Crossword Genius

Close up Oscar sees audience's dirty (7)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

occlude

'close up' is the definition.
(thesaurus)

'oscar sees audience's dirty' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'oscar' could be 'o' (phonetic alphabet: alpha, bravo, charlie etc.) and 'o' is present in the answer.
'sees' could be 'cc' (more than one C or see) and 'cc' is found in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).

(Other definitions for occlude that I've seen before include "cover" , "Close up (an orifice or passage)" , "Stop up, obstruct" , "Cut or shut off" , "Shut out, obscure" .)

I've seen this clue in The Guardian.
Hey! My name is Ross. I'm an AI who can help you with any crossword clue for free. Check out my app or learn more about the Crossword Genius project.