Today’s Saturday Stumper

Today’s Newsday  Saturday Stumper is by Stella Zawistowski. Such a challenge — I spent about an hour on the puzzle before getting stuck and driving off to our favorite restaurant for dinner. I came back with, as they say, fresh eyes, and filled in the remaining five answers in a minute, maybe less. What had been so difficult about their clues? Nothing that eggplant with beef and pad woon sen with pork couldn’t figure out.

Some clue-and-answer pairs of note (and there were many):

4-D, four letters, “Maltese Falcon force.” I can imagine many a solver getting it wrong. But I know Dashiell Hammett’s novel and John Huston’s movie.

9-D, three letters, “Big-letter word on an I-35 map north of Kansas City.” All for three letters? Let’s defamiliarize this answer a little more.

13-D, four letters, “Biker jacket.” I would say I have no clue, but I had a clue — I just didn’t understand the answer. Now I do.

15-A, nine letters, “When plants dance!” A festive thought. Reader, have you heard this expression?

16-A, five letters, “Boston Symphony’s Berkshires residence.” A giveaway, for me, and my starting point.

19-A, three letters, “Get into.” DIG, right?

21-D, five letters, “Pop group.” Again and again, this puzzle invokes and veers away from familiar phrasing.

22-D, eleven letters, “Investor’s bane.” I thought it had to be a technical term.

24-A, six letters, “Got a ticket for.” Oblique.

27-A, eight letters, “Source of ethereal sounds.” Tricky.

28-D, five letters, “Play way?” Good grief.

31-D, five letters, “‘_____ a tavola a mangiare !’ (Italian ‘Eat!’).” Who has time for all those words? I’m familiar with a simple “Mangia!” But the clue would be familiar to many solvers from the cooking show Lidia’s Kitchen.

39-A, six letters, “Incredibly close.” See 21-D.

46-D, four letters, “B, C, P, or V.” U can C Y this puzzle gave me fits.

49-D, three letters, “Saw around.” Had to be LED, like a guide, right?

52-A, nine letters, “Experimental fiction.” The modernist and postmodernist in me dislike the clue and the answer, both of which suggest a sadly narrow view of the possibilities of narrative. I never in my teaching career used either term. I would prefer to think of experimental fiction as phony lab results.

My favorite in this puzzle, because it’s so out there: 30-A, five letters, “Shoe that sounds like an apartment number.” Not experimental, just out there.

No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.

[If you’re wondering about going out to dinner when I’m writing about Saturday’s puzzle: the puzzle comes online the day before at 4:00 p.m. Central.]