra by the French composer Claude Debussy. Listen to it (as I am right now, coincidentally!), and one can imagine oneself at the ocean. “La Mer” is French for “The Sea”. The three movements are:

1. “De l’aube à midi sur la mer” (From Dawn to Noon on the Sea)
2. “Jeux de vagues” (Play of the Waves)
3. “Dialogue du vent et de la mer” (Dialogue of the wind and the sea)

64. First name in design COCO
Coco Chanel was a French fashion designer. Perhaps because I am a man, clothes design is not my forte. However, if I had to pick a designer whose clothes I really liked, it would be Chanel. She had a way of creating simpler designs that looked so elegant on a woman.

Down
2. Love abroad AMORE
“Amore” is Italian for “love”.

6. “Picnic” playwright INGE
Playwright William Inge had a run of success on Broadway in the early fifties. Inge’s most celebrated work of that time was the play “Picnic”, for which he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize. The original 1953 cast of “Picnic” included a young male actor making his debut on Broadway. His name was Paul Newman. Many of Inge’s works are set in the American heartland and so he became known as the “Playwright of the Midwest”.

7. Mus. direction STAC
Staccato is a musical direction signifying that notes should be played in a disconnected form. The opposite of staccato would be legato, long and continuous notes played very smoothly.

8. 10-Down vehicle LEM
In the Apollo program, the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM) was the vehicle that actually landed on the moon and returned the astronauts to the command module that was orbiting overhead. The third LEM built was named “Spider”, and it participated in the Apollo 9 mission which tested the functionality of the LEM design in space. The fourth LEM was called “Snoopy” and it flew around the moon in the Apollo 10 mission, the dress rehearsal for the upcoming moon landing. Apollo 11’s LEM was of course called “Eagle” and it brought Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to and from the moon’s surface. Another famous LEM was Apollo 13’s Aquarius. Although Aquarius never landed on the moon, it did serve as a “lifeboat” for the three astronauts after the explosive rupture of an oxygen canister in the Service Module.

10. Mission program APOLLO
The Apollo program is very much associated with President Kennedy, as he gave NASA the challenge to land men on the moon by the end of the sixties. However, the Apollo program was conceived during the Eisenhower administration as a follow-up to Project Mercury that put the first Americans in space.

11. Self-named sitcom REBA
Reba McEntire is a country music singer and television actress. McEntire starred in her own sitcom called “Reba” that aired on the WB and the CW cable channels from 2001 to 2007.

23. Large Hadron Collider acronym CERN
CERN is an acronym that stands for “Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire” (European Council for Nuclear Research. CERN’s mission is to provide the largest particle physics lab in the world, and it does just that, having built several enormous particle accelerators. The CERN particle accelerator most in the news these days is the Large Hadron Collider located near Geneva.

The Large Hadron Collider is the world’s largest particle accelerator. It is located on the French-Swiss border near Geneva, in a tunnel that is a whopping 17 miles in circumference.

26. Capital of Rwanda KIGALI
Kigali is the capital of the African nation of Rwanda, and is located in the center of the country. That location led to the city being picked as the capital in 1962, over the traditional capital of Nyanza. The choice was made on the occasion of Rwanda’s independence from Belgium.

29. Piglike animal TAPIR
All four species of tapir are endangered. Even though the tapir looks much like a pig, it is more closely related to the horse and the rhinoceros.

31. Poet friend of T.S. EZRA
Ezra Pound was an American poet who spent much of his life wandering the world, spending years in London, Paris, and Italy. In Italy, Pound’s work and sympathies for Mussolini’s regime led to his arrest at the end of the war. His major work was the epic, albeit incomplete, “The Cantos”. This epic poem is divided into 120 sections, each known as a canto.

The author T. S. Eliot was the son of Henry Ware Eliot and Charlotte Champe Stearns, so his full name was Thomas Stearns Eliot (TSE).

32. 10-Down first name NEIL
(10D. Mission program APOLLO)
Neil Armstrong was the most private of individuals. You didn’t often see him giving interviews, unlike so many of the more approachable astronauts of the Apollo space program. His famous, “That’s one small step for (a) man, one giant leap for mankind” statement; that was something that he came up with himself while Apollo 11 was making its way to the moon.

34. 1989 Lawn-Boy acquirer TORO
Toro is a manufacturer mainly of lawn mowers and snow removal equipment based in Bloomington, Minnesota. The company was started in 1914 to build tractor engines.

The first Lawn-Boy mower was introduced in 1934 by the Evinrude Company. They have been produced by the Toro Company since 1989.

35. Gravy base ROUX
A roux is a mixture of wheat flour and clarified butter (or other fat) cooked together until it can be used as a thickening agent. Roux is an essential ingredient in French cooking, although “healthier” versions of roux are being used more and more these days.

40. Part of MIT: Abbr. INST
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

42. Yom Kippur War prime minister MEIR
Golda Meir was known as the “Iron Lady” when she was Prime Minister of Israel, long before that sobriquet came to be associated with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Golda Meir was born Golda Mabovitch in Kiev (in modern-day Ukraine), and when she was a young girl she moved with her family to the United States and settled in Milwaukee. As a teenager she relocated to Denver where she met and married Morris Meyerson, at the age of 19. She and her husband joined a kibbutz in Palestine in 1921, when she was in her twenties. Meir had been active in politics in the US, and continued her political work in Palestine. She was very influential during WWII, and played a leading role in negotiations after the war leading to the setting up of the state of Israel. By the time she was called on to lead the country, Meir had already retired, citing exhaustion and ill health. But serve she did, and led Israel during turbulent times (e.g. the massacre at the Munich Olympics, and the Yom Kippur War). She eventually resigned in 1974, saying that was what the people wanted.

The Yom Kippur War started on October 6 in 1973 with a surprise move by Syria and Egypt into the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights. The conflict quickly escalated into a confrontation between the US and the Soviet Union, as both superpowers rushed arms to the opposing states. Within a week, Israeli forces had regained the land that had been lost and two weeks later had advanced within striking range of both Cairo and Damascus. A UN brokered ceasefire brought the war to an end on October 25, after just 19 days of fighting.

45. Film with Manny the Mammoth ICE AGE
“Ice Age” is a 2002 animated film that has spawned a whole series of movies: “Ice Age: The Meltdown” (2006), “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” (2009) and “Ice Age: Continental Drift” (2012).

49. “Heart of Georgia” MACON
The “Heart of Georgia” is an alternative name for Central Georgia, and is that part of the state surrounding the city of Macon. Famously, Macon was home to the Allman Brothers, and also Little Richard, Otis Redding and Randy Crawford.

51. Wrap relatives GYROS
A gyro is a traditional Greek dish, a sandwich made with pita bread containing meat, tomato, onion and tzatziki (a yogurt and cucumber sauce). The meat for gyros is usually roasted on a tall vertical spit and is sliced from the spit as required. The name “gyro” comes from the modern Greek word “gyros” meaning “circle”, a reference to the meat turning as it is grilled in a rotating circular motion.

53. “__ Rhapsody”: Brahms vocal work ALTO
The “Alto Rhapsody” is a vocal work composed by Johannes Brahms as a wedding gift for the daughter of his good friends Robert and Clara Schumann. The piece might be a little more than a wedding gift, as there is much speculation that Brahms had romantic feelings for young Julie Schumann.

54. Many CEOs have them MBAS
The world’s first MBA degree was offered by Harvard’s Graduate School of Business Administration, in 1908.

55. Stone of “The Help” EMMA
The actress Emma Stone really came to prominence with her performance in the 2010 high school movie called “Easy A”. My favorite film in which Stone appears is 2011’s “The Help”.

“The Help” is a 2011 film that is an adaptation of a 2009 novel of the same name written by Kathryn Stockett. The story centers on a young female journalist who writes a book exposing the racism experienced by African American maids working in Jackson, Mississippi in the sixties.

56. Miffed, with “in” A PET
Apparently there’s a phrase “in a pet” meaning “in a snit, in a temper”.

60. Flier with Chicago H.Q. UAL
United Airlines (UAL) has a complicated history, but can trace its roots back to Aviation Enterprises, founded in 1944 and later called Texas International. The first use of the “United” name in the company’s history was when airplane pioneer William Boeing merged his Boeing Air Transport with Pratt & Whitney to form the United Aircraft and Transport Corporation (UATC) in 1929. The Air Mail Act of 1934 required that UATC be broken up into United Aircraft (which became United Technologies), the Boeing Aircraft Company and United Air Lines.

61. Kelly Clarkson label RCA
Apparently singer Kelly Clarkson was the first winner of “American Idol”. That’s all I know …

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. SEC nickname BAMA
5. Seating choice AISLE
10. Skills ARTS
14. Islamic leader IMAM
15. What recon may provide INTEL
16. Famille member PERE
17. Baseball, vis-à-vis jai alai? POKIER GAME (from “poker game”)
19. Award for Jessica Tandy OBIE
20. Poetic preposition ERE
21. Short time, shortly NSEC
22. Wood shop tool C-CLAMP
24. Scoff at DERIDE
26. “Hooked on Bach” company K-TEL
27. GE range, vis-à-vis an Easy-Bake toy? TOASTIER OVEN (from “toaster oven”)
33. Spread STREW
36. “A Challenge for the Actor” author HAGEN
37. Commercial ending? -IZE
38. Appear dramatically LOOM
39. Hemingway and others PAPAS
40. Letters on a cross INRI
41. Tulsa sch. ORU
42. Shell rival MOBIL
43. Ryan of “Bones” O’NEAL
44. SpongeBob’s underwear, vis-à-vis Mickey’s? BOXIER BRIEFS (from “boxer briefs”)
47. __ block CITY
48. Certain evergreen seed NUTMEG
52. One taking a shot CAMERA
55. Grub EATS
57. One or more ANY
58. “Sin City” actress ALBA
59. Jeep, vis-à-vis a Cadillac? BUMPIER CAR (from “bumper car”)
62. Buck STAG
63. Its second movement translates to “Play of the Waves” LA MER
64. First name in design COCO
65. Socks HOSE
66. Delight ELATE
67. Hill workers ANTS

Down
1. Human, e.g. BIPED
2. Love abroad AMORE
3. Auto attachment? -MAKER
4. “__ being unreasonable?” AM I
5. Like some rescues AIR-SEA
6. “Picnic” playwright INGE
7. Mus. direction STAC
8. 10-Down vehicle LEM
9. Ins ELECTEES
10. Mission program APOLLO
11. Self-named sitcom REBA
12. Cut TRIM
13. Percolate SEEP
18. Fund ENDOW
23. Large Hadron Collider acronym CERN
25. It’s checked when it’s done ITEM
26. Capital of Rwanda KIGALI
28. Inferior SHABBY
29. Piglike animal TAPIR
30. Grape site VINE
31. Poet friend of T.S. EZRA
32. 10-Down first name NEIL
33. Challenging roommate SLOB
34. 1989 Lawn-Boy acquirer TORO
35. Gravy base ROUX
39. Easily moved PORTABLE
40. Part of MIT: Abbr. INST
42. Yom Kippur War prime minister MEIR
43. Helpful OF USE
45. Film with Manny the Mammoth ICE AGE
46. Complete ENTIRE
49. “Heart of Georgia” MACON
50. Sign into law ENACT
51. Wrap relatives GYROS
52. Get money for CASH
53. “__ Rhapsody”: Brahms vocal work ALTO
54. Many CEOs have them MBAS
55. Stone of “The Help” EMMA
56. Miffed, with “in” A PET
60. Flier with Chicago H.Q. UAL
61. Kelly Clarkson label RCA

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