NEW YORK TIMES CROSSWORD
ACROSS
1 Team leader
9 Aidy of “Saturday Night Live”
15 “Yeah, I’m breaking up with you”
16 Kind of board at the beach
17 Prepare for everything, maybe 18 Journalist’s secret
19 Bulrush, e.g.
20 Zoom call background effect
22 Coveted magic item in Sondheim’s “Into
the Woods”
23 Retirement spots
24 “Absolutely!”
27 Check in
28 Really tiny machines
34 Explosive feedback?
38 A heavy one may want a lighter 39 Largest of the Society Islands 40 Calculus AB or Physics C, e.g.
41 Showbiz sappiness
43 Bottle of rum go-with
45 “I can’t say for sure”
49 Gift tag word
53 Snack item since 1912
54 Fruit-bearing shrub known botanically as
Prunus spinosa
55 Food you might eat in a bed
56 Davy Jones was one
59 Portrayer of the lawyer Robert Shapiro
in “The People v. O.J. Simpson”
61 Regard
62 “You’re on!”
63 “Who, me?” rejoinder
64 A 50/50 chance … or a description of the lengths of this puzzle’s Across and Down answers, respectively
DOWN
1 “Can we talk?,” tersely 2 Bank regulator
3 Show vanity, in a way
4 Accomplishes the impossible with
cats
5 Big inits. in payroll services
6 Surround sound pioneer
7 Ready
8 They make up families
9 Some shot
10 Joey who doesn’t wear pants
11 “Absolutely!”
12 Match
13 Common kind of battery
14 Minute
21 Light (into)
25 0°
26 Free movie starring yourself?
28 Big employer of U.S. mathematicians,
in brief
29 Something that may be toted on a tour 30 ___ at all
31 “Yep, that’s fine”
32 Get drunk, formally
33 Straight: Prefix
35 Something you might strike
36 Old telecom inits.
37 Cheney of politics
41 Scottish sheepdog, informally 42 Small-screen milestone of the 1950s 44 Extra periods, for short
45 Cozy
46 Popped up
47 Signs a 48-Down
48 See 47-Down
49 Ring bearer of note
50 All ___ up (irritated)
51 Eightsome
52 Board, so to speak
57 Antidiscrimina-tion inits.
58 Layer of green eggs
60 Mover’s need, maybe