THE NEW YORK TIMES, WEDNESDAY, JULY 22, 2020 N C3Fill the grid with digits so as not to repeat a digit in any row or column, and so that the digits within each
heavily outlined box will produce the target number shown, by using addition, subtraction, multiplication or
division, as indicated in the box. A 4x4 grid will use the digits 1-4. A 6x6 grid will use 1-6.
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ANSWERS TO
PREVIOUS PUZZLESKenKen
Two Not Touch
Put two stars in each row, column and region of the grid. No two stars may touch, not even diagonally.
Copyright © 2020 http://www.krazydad.com
What popular consumer product has the unfortunate anagram BUY NOT?Brain Tickler
YESTERDAY’S ANSWER The only number that is spelled in alphabetical order is “f-o-r-t-y.”ANSWERS TO
PREVIOUS PUZZLESPUZZLE BY WILL SHORTZ
Crossword Edited by Will Shortz
ACROSS
1 Accumulated,
with “up”
6 Asked earnestly
10 ___ War (1899-
1902)
14 Muscat resident
15 Org. that
supported the
Lovings in Loving
v. Virginia
16 Humerus
attachment
17 Six-time All-Star
for the Arizona
Diamondbacks
(2013-18)
20 “Shut ... up!,” i n
a text
21 Java, for one:
Abbr.
22 Flummoxed
23 Taraji P. ___,
star of “Hidden
Figures”
26 Word with twist
or tongue
27 “Moonbeam,” for
a flashlight, e.g.32 Compound
containing an
NH 2 group,
informally
33 Shirts and
blouses
34 Yule quaff36 Some hosp.
workers
37 Circe turned
Odysseus’ men
into these, in the
“Odyssey”
39 “Little” fellow of
old comics
40 Spike in movie
rentals?
41 Part of a
wineglass
42 Kingdom of
horsemen in “The
Lord of the Rings”
43 “Are you as
jazzed as I am?”
47 Alley ___
48 “Enough
already!”
49 Class for
baseball’s
Albuquerque
Isotopes
53 ___ Records
(British label)
54 Univ. paper
graders, maybe
57 People are
protected when
they’re in it
60 Aide: Abbr.
61 Man of the cloth?
62 Rich dessert
63 Some sorority
chapters
64 Yemen’s capital65 StartDOWN
1 Cops, in slang
2 One leading the
faithful in prayer
3 Some creases on
the face
4 Photo blowup:
Abbr.
5 Start, as a meal
6 Ghostly shade
7 Like some TV
screens, for short
8 Who sings “Let It
Go” in “Frozen”
9 Aid in some
makeshift repairs
10 Cause of a limp,
maybe
11 Mixture
12 Some rushers, in
football13 “Dagnabbit!”
18 Greek peak
southeast of
Olympus
19 Bits of forensic
evidence
24 Start of a
German count
25 WSJ competitor
27 Shopping ___
28 Louvre Pyramid
architect
29 Rocker Bon Jovi
30 Bob Feller and
Nolan Ryan each
pitched 12 of
these
31 For whom “time
and tide wait,” in
a saying
35 Pagoda
instrument
37 Per diem
payments, e.g.38 Like the
monsoon season
39 “Me? Uh-uh!”
41 Crept quietly
42 Castigate
44 Apartment
restriction
45 Onetime Nissan
S.U.V.
46 Spanish for “how”
49 Ivan or Peter,
e.g.
50 Overly hasty
51 “Given that ...”
52 Reebok
competitor
55 Pay (up)
56 Leave in
58 B+, e.g.
59 Part of many
a three-day
weekend: Abbr.ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLEPUZZLE BY PETER A. COLLINS7/22/20Online subscriptions: Today’s puzzle and more than 9,000 past puzzles,
nytimes.com/crosswords ($39.95 a year).
Read about and comment on each puzzle: nytimes.com/wordplay.ASK NETS STALE
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LOME I N LUKE SK I
STEEL SPAN TEN12345 6789 1011121314 15 1617 18 1920 21 2223 24 25 2627 28 29 30 3132 33 34 3536 37 38 3940 41 4243 44 45 4647 4849 50 51 52 53 54 55 5657 58 5960 61 6263 64 65LOS ANGELES — Tension within the stately
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sci-
ences spilled into public on Monday when a
prominent producer sued the organization
over a procedural matter and in the process
attacked officials over the troubled state of
the Oscars.
Michael Shamberg, a producer and exec-
utive producer of “The Big Chill” (1983),
“Erin Brockovich” (2000), “Django Un-
chained” (2012) and other films, filed the
lawsuit in Los Angeles County Superior
Court. It claims that the academy did not
adhere to its rules when its 54-member
board declined to vote on bylaw amend-
ments proposed by Shamberg. In conjunc-
tion with the filing, Shamberg, who unsuc-
cessfully ran for an academy board seat in
June, publicly admonished the organiza-
tion, a rarity for a member of the Hollywood
establishment.
“The place is being run into the ground,”
Shamberg said in an interview, referring to
the academy. “They think if they don’t talk
about problems they will go away. I’m tired
of it.”
According to his complaint, Shamberg in
January formally proposed amending the
93-year-old academy’s bylaws to put a
greater focus on engaging movie buffsthrough social media. He also asked the or-
ganization to conduct an annual survey of
members, in part to solicit ideas about how
to make the Oscars more relevant to young
adults and to give members a way to be
heard. Television ratings for the most re-
cent Academy Awards plunged 31 percent
among viewers 18 to 49 compared with the
previous year, according to Nielsen data.
An academy spokeswoman declined to
comment.
Scott Miller, the academy’s general coun-
sel, defended the board’s handling of the
proposed amendments in a July 10 letter to
Shamberg’s lawyer. Miller said Shamberg
received “abundant consideration” in pro-
cessing and reviewing his proposal, noting
that the producer had presented his pro-
posal, titled the Relevance Project, to the
board in person.
“The fact that Mr. Shamberg disagrees
with the academy’s social media strategy
does not mean the board has failed to exer-
cise reasonable business judgment in that
area,” Miller wrote. “And it does not mean
Mr. Shamberg is entitled to supplant their
judgment with his.”
Total viewership for the Oscars telecast
has declined 43 percent over the past dec-
ade. (To compare, Golden Globes viewer-
ship has increased by about 7 percent.) At-tempts by the academy to prop up the Os-
cars — shortening the televised portion of
the ceremony by excluding certain catego-
ries, adding a category for achievement in
“popular” film — have been poorly intro-
duced and ultimately scrapped.
Shamberg, 75, said the academy could
improve the fortunes of the Oscars if it had a
sharper, speedier and more emotional pres-
ence on Instagram and Twitter, among
other platforms. He said the academy
should be in the league of a National Geo-
graphic, which has 140 million followers on
Instagram, or a Nike, which has 117 million.
The academy’s account has 2.6 million fol-
lowers and largely posts archival stills and
images of celebrities on red carpets. Sham-
berg called the organization’s voice in social
media posts “bland and formulaic.”
“It is the academy’s stubborn refusal to
engage the audience on social media that
dooms the Oscars to a has-been awards
show,” he wrote in a June 30 email to the
board. “None of you filmmakers, publicists
or studio executives would approve a digital
marketing campaign for one of your movies
that is as bland and all over the map as
academy posts.”
He added, “It’s time for the academy and
the board of governors to step up and pub-
licly admit that the Oscars are in crisis.”Producer Takes Film Academy to Task in Lawsuit
Michael Shamberg
faults the Oscars’
social media strategy
and relevance to
younger viewers.
Michael Shamberg wants the
Oscars to be more engaging on
Twitter and Instagram.KYLE ESPELETA/GETTY IMAGESBy BROOKS BARNESThe Richard Tucker Music Foundation,
which grants prestigious awards to young
singers, removed David N. Tucker from its
board of directors on Monday evening. Mr.
Tucker, a son of the distinguished tenor for
whom the foundation is named, was re-
moved after an uproar over racially
charged comments that he made on a Black
singer’s Facebook page.
“The Richard Tucker Music Foundation
condemns the hurtful and offensive com-
ments made by one of our board members,
David Tucker,” Jeffrey Manocherian, the
foundation’s chairman, and Barry Tucker,
its president and another of Richard Tuck-
er’s sons, said in a statement.
On Saturday, Julia Bullock, a Black so-
prano, shared on her Facebook page an arti-
cle from The Washington Post that quoted
protesters in Portland, Ore., who said they
had been detained by federal officers in un-
marked vans. In response, Mr. Tucker com-
mented: “Good. Get rid of these thugs and I
don’t care where you send them. They are a
Pox on our society.”
In another comment, he wrote, “About
time someone tough will try to crush the
mob before they destroy and kill more inno-
cent people. Bravo to Trump to send in Fed-
eral troops.”
When Russell Thomas, a Black tenor, re-
plied in a comment that the Tucker Founda-
tion had given its top prize, the Richard
Tucker Award, to only one Black artist since
it was first granted in 1978, Mr. Tucker
wrote that “pulling the race card is another
convenient excuse to modify excellent
standards of vocal artistry.”
A spokeswoman for the foundation said
on Monday that while there had been a sin-
gle Black winner of the Tucker Award —
Lawrence Brownlee, in 2006 — the founda-
tion had awarded a dozen smaller career
and study grants to Black artists over the
past decade.
Mr. Brownlee called Mr. Tucker’s com-
ments “racist” and “deeply disappointing”
in a Facebook post on Monday. He said that
while he was the only Black artist to have
received the prize, there were many other
Black singers whose talent would have
made them worthy recipients.
The Black Opera Alliance, an organiza-
tion founded last month that aims to expose
racial inequity in opera, wrote an open let-
ter to the foundation’s board on Sunday call-
ing for Mr. Tucker’s removal.
“We are deeply disturbed,” Derrell Acon,
the founder of the group and the director of
engagement and equity at Long Beach
Opera in California, wrote in the letter, to
which other members of the group also con-
tributed. “It is impossible for someone who
holds these views to contribute produc-
tively to any organization that seeks to cul-
tivate a culture of respect, equity and
justice.”
The group called for the foundation topublicly condemn Mr. Tucker’s comments,
to do more to combat potential racial bias in
its leadership and to embrace Black
performers.
Since the letter was published, several
past winners of the foundation’s top prize
also condemned Mr. Tucker’s comments
and called for his removal.
Last year’s winner, the soprano Lisette
Oropesa, tweeted on Sunday evening that
Mr. Tucker’s comments were “disappoint-
ing” and “racist.” The mezzo-soprano Joyce
DiDonato, who won the 2002 prize and cur-
rently serves on the foundation’s board,
tweeted on Monday that she had told the
foundation that she could not continue to
serve unless it removed Mr. Tucker.
The mezzo Stephanie Blythe, who won
the award in 1999, wrote on Facebook on
Monday that she was “horrified” by Mr.
Tucker’s comments, and also called for his
removal. “These statements were not some
spur of the moment, off the cuff comments,”
she wrote. “They were full of indoctrinated
hate.”
Mr. Acon said in an interview that his goal
in forming the Black Opera Alliance was to
empower Black singers and administrators
to speak out against injustice in the indus-
try. “We don’t want to allow the system to
just absorb injustice and for it to become
yesterday’s news,” he said. “We want to put
companies and institutions to task and
make sure they respond in an equitable
way.”
Mr. Tucker’s removal comes amid a
broader reckoning in the opera world overthe lack of diversity in classical music. A
New York Times article published last week
revealed that the Metropolitan Opera has
only three Black managing directors on its
45-member board, and just two Black mem-
bers of its 90-person orchestra. The Met has
not presented an opera by a Black com-
poser in its 137-year history.
Peter Carwell, the Tucker Foundation’s
executive director, said in an interview on
Monday evening that the foundation is as-
sembling a diversity task force. “We’ve dis-
cussed these issues in the past,” Mr. Carwell
said. “And now we feel the need to not only
discuss, but prioritize them.”The tenor Lawrence
Brownlee has been the only
Black winner of the Richard
Tucker Award since it was
first given by the Richard
Tucker Music Foundation
in 1978.HIROYUKI ITO FOR THE NEW YORK TIMESOpera Group Removes Namesake’s Son Over Comments
Richard Tucker foundation
reacts to racially charged posts.
By SARAH BAHR