Saturday, February 8, 2014 — Entertainment Tonight

Introduction

You should find today's puzzle from Cox & Rathvon to be a very entertaining diversion. The puzzle encompasses a broad gamut of the arts and popular entertainment. We find references to cinema, stage, music, and dance as well as literature. Musical genres range from classical, to opera, to jazz, to rock, to hip-hop — there's even something for the very young. So, if you are not into the Olympics, there are a multitude of ideas for alternative ways to spend your time.

Solution to Today's Puzzle

Legend:	"*" anagram; "~" sounds like; "<" letters reversed
	"( )" letters inserted; "_" letters deleted; "†" explicit in the clue

Across

1a   C|AM|ERAS — C (cold) + AM (in the morning) + ERAS (times)

5a   TROUPES* — anagram (improved) of POSTURE

9a   M(EL|O|DR)AMA — MAMA (mom) containing (embracing) {EL (the Spanish; Spanish word for 'the'} + O (love; tennis score) + DR (doctor)}

10a   TANG|O — TANG (bite) + O ([letter that resembles a] bagel)

11a   SEAQUAKE~ — sounds like (upon hearing) SEEK (look for) + WAKE (the trail of a boat)

12a   TR(Y)OUT — TROUT (fish) containing (around) Y (the fourth [letter] of JulY)

Since the solution is a single word, it must be a noun rather than a verb.

Fish^[7] is a television series that was spun-off from the sitcom Barney Miller. It ran from February 1977 to May 1978 and starred Abe Vigoda as New York Police Department Detective Phil Fish and Florence Stanley as his wife Bernice.

14a   YUL|E — YUL (Brynner) + E (English)

Yul Brynner^[7] (1920–1985) was a Russian-born United States-based actor of stage and film. He was best known for his portrayal of the King of Siam in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical The King and I, for which he won two Tony Awards and an Academy Award for the film version; he played the role 4,625 times on stage. He is also remembered as Rameses II in the 1956 Cecil B. DeMille blockbuster The Ten Commandments, General Bounine in the 1956 film Anastasia and Chris Adams in The Magnificent Seven. Brynner was noted for his distinctive voice and for his shaved head, which he maintained as a personal trademark long after adopting it in 1951 for his role in The King and I.

16a   INN|OVATION — INN (tavern) + OVATION (cheers)

Cheers^[7] is an American sitcom television series that ran for 11 seasons from 1982 to 1993. The show is set in a bar named Cheers (named after the popular toast) in Boston, Massachusetts, where a group of locals meet to drink, relax, and socialize. The show's theme song lent its famous refrain, "Where Everybody Knows Your Name", as the show's tagline.

18a   PRIM|A D|ON|NA — PRIM (very proper) + AD (advertisement) + ON (about) + NA (North American)

19a   KEEP< — reversal (returning) of PEEK (furtive glance)

22a   GREASE~ — sounds like (listened to) GREECE (Mediterranean land)

Grease^[7] is a 1971 stage musical named for the 1950s United States working-class youth subculture known as greasers. The musical, set in 1959, follows ten working-class teenagers as they navigate the complexities of love. The score attempts to recreate the sounds of early rock and roll. In its record-breaking original Broadway production, Grease was a raunchy, raw, aggressive, vulgar show. Subsequent productions sanitized it and tamed it down. A hugely successful film version in 1978 starred John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John.

23a   ST|RANGER — ST (street) + (followed by) RANGER (park warden)

26a   ASTI|R — ASTI (sparkling wine) + R (right)

Asti^[7] (formerly known as Asti Spumante) is a sparkling white Italian wine that is produced throughout southeastern Piedmont but is particularly focused around the towns of Asti and Alba. Since 1993 the wine has been classified as a Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita (DOCG) and as of 2004 was Italy's largest producing appellation.

27a   THE|SPI(A)NS — A (answer) contained in {THE (†) + SPINS (pleasure rides)}

As far as I can determine, "The Pleasure Rides" is a work of fiction — one invented by the setters to suit their cryptic purposes in this clue.

28a   T(URNS) IN — URNS (coffee containers) contained in (coated) TIN (metal)

29a   MARITAL* — anagram (after repositioning) of ALTAR IM

Down

1d   CO(ME)S BY — ME (†) contained in (interrupting) COSBY (†)

Cosby^[7] is an American situation comedy television series broadcast on CBS from September 1996 to April 2000, loosely based on the British sitcom One Foot in the Grave. The program stars Bill Cosby and Phylicia Rashād, who previously worked with Cosby in the 1984–1992 NBC sitcom The Cosby Show.

2d   M|ELBA — M (month) + (on; in a down clue) ELBA (Italian island)

Dame Nellie Melba^[7] (1861–1931) was an Australian operatic soprano. She became one of the most famous singers of the late Victorian Era and the early 20th century. She was the first Australian to achieve international recognition as a classical musician.

3d   R(ADI<)UM — reversal (put back) of IDA (†) contained in (in) RUM (booze)

4d   STAN K|ENTON* — STANK (performed badly) + an anagram (bananas) of ON TEN
Stan Kenton^[7] (1911–1979) was a pianist, composer, and arranger who led an innovative, influential, and often controversial American jazz orchestra.

I seriously question whether Stan Kenton could have been expected to do much with this:

5d   TRAP< — reversal (regarded retrospectively) of PART (role)

Pitfall^[7] is a 1948 black-and-white film noir drama, based on a novel of the same name by Jay Dratler, which starred Dick Powell and Lizabeth Scott.

6d   ONTARIAN* — anagram (travelling) of ON A TRAIN

7d   PAN(TOM|I)ME — {PAN (criticize) + ME (†)} containing (about) {TOM (cat) + I (†)}

8d   SHORTEN* — anagram (repaired) of THRONES

13d   DOWNSTREAM — {OWNS (controls) + T (time)} contained in (in) DREAM (fantasy)

15d   LE(ICE)STER — LESTER (Pearson) containing (obtains) ICE (diamonds)

Lester Pearson^[7] (1897–1972) was the 14th Prime Minister of Canada from 22 April 1963 to 20 April 1968. He also won the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1957 for organizing the United Nations Emergency Force to resolve the Suez Canal Crisis.

17d   MAESTROS* — anagram (arranged) of SOME STAR

18d   P(AGE)ANT — PANT (breathe excitedly) containing (taking in) AGE (mature)

20d   PERUS|AL — PERU (South American country) + S ('s) + AL ([symbol for the chemical element] aluminum)

21d   RAPPER~ — sounds like (vocally) WRAPPER (cover)

24d   GI|ANT — GI ([American] soldier) + ANT ([insect] soldier)

Giant is a 1952 novel by American writer Edna Ferber^[7] (1885-1968) which was made into a 1956 American drama film of the same name starring Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson and James Dean.

25d   S(T)UN — SUN (star) containing (receiving) T (true)

Key to Reference Sources: 

^[1]   - The Chambers Dictionary, 11th Edition
^[2]   - Search Chambers - (Chambers 21st Century Dictionary)
^[3]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (American Heritage Dictionary)
^[4]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)
^[5]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford Dictionary of English)
^[6]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford American Dictionary)
^[7]   - Wikipedia
^[8]   - Reverso Online Dictionary (Collins French-English Dictionary)
^[9]   - Infoplease (Random House Unabridged Dictionary)
^[10] - CollinsDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)
^[11] - TheFreeDictionary.com (Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary)

Signing off for today — Falcon