8
Thursday, May 10, 2018
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
ARTS
ACROSS
1 Bookie’s
concern
5 Wedge-shaped
bones
10 Elite Eight org.
14 Bygone
depilatory brand
15 Cantilevered
window
16 Panhandler’s
income
17 Start of a
business journey
19 Watery defense,
perhaps
20 Hustle
21 First name in
bike stunts
23 Phased-out
Secret Service
weapon
24 Way to get from
17- to 39-Across
29 Doce meses
30 Roll of bills
31 Woolly mammal
32 Seasonal song
ender
34 Proceed
tediously
37 Like pals who go
way back
39 Pinnacle of the
journey
44 Three Gorges
project
45 Wail
46 Former autocrat
47 Stat for Miguel
Cabrera
49 Menu phrase
51 Letter before
omega
52 Way to get from
39- to 63-Across
58 Bygone greeting
59 Site with digging
60 Witty remark
61 Word with work
or play
63 End of the
journey
68 Field of work
69 Food poisoning
cause
70 Times past
71 Place of bliss
72 Summer Triangle
star
73 WWI battle river
DOWN
1 Top 40 title for
Metallica or U2
2 Resting place
3 Overthrew
4 Las Vegas feature
5 Peruvian
currency
6 Occur
7 Catlike carnivore
8 “Deathtrap” actor
9 Gene variant
10 ’60s hot spot
11 Data storage
medium
12 Render
speechless
13 On the move
18 Cry of pain
22 __ gravity
24 Wholesale
quantity
25 Figurine material
26 Mesmerized
27 Wing it
28 Dutch
earthenware city
33 High-tech
greeting
35 Fertility clinic
specimens
36 Big name in
whisky
38 Naysayers
40 Darker-than-
ocher pigment
41 Cantina cooker
42 Threw
43 Pelee Island’s
lake
48 Toughened
50 Top of the heap
52 Triangular part of
a house
53 Roundish
54 Sierra __
55 Pizza slice, say
56 Playwright
Chekhov
57 Comfortably
familiar
62 Understanding
64 Seine site
65 Corduroy feature
66 “Dream on,
laddie”
67 Original
Dungeons &
Dragons co.
By Jeff Stillman
©2018 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
05/10/18
05/10/18
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
RELEASE DATE– Thursday, May 10, 2018
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
Through the public eye, it’s
easy to view every aspect of
Serena Williams’s life as picture-
perfect. She’s not only one of
the greatest athletes of our
generation — with 23 Grand Slam
tennis titles and four Olympic
gold medals — but she’s also a new
mom to an adorable eight-month
old
daughter
with
charming
husband, and Reddit co-founder,
Alexis Ohanian. Still, what the
media so often fails to recognize
about Williams is the adversity
she had to overcome to make it to
the top as a Black female athlete,
as well as the more personal
insecurities she continues to face
about being a “good-enough”
mother. In a raw look into the
anxiety and pressures that lurk
within the greatest tennis player
in the world, the five-part HBO
documentary
series
“Being
Serena” lets Williams take the
reigns and write her own life
story for a change.
In the first episode of the
series, titled “Fear,” Williams
encounters a series of unexpected,
yet significant challenges. Just
days before she was set to take
on her sister, Venus,
in the final match of
the 2017 Australian
Open, Serena had a
bewildering
dream
that she was pregnant.
Her
suspicions
rang true and, after
receiving clearance to play from
her doctor, she went on to win
the title (with Venus joking that it
wasn’t a fair match because it was
really two against one).
From then on, the documentary
showcases
Williams
coming
down off of her good-news high
and sinking into a deep hole of
fear. Worries about not being the
best mother and tennis player
of all time rise to the forefront
of Williams’s thoughts. Not to
mention, Serena stays terrifiedly
cognizant of the riskiness of
her future delivery (considering
her past history with blood
clots during surgery). All of this
pressure to be perfect and the
uncertainty that comes along with
being a first-time mother appear
to suck the confidence right out of
our champion, her vulnerabilities
manifested
and
exposed.
As the camera —
sometimes intimately
handled
by
her
husband,
Alexis
—
follows Serena around
the house, to training
sessions and, ultimately, into
the delivery room, we become
privy
to
some
very
private
moments. Even though filmed
celebrity births are nothing new
to television, the way in which
Williams documents the entirety
of her pregnancy sheds light on
the not-so-glamorous parts of
the process. In this way, “Being
Serena” rarely feels forced or
manicured as a series and ends up
playing out more along the lines
of an upscale home movie.
The
most
heartwarming
instances
of
the
premiere
episode occur when Serena gets
up close and personal in a one-
shot frame and provides some
very conversational video diary
updates. She vows that she will
return to tennis even stronger
after the birth of her daughter,
using the documentary as a
source of motivation to re-watch
down the road. As the credits role
and no formal director is cited,
the most remarkable aspect of
“Being Serena” is revealed — its
honest, first-hand perspective.
Even without an uber dramatic
storyline or intense, singular
moment
of
conflict,
“Being
Serena” wins in its willingness
to highlight vulnerability and
the unpleasant truths associated
with change. As the episodes go
on, the documentary will surely
continue to offer some much-
needed
reassurance
to
those
feeling isolated by their anxieties
because in the end, even those
who seem unstoppable are still
human.
‘Being Serena’ is a
look into a full life
MORGAN RUBINO
Daily Arts Writer
“Being
Serena”
HBO
Series Premiere
SINGLE REVIEW: “STREAKY”
THIRD WORLDS
“Streaky”
Death Grips
Third Worlds
“Streaky,” released this
past Saturday, is not standard
fare from Death Grips. It still
has all their tells — blipping
synths, MC Ride’s inexhaust-
ible, commanding voice at
every volume, anxiety and a
sense of foreboding but not
since “Hacker,” from their
2012 release The Money Store
has Death Grips sounded so
pop friendly. There’s a clear
progression from chorus to
verse and back to chorus
again, which seems to be an
intentional choice rather than
falling back on simpler com-
positions. In addition, all leit-
motifs are introduced within
the first minute of the track.
There’s something comfort-
ing about the shift to a more
traditional place, but also
something intensely discon-
certing. “Streaky” possesses
the sleekness of a Government
Plates track and the coolness
of some of the calmer moments
of Bottomless Pit, but, as
always, tension and worry
are boiling underneath. Their
six albums and other releases
have proved that the group is
capable of creating evocative,
disparate sonic landscapes and
“Streaky” points to a definite
turn for Year of the Snitch.
The predictability and ease of
“Streaky” might be a sign of
future restraint —or just a red
herring.
- Jack Brandon,
Daily Film Editor