Top actor makes smooth journey and starts exhibiting Spanish national flag (5,3,7)
I believe the answer is:
stars and stripes
'national flag' is the definition.
(Stars and Stripes is an example)
'top actor makes smooth journey and starts exhibiting spanish' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'top' could be 'star' (eg a top player is a star player) and 'star' is found in the answer.
'smooth' could be 'strip' (stripping is a kind of smoothing) and 'strip' is present in the answer.
'and' could be 'n' (common abbreviation for 'and') and 'n' is present in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for stars and stripes that I've seen before include "indications of rank" , "indicators of military rank" , "The US flag" , "Standard" , "American flier" .)