When half-cut, fame and talent can be deadly (5)
I believe the answer is:
fatal
'be deadly' is the definition.
(similar in meaning)
'when half-cut fame and talent' is the wordplay.
'when half-cut' suggests halving the letters.
'and' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'talent' becomes 'tal' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'fame' with half the letters taken is 'fa'.
'fa'+'tal'='FATAL'
'can' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for fatal that I've seen before include "very bad for health!" , "Leading to disaster" , "critical" , "Disastrous, maybe lethal" , "Bringing death" .)