Mary Cutler puts down her pen
Forty Years On
Mary Cutler has the last word on retiring from writing for The Archers
I have had the benefit of being listened to by what must be one of the most intelligent, engaged and passionate audiences in the world.
On 28 May 2019 I attended my last script meeting as an Archers writer, forty years and three weeks after I submitted my first set of scripts. How lucky am I? Forty years in one of the best jobs a writer could possibly have – the envy of much better-known writers than me. Rightly so. It is the dream job. I have had the opportunity to work collaboratively on the storylines with so many immensely creative people, including the other writers and the Archers production team. But after that I’ve had the freedom to dramatise those stories, every word of it mine, so that people could – and did – say “Oh that sounds like one of Mary’s”, the miracle of the show being that it still sounded like The Archers.
I had the privilege of having my words spoken by a roll call of extraordinarily talented actors who bring to life the iconic characters of which The Archers is full. I have had the benefit of being listened to by what must be one of the most intelligent, engaged and passionate audiences in the world. I have had the opportunity to write about every dramatic situation I might have liked to explore – comic, tragic, social and political. I am frustrated if people say, as they sometimes do, “But what about your own work?” This is my own work, and I have always been, and am still, eternally grateful to have had the opportunity and the honour to be a part of the unique and extraordinary phenomenon that is The Archers.
Apparently I’ve written over a thousand scripts. And I have to hold my hands up – boos and hisses off – to being the writer who pushed Nigel off the roof.
1979 was a different world. I’d like to think that the female characters are a little stronger now, and certainly more ‘on mic’, thanks to the efforts of many writers, male and female. I came in with a team of other young women, rare in those days, though happily not now. William Smethurst, who gave me and others our first chances, once said, rather wickedly "...the girls write better.” Well, this girl tried. Thank you all, so much.
Mary Cutler
Writer Mary Cutler's "terrifying" first Archers commission
The Archers longest-serving writer, Mary Cutler, recounts how her writing career began.
