MGWCC #92

crossword 3:30 (across lite)
puzzle about 5 minutes (with shameless wikipediaing)
greetings, and welcome to the 92nd episode of matt gaffney’s weekly crossword contest, “Draw an Award.” this week’s oscar-themed puzzle had the following asterisked theme entries:

• {She co-starred with Michael Douglas as he won an Oscar in “Wall Street”*} clues DARYL HANNAH. i only know her as the replicant in blade runner. wait, did i spoil it for you? sorry. i’m a jerk. also, rosebud was the sled.
• {Best Supporting Actress nominee this Sunday for “Up in the Air”*} is ANNA KENDRICK. right, her. no idea who that is. i don’t even know what this movie is about, although i recognize the name of the movie because i did peter gordon (or should i say, ogden porter)’s oscar-themed fireball crossword.
• {He hosted the Oscars 18 times*}? BOB HOPE. i know who this is.
• {Oscar-winning role for Forest Whitaker*} was IDI AMIN in … whatever that movie was about kings of scotland. i know my ugandan dictators, but what does he have to do with scotland?
• {Best Actor nominee this Sunday for “The Hurt Locker”*} JEREMY RENNER. no idea. although now that the oscars are over and apparently the hurt locker won everything (except for best actor), i at least have some inkling what this movie is about. though i still don’t get the title.
• {Actress who played Eowyn in 2003’s Best Picture, “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King”*} is MIRANDA OTTO. okay, this is a pretty minor role. i mean, yeah, she did get to off that nazgul dude, but how could anybody actually know the name of this actress?

the puzzle instructions tell us that This week’s contest answer is a film that won the Best Picture Oscar. This film’s title would have made a good theme entry this week. so what’s going on with this theme? well, they’re all oscar-related people, although some of the connections are tenuous at best. daryl hannah actually won a razzie for worst supporting actress in wall street (although as sandra bullock proved last weekend, razzies and oscars are not mutually exclusive). MIRANDA OTTO, as i’ve pointed out, played only a bit part in the best picture of 2003. i can’t fault the inclusion of the two people nominated for 2010 oscars, even if i’ve never heard of either of them, because i know some people are into this whole oscars thing. i had no idea BOB HOPE hosted the oscars, let alone 18 times, but that seems like somebody legitimately connected to the oscars. and IDI AMIN has more of a connection to the oscars than he does to scotland.

so what’s the connection between the theme answers? they all contain a palindromic name: HANNAH, ANNA, BOB, IDI, RENNER, and OTTO. (the title, “Draw an Award,” does not contain any palindromic names but is itself a palindrome.) so we’re looking for a best picture winner that contains a palindromic name. since i could name about five best picture winners off the top of my head (seriously… i couldn’t even tell you what won best picture last year), i immediately looked it up on wikipedia. it didn’t take me long to find all about eve, which is a movie i’ve certainly heard of, although i have no clue what it’s about (although … i do know who it’s about, i think). well, anyway, there you have it. only two letters off from all about steve, which is a winner in a different sense (though it did not win worst picture, that honor having been bestowed upon transformers: revenge of the fallen).

movies in general, and the oscars in particular, are not really my thing. (on sunday night i watched two consecutive NBA games.) and there is pretty much no way i could have solved this meta without outside assistance. honestly, i didn’t even try. but i don’t begrudge the movie buffs a puzzle aimed at them (especially after so many sports metas last month), and i hope they liked it.

what about the crossword? most of it was dead easy, but i was shocked when i had to make a series of wild-ass guesses in the SE corner, and even more shocked when they turned out to be right. as i’ve already mentioned, i had no clue on JEREMY RENNER and MIRANDA OTTO. they were crossed by:

• {“The Cover of the Rolling Stone” singer, 1972} is apparently DR. HOOK (and the medicine show), a pop-country rock band from new jersey. ohhh-kay.
• {Online store site}, E__Y… that’s a gimme, right? well, no, not when it’s ETSY. wtf?

once i realized RENNER and OTTO were going to have to be palindromes, there was only one way to do it, but somehow i made the right guesses before i fulled grokked the theme.

speaking of which, here’s the 2-minute rundown of other stuff that caught my eye:

• the {Robert Heinlein-coined word meaning “to understand deeply”} is GROK, from stranger in a strange land.
• {___ Mae Washington-Williams, Strom Thurmond’s African-American daughter (hidden in DRESSIEST)} is a “whoa” kind of clue. the answer is ESSIE, which is straightforward enough given the hint. as it should be, since it crosses two theme answers at vowels and … yeah.
• echoes of last week: {Novosibirsk no} is NYET, and {Like people from Mecca} clues SAUDI. but india is represented not by mumbai but by {The Taj Mahal’s city}, AGRA. and the {Capital 1,800 miles SW of Shanghai} is BANGKOK, in “siam”.
• wait, no, mumbai is here, too: {Rama and Krishna, in Mumbai} are GODS, i guess. i thought they were both avatars of vishnu. you might call them both divine, but GODS plural seems like an exaggeration.
• geography not from last week’s puzzle: fitb RHODE {___ Island}, {Ankara cash} is LIRA, {Wight or Man} is an ISLE, a {Damascene, e.g.} is a SYRIAN, and a PISAN is a {Certain Tuscan}. no, not that tuscan. the one next to him. yeah, her.
• {___ Lopez (chess opening)} = RUY. gratuitous chess clue of the week? nah. how else are you gonna clue it?

okay, that’s all for me. peace out.