| HIRD | Thora -, BAFTA Best Actress award winner for Talking Heads: A Cream Cracker Under the Settee |
| BENNETT | Actor and playwright whose monologues Talking Heads originally included Patricia Routledge in A Lady of Letters and Thora Hird in A Cream Cracker Under the Settee (7) |
| BRENDABLETHYN | Best Actress award winner at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival (6,7) |
| CHER | 1987 Best Actress award winner |
| TAKEMETOTHERIVER | First Top 40 hit for Talking Heads, and a hint to the starts of the theme answers |
| BERYL | ... Reid won the 1967 Tony Best Actress award for her role in The Killing of Sister George (5) |
| ANUNMARRIEDWOMAN | Oscar-nominated film for which Jill Clayburgh won the Best Actress award at the 1978 Cannes Film Festival |
| MICHELLE | ____ Yeoh, Malaysian actress who won the Best Actress award at the 2023 Oscars (8) |
| AMERICA | Country where one gets stuck into in a cream cracker (7) |
| MADONNA | She won the Best Actress award for her role in Evita (7) |
| VANESSAREDGRAVE | First double winner of the Cannes Film Festival's Best Actress award (1966 and 1969) |
| SOFAR | Right under the settee up to now |
| TUTIN | Dorothy ____ won her first Evening Standard best actress award for playing Viola in the 1960 RSC production of Twelfth Night |
| PANELDISCUSSION | Finally, exchange a number of instruments on display for Talking Heads (5,10) |
| SYSTEMSANALYSTS | They look after the applications and arrangements for Talking Heads (7,8) |
| BAKER | Joe Don ___, 1986 BAFTA Best Actor nominee for BBC drama series Edge of Darkness (5) |
| ONCE | ___ in a Lifetime, 1981 hit for Talking Heads (4) |
| THROW | It's worth changing a loose cover on the settee maybe (5) |
| SNAKE | Being legless, sank drunkenly on the end of the settee (5) |
| CHARRED | Cleaner embarrassed how the settee got very close to the fire? |
