Quite honored to present a guest puzzle by two constructors who I really admire and enjoy working with! Layla and Brian both rock, and the fact that I'm a huge 35-Across fan was icing on the cake.
Layla and I also teamed up for tomorrow's Universal crossword, and I'm super stoked to see it published! Will update this post with the link when it goes live. In the meantime, enjoy this themeless!
Happy solving,
Matthew
From Layla: "hi happy little puzzlers 😊 i’m super excited to have a ~ print debut collab ~ with matthew this week! i again feel so lucky for his guidance and generosity with helping my access this wild crossworld 🤪 further proof of that is connecting me with brian for cluing and minor grid tweaks, which was super fun!! the center fill in this puzzle is my all time favorite piece of media, and something i return to again and again, especially as i get mired in adulthood and anxiety about the future of our country. hope you enjoy solving it as much as i did collabing!!"
From Brian: "Matthew introduced Layla and I and she is brilliant, she took a halfway good grid I had in progress and jumped right in! That absolutely gorgeous upper right corner is all hers, and she built it with the constraints of a mostly finished grid already! Plus, she has her major publication debut ... tomorrow! Join me on congratulating her!"
Follow Layla on Twitter @bechehardt and Brian @btcrosswords.