Saturday, February 23, 2013 — Spot the Theme

Introduction

I found this puzzle to be perhaps just a tad more difficult than those from the previous couple of weeks, although still not too taxing.

For the second week in succession, I failed to discern a theme in today's puzzle from Cox & Rathvon. Last week, a sharp-eyed reader was able to find one. So, once again, I put the challenge out to readers — identify the theme.

Solution to Today's Puzzle

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

Across

1a   S(H)R|ILLNESS — {SR (senior) + ILLNESS (complaint)} containing H (hot)

6a   OMEN< — reversal of (the return of) NEMO (Disney clownfish)

Nemo is the principal character in the 2003 animated feature Finding Nemo^[7] released by Walt Disney Pictures.

9a   DON|O|VAN — DON (put on) + O (love; a score of nil in tennis) + VAN (truck)

Donovan^[7] (born Donovan Phillips Leitch) is a Scottish singer, songwriter and guitarist. Initially labelled as an imitator of Bob Dylan, he developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelia, and world music (notably calypso). He has variously lived in Scotland, London, and California, and, since at least 2008, has lived in County Cork, Ireland with his family.

10a   SU(BUN)IT — SUIT (exec) containing (pocketing) BUN (roll)

12a   _LUCID_< — hidden (piece of) and reversed (in retrospect) in riDICULe

13a   ELIZABETH* — anagram (disturbed) of I BET HAZEL

Hazel^[7] is a single-panel cartoon series by American cartoonist Ted Key (1912 – 2008) about a wry and bossy live-in maid who works for a middle-class family. The cartoon appeared in The Saturday Evening Post from 1943 until that weekly magazine folded in 1969. It was then picked up for daily newspaper syndication and Key continued to draw the cartoon until he retired in 1993. Following his retirement, reprints of the cartoons continued to run in many newspapers. A television series based on the cartoon ran from 1961 to 1966.

Elizabeth II^[7] is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states, known as the Commonwealth realms, and their territories and dependencies, and head of the 54-member Commonwealth of Nations.

14a   RECEDE~ — sounds like (the sound of) RESEED (broadcast [seeds] again)

16a   T(RUM)AN — TAN (bronze) containing (filled with) RUM (booze)

The Truman Show^[7] is a 1998 American satirical comedy-drama film in which Canadian American actor Jim Carrey plays Truman Burbank, a man who is living in a constructed reality television show, broadcast around the clock to billions of people across the globe.

20a   HIDING — double definition; "flogging" & "in secret"

21a   CO|AXED — double definition, the second being cryptic; "persuaded"& "fired [axed] in tandem?"

The question mark serves to warn us of the cryptic nature of the second definition.

24a   ST(AGE) LEFT — {ST (saint) + LEFT (remaining)} containing (outside) AGE (mellow)

26a   P(I)LOT — PLOT (story line) containing (involving) I ([Roman numeral for] one)

27a   LORE|LEI — LEI (garland) following (after) LORE (learning from the past)

Judy Garland^[7] (born Frances Ethel Gumm; 1922 – 1969) was an American actress, singer and vaudevillian. Described by Fred Astaire as "the greatest entertainer who ever lived" and renowned for her contralto voice, she attained international stardom throughout a career that spanned more than 40 years as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage.

Lorelei^[5] is a legendary siren said to live on the Lorelei rock on the bank of the Rhine, whose song lures boatmen to destruction.

28a   NO(NAG)ON — NAG (harry) contained in (tucked into) NOON (lunch hour)

In the surface reading, the setters expect us to think of "sides" as side dishes.

29a   DID|O — DID (accomplished) + O (zip; nothing)

In the Aeneid (an epic by the Roman poet Virgil), Dido^[5] is the queen and founder of Carthage, who fell in love with the shipwrecked Aeneas and killed herself when he deserted her.

30a   GALS|WORTHY — GALS (LASS'S; gal's) + WORTHY (meritorious)

John Galsworthy^[5] (1867 – 1933) was an English novelist and dramatist. He is remembered chiefly for The Forsyte Saga (1906–28), a series of novels which was adapted for television in 1967. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1932.

Down

1d   S|ADDLE — ADDLE (get [someone] confused) following (after) S (second)

2d   {RUN SCARED}* — anagram (drifting) of UNDER CARS

3d   L(IV)ID — LID (cover) containing (keeping) IV ([Roman numeral for] four)

4d   N(INTEND)O —NO (negative) containing (about) INTEND (mean)

Nintendo Co., Ltd.^[7] — a Japanese multinational consumer electronics company headquartered in Kyoto, Japan — is the world's largest video game company by revenue.

5d   SI(SKI)N — SKI (hit the slopes) contained in (in) SIN (error)

Pine Siskin

7d   MIN(C)E — C ([symbol for the chemical element] carbon) contained in (inside) MINE (pit)

8d   NOT(C)HING — C ([Roman numeral for] 100) contained in (in) NOTHING (squat)

11d   BEAT|R(I)X — BEAT (exhausted) + {RX (prescription) containing (†) I ([symbol for the chemical element] iodine)}

Beatrix Potter^[5] (1866 – 1943) was an English writer for children who is known for her series of animal stories, illustrated with her own delicate watercolours, which began with The Tale of Peter Rabbit (first published privately in 1900).

15d   C(ONCE)AL — ONCE (uniquely) contained in (in) CAL (California)

17d   MA|DE LIGHT — MA (mother) + (and) DELIGHT (joy)

18d   WHIST|LED — WHIST ([card] game) + LED (went ahead)

19d   FOR|TUNES — FOR (†) + TUNES (songs)

22d   REGINA* — anagram (misplaced) of GEAR IN

Regina^[7] is the capital city of the Canadian province of Saskatchewan.

23d   ST(INK)Y — INK (black fluid) contained in (in) STY (pen)

25d   A(IRE)D — AD (commercial) containing (about) IRE (rage)

26d   PIN|TO — PIN (fasten on) + TO (†)

Another way to interpret the clue is to read both the wordplay and the solution as entire phrases. Thus "fasten onto" is equivalent to "pin to".

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)

Signing off for today — Falcon