New York Times, Tuesday, September 8, 2020

KEVIN: I like horror movies if they're intelligent and well done. Psycho is a classic, so I felt it was deserving of a tribute puzzle. (It's my second movie tribute in the NYT; I had an "ET" puzzle published on 9/24/13).

I don't remember when I first built a version of this grid. Eight years ago, maybe. I wasn't happy with it. Two years ago, I noticed that the 60^th anniversary of the movie's release was two years away. I decided to ask for Brad's help fixing the crummy fill. I figured six months max working with Brad (it didn't take that long), six months for Will to get back to us (it didn't take that long), and we'd still be one year ahead of the anniversary date.

Brad came up with the idea to split PSYCHO into PSY and CHO and place them in those two symmetrical down spots, as a nod to the split personality of the main character. That's why I like to collaborate with people on puzzles. Two heads are better than one. I would never have come up with that on my own. Kudos to Brad.

BRAD: This puzzle has been biding its time in the vaults for a little while. My memory of the project is like Kevin says: I was invited on board to help spruce up the fill and to brainstorm with him about a revealer (eventually two three-letter words instead of one six-letter word). I didn't know if editors would go for a puzzle about fractured mental health, but on the other hand, it's not every day that an iconic movie quote and associated names fit so neatly into a grid. Kevin had packed it all in beautifully, just like he did for our Dr. Seuss puzzle of 7/14/15.

I think I've seen Psycho just once; if I rewatch a Hitchcock film, it's more likely to be North by Northwest or Rebecca. But I surprised myself by loving the "Bates Motel" TV series with Vera Farmiga and Freddie Highmore.

PSY/CHO! It's such a fitting split, the movie poster containing a vertical slash through it.

Wait. The slash on the poster is horizontal, cutting every letter in half, not PSY/CHO into two parts. Never mind.

Okay, I buy Brad's explanation of the split personality issue = PSY / CHO. I did also wonder if this might be offensive to those with mental health issues, though. Mimicking the movie poster with a black horizontal slash across the puzzle might have avoided that issue (explaining that it's art copying art).

And a jagged line of black squares across the middle of the grid could have split the puzzle in half! What can I say, I love it when crosswords break the rules. This would have been a perfect reason to do so.

Kudos to Kevin for finding a symmetric set that so fully describes the movie, and to Brad for polishing it. Neat how PSY and CHO fortuitously intersected other themers.

There's such a high density of thematic material, though — it's no surprise that there's a price to pay. I didn't mind any one entry, but the agglomeration of BRIS SCTV IONA BOFFO POLER APER made me pause. I definitely wouldn't give this puzzle to a newer solver, except if he/she were a huge ALFRED HITCHCOCK fan. Even then, I might pause.

Perhaps a less traditional "here are a bunch of things about X" tribute concept — if not a black slash mimicking the movie poster, perhaps arranging themers to form the famous shower scene? — could have been more memorable.