"Canceled Performance," by Ross Trudeau

Editor's Comments

I receive so many submissions whose themes involve adding or deleting letters that I've had to set the bar for them extra-high.  Ross's puzzle today really exemplifies what I'm looking for in this theme genre—all the "base phrases" (like lactose intolerant and partisan tactic) are fun and in-the-language, the reveal nicely describes what's going on, and the transformations are all funny.  That last criterion is subjective, though a big part of humor for me is whether the theme entries can be clued in a way that makes sense.  For example, LOSE INTOLERANCE works well from that perspective, though LOSE FREE wouldn't work for me, since I can't imagine a clue for it that wouldn't be a major stretch.