Sunday, September 6, 2026 — Lights, Camera, ... Really Cool Crossword!

0:00Welcome to Gene and Mike, to the New York Times Crossword. Hi, I'm Gene. And I'm Mike. And today we are doing the Crossword for Sunday, September 6th, 2026. So, did you have to labor on Labor Day Eve? Well, I always have to labor on Sunday. Mm-hmm. Sunday is always a kind of a work of labor. Yes, definitely. I got the word WUSH applied to this Crossword. Why? Because that was the sound I kept hearing as I was reading each one of those clues, and there was just the WUSH as it would go way over my head. Oh, no. There were lots of places where I'm like, I have no idea. Uh-huh. I have to admit, I did this with our daughter. And, uh, yeah, we were like, gee, we're not getting anything in this part of it. So, you know, we said that several times, we worked our way down the puzzle.

1:02Right. But eventually, it all came together. This was by John Cugumman, who has a reputation for creating very interesting crosswords. Yes. In fact, there's this remark from Will Schwarz. John Cugumman of Gainesville, Virginia, is a software engineer specializing in cybersecurity. This is his 24th Crossword for the Times and his first to include visual clues. John's father, who test solves all of John's puzzles, remarked on this one, boy, that's going to get some comments in a good way we hope. Of course, there are always people in word play who want to grumble. Yes. But I think the majority liked it. I certainly liked it a lot. Oh, I thought it was a great solve. It just made me work really hard. Uh-huh. But it was fun. It was fun because it had pictures. Yes. Picture clues. Uh-huh. And they turned out to be pretty funny. They did. Uh-huh. Once you figured them out, a little hard to decipher.

2:04But eventually, we got through them. Uh-huh. Why don't we talk about that theme? Because it is quite intriguing. Yes. Well, the name of the puzzle was crossover films. There was a note letting everyone know that there were pictures. And if you couldn't see them, you had to update an app or something. Or just buy a paper. Right. They would be in there. Uh-huh. And they were in color. That's kind of unusual. Oh, you said color pictures. I wonder if they would have been in color in the actual physical newspaper. I mean, I know newsprinters can bring in color. Uh-huh. But I don't know if they'd splurge color for the crossword or not. But they really didn't need the color. There's no color aspect to the clues. Well, that first one, 23 across, was a picture of a couple of wolves and music and their dancing and running the middle of them is the superhero, the flash. Yep. And the answer was flash dances with wolves.

3:08So I mean, remember the theme was crossover films. And that's exactly what the answers were. They were two films that were crossed over. They put them together to create one long, funny, funny answer. Mm-hmm. Flash dances with wolves. Then, 39 across was a lighthouse. And it was beaming out to the sea. And in that beam was the symbol for Gucci. Which of course, I'm very well first time. And the answer was the lighthouse of Gucci. So that one was pretty, pretty straightforward. If you knew that was Gucci. Then we had a 62 across, which was a lion addressed and a suit with his feet up on the desk and surrounded my money and smoking us a gar and looking pretty happy. And that was the Lion King pin. Yep.

4:09The Lion King and King pin. And then finally, the, no, no, we said it on the one after the 68 across was, it was like three, three people, three guys and they're dressed in black with skeletons on their shirts. And then a big, and they're crying. And then a big X, a big X through all of that, big red X. And that was bad boys don't cry. So that was that one. And I think my favorite one was 93 across, which was a picture of Batman with this giant hand giving him a vaccination in the arm. And that was a shot in the dark night. Yes. It's just nice, funny. And then the last one was 12 men in black suits and with their arms crossed. And of course, that was 12 angry men in black.

5:15So that was the, and you know, made the puzzle a lot of fun to solve in spite of the fact that we got stumped in a few places, but it all worked out. I think my favorite was, my favorite illustration was 23 across that picture of flash there. Yeah, flash dances with wolves. But they didn't give the illustrator a lot of room to make these pictures in. No, and you know, if you didn't run the computer, you could blow them up. Sure. You know, a lot. Yes. You could see them better, but no, I mean, they didn't have much more space than a regular regular written clue. So they're very tiny dances. Yes. Or flash dance with wolves. But I can, I can still make these all out. I'm sure they spent a lot of time debating this. Oh, I'm sure. Yeah. Mm hmm. Well, there were lots of tough clues. Even 21 across. I should have gotten this one immediately.

6:16Closest area to a movie theater projector, maybe. Last row. Yeah. I had it. I don't know. For some reason, I was thinking of something akin to a movie theater projector and I had an Ellen and A and a T and I was thinking of Lantern. But it was, I realized then it was physically closest, of course, last row. We put balcony, which is kind of crazy because mostly the theater stuff out there. Nice. But if they did, that would be closest to where the film was actually being shown. I expect so. Right next to that 22 across, note worthy was nameable. Nameable. Spelled N-A-M-A-B-L-E. That just looks so wrong spelled like that. It's like, there should be an E, but then that would look wrong too. I guess I'm just not used to the word nameable. I've never used the word name. Really? I'm going to use it first day of classes. Okay. All right, nameable people. I'm not sure exactly how I'm going to be using it to be honest, but 35 down was offerer

7:18of a 33 country train pass. And I had enough letters. I thought, oh, it's Europe. That I thought Europe probably as a country doesn't offer the pass, but it's your rail. Your rail, yeah. Which we have traveled on. Yes, we have. It's fun. I know. Extremely well run. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. I did not know 34 down ever one of Ralph Waldo Emerson's six representative men and it was Gulf G-O-E-T-H-E. Yes. I should know who that person is. I feel I'm revealing my ignorance here. Uh-huh. Clearly he's German. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

8:18Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. It's a followed or novelist or what, but I believe that's what this field is. See, I think that would've worked quite well on a Saturday creusward. Uh-huh. I love the answer to 47 across. So, as I was saying and the answer was any who, any who spelled H-O-O. Now we've seen a couple of clues in which the answer could've been any who, and in fact, I remember putting down any who, but it just turned out to be any how. Yeah. So I was a little bit reluctant there. especially because 48 down, which is where that last O of any who ended, was desert country popular for whale watching. Turned into the O man. Yes. I'm like, they have whales down there. I guess. So, or maybe they import them. I don't know, they have enough money through oil that they can probably afford to do that. The one next to it, block Sabbath, this is 44 down, block Sabbath guitarist Tony.

9:20Tony Iomi. Yes. I'm like, I'll come on. But we ended up because we had a mistake as we had 54 across. That is the, I mean, and the answer was, I bet you went for Irm, you are. Yeah, we had an R. So we had R Omi. I, I, I wrote me, but it was Iomi. Yes. You know, and that's a debut. Well, I can believe that I've never seen it before. But black Sabbath has been around a lot, a lot longer than I have been doing cross-erf. Right. Well, that was about, you know, looking at, looking at the crosses, the eye, because it was house of Gucci. So that was a given. Even if you said any how it still would have been the O, that third letter was the one that was up for debate. Was it Irm or Um? Sixty across was Mr. Knightley's love interest in classic literature, Emma. Right. And Kingpin. So there's only one letter there that you could be natic-datic. Yeah, exactly. So there wasn't that bad.

10:22Yeah. But then there were others alike. For instance, this one, I thought I remembered it, but I wasn't sure. 58 across dog hybrid with thick, low shedding fur. She poo. SHIH P O O. Right. Did you remember that? No. Ah, OK. I just got that one from the crosses. Another one of that from the crosses was 65 of class operatic pop group formed by Simon Cowell. I know. It's like seriously? It'll diva. It'll diva. I had all the letters except the L. Because I didn't, the L crossed with 57 down. Blank Minderbinder, what a great name. From Catch 22. And I had M and I and a blank in an own. I thought, well, maybe it's Miko with a K. That sounded like it could have been a name. Or Mino. I mean, there's things like all the, OK, Mino probably. But I mean, considering that the last name was Minderbinder, that sort of opens up the floodgates.

11:23There could have been any of 26 letters there. Possibly a pound sign for all I know. Well, but my love is a real person's name. That is. That's what we went for right away. Right. Well, that's good. And Il-Divo makes sense. But I found that to be sort of a struggle. 79 across. I desperately needed that. And the clue was, Panamanas e Puerto Ricanas. How was that for pronunciation? Oh, not too great. No, I didn't think, well, can you do better? Panamanas e Puerto Rico, Minas. Whoa, I just had a sensational being in Puerto Rico or Panama. It means women from Panama or Puerto Rico. Oh, OK. And it was Latinas. See, I looked at that and thought, that's Latin. I'm sorry, that's Spanish. I saw Latinas and thought, Latin, that's Spanish. There's no way I'm getting that. I think it's actually maybe girls, not women.

12:25Oh, OK. Younger, younger. One that I did remember, 89 across, blank finch, lawyer into killer mockingbird, Atticus. Atticus, French. Because that's such an unusual name. Yeah, great look to it. But there were still, there were still, oh, I love 75 down. Of course, vegan brand with the logo of a cow wearing a fake mustache, incognito. We have to go find some of that just because of the name. I've never seen it sold around here, here being Northeast Wisconsin. Yes, I have. Have you? No. OK, well, next time you're at Whole Foods, see if you can get some incognito. You've got it. I'll bring it back. OK. There were other places, too, where I was just sort of in trouble. Even 117 across, pushing off was sending. I thought it had to be, and then 100 down was vintage goods. The retailer was Etsy. So the ass of sending worked.

13:26But pushing off is sending. I guess that works in some context. I think so. But we had 53 down. That was DJ and record producer Steve Blank, Steve Aoki. Yes. Did you know Steve Aoki? No. OK. Then off in the crosses. How about 73 down? Did you get coyotes, foxes, et al? Canids? No. That was it. I'll buy the crosses. That was a debut, by the way. Oh, I should point out that I only, the Black Sabbath guitarist Tony, was also a debut. Yes. I did not realize that. Newsroom writing standard in brief. I love writing standards. Four down AP style. Right. And I ended up at 85 across. Fandom identifi, sorry, let me try that one more time. Fandom identities often with fluffy tails and ears

14:27for sonas. Yes. Because I thought, I don't know, with fluffy tails and ears, I thought about a cat. And so I had personas spelled PURR. Oh. Now it should have been PURR, but I had personas. And then if we looked at 85 across, it was word combined with Fetty in a Portmanteau. So I thought, pun Fetty. That sounds like fun. But it was fun Fetty. And it was first on us. So I spent more time on this crossword than I spent on any other crossword this week. And I did Fridays crossword. So that is saying a lot. But again, I hope John Cookelman doesn't read word play. And just keeps cranking out these great crosswords. Yeah. I'm surprised. I thought, you know, it always seems like the people who write in on word play like a good challenge. Just a bit. I think when it comes to like fact that you know, you there

15:27no goeth or you don't or you either no yummy or you don't, I think they get a little annoyed at that. But he gives you enough of the crosses that you can make. I mean, part of the problem is, you know, you've got people from all over the world trying to do these crosswords, right? Well, they can't make a crossword that's going to work for everyone around the world. It would be the most boring crossword ever. It's designed for a North American, primarily American audience with, and that's just, that's just the way it is. So, but I thought it was great. I love it. Yeah, well done, John. We'll give you a five squares on the Jamsey or scale. Even if a few people, a minority, a very small minority, are grumbling on word play. What did they know? That is it for today. Thanks everyone for listening. Remember, we love feedback, crossword podcast at iCloud.com or click on the send fan mail link.

16:29What did you think of today's crossword crossover films? Love it? Hate it? Let us know. We will be back again with our cutting-edge analysis of tomorrow's crossword, tomorrow. Bye-bye.