City with piers / MON 11-13-17 / Alternatives to mums

Constructor: Peter A. Collins

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging (slowish for a Monday) (3:18)

THEME:"COOL / HAND / LUKE" (65A: With 66- and 67-Across, source of this puzzle theme's quote) — a quote theme to commemorate the 50th anniversary of this movie's release (Nov. 1967): "WHAT WE'VE GOT / HERE IS FAILURE TO / COMMUNICATE" (20A: With 37- and 52-Across, #11 on the American Film Institute's "100 Years ... 100 Movie Quotes" list)

Word of the Day: Susan ISAACS (39D: Susan with the 1978 best seller "Compromising Positions") —

Her first novel (and first attempt at fiction), Compromising Positions, was published in 1978. It was chosen as a main selection of the Book of the Month Club and, like all of her subsequent novels, was a New York Times bestseller. Her fiction has been translated into thirty different languages all over the world. She has also written a work of cultural criticism, Brave Dames and Wimpettes: What Women are Really Doing on Page and Screen. // In addition to writing books and screenplays, Isaacs has reviewed fiction and nonfiction for The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, and Newsday. She belongs to the National Book Critics Circle. Isaacs has written about politics, including a series of essays on the 2000 presidential campaign for Newsday. She has also authored op-eds and articles on feminism, film, and First Amendment issues. (wikipedia)

I don't know how the constructor or editor or someone couldn't see what a bad idea this quote puzzle was right away. Most people (esp. those who haven't seen the film, i.e. most people today) think that the quote is "WHAT WE'VE GOT HERE IS ***A*** FAILURE TO COMMUNICATE" (or, if you're a spelling hero like me, "WHAT WE'VE GOT HERE'S A FAILURE TO COMMUNICATE." I get that the quote here is technically accurate, but honestly I don't care if it came from a ****ing shooting script with Donn Pearson's own damn signature on it—it's Monday, and most people the quote only one way. Now I have listened to the quote in question, and there is no doubt that the puzzle quotes it precisely and accurately. And Yet. The quote is famously "misquoted"for a reason—because it is *requoted* in the movie itself with the damned *A* in there. Here. Here. Lisssssten.


So the accuracy of the original quotation doesn't matter, for Monday puzzle purposes. Most solvers—or ... let me dial that back and say "a good number of solvers" (like every one I've spoken to so far tonight) are going to flail around in that "A" / no "A" portion of the quotation, and that will be all they remember about the puzzle. Or it will take up most of their attention. Not the effect you want to have, esp. on a Monday. And I mean, for what—a basic quote puzzle? Gotta be a better way to commemorate the 50th anniversary of this movie's release.


Puzzle was definitely on the slow side for me, both because I had to work out the quote thingie, and because originally I didn't see that the theme clue was asking for a quote. I thought it was asking for a movie, because my solving software broke the loooong clue just after "Movie" and so the word "Quotes" went totally out of my sight line (clue appears at top of grid in Across Lite, and when it's really long the font gets really tiny). So for something like 20 seconds I was wondering how in the world there was a movie with a title that long that I'd never heard of that was somehow also the 11th greatest movie of all time (!?!?). Fill on this one is pretty blah, but that's what happens with you have a lot of short Downs. Only the SW corner is really icky. The rest holds up OK. And actually the longer Acrosses are pretty nice. Lots and lots and lots of names in this grid, but only ISAACS gave me any trouble (no idea who that is) (39D: Susan with the 1978 best seller "Compromising Positions"). I also don't really know MITA, but I also never saw that clue for MITA, so that was convenient. I thought [Alternative to mums] might be DADS but it wouldn't fit :(

See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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