Thread 98 - Discuss The Archers here! If you don’t give a ha’porthfor Pip come and add your two penn’orth - we do enjoy a bit of change counting (especially if it’s in old money)

[Bittermints]

Many thanks to @LilianGish for the title (again - she has real gift for this!). Further thanks due to @PseudoBadger for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads and to @DadDadDad for being our resident statistician and keeping the ball rolling when Pseudo stepped back a bit.

All views on The Archers welcome here! New blood welcomed. We don't all agree on all points and most of us are posting tongue in cheek a lot of the time, so don't worry about revealing that you'd like to be Susan's best friend or other odd unusual views.

Spoilers: not on this thread, please. We don't wait for the omnibus to discuss the weeknight episodes, but we do try our best to avoid cross-contamination from www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3439443-keep-it-to-yourself-the-archers-spoilers-thread-4, where spoilers are positively welcomed!

(Change counting references arose specifically out of a nostalgic discussion on the previous thread, if anyone is intrigued.)

I quite liked the history - I started listening around the time Elizabeth was getting involved with insuitable men so quite a long time. Having it there made it feel like less of a character transplant.

Brilliantly done.

I’ve just sat in a parked car for 10 mins so as not to miss a beat of that. Several strange looks from neighbours...

Now that's what I call a monologue two-hander. Excellent. Will listen again.

Elizabeth...(gulp)!

Wow. That took TA to a whole new level. Particular congratulations to Alison Dowling and the scriptwriters.

Outstanding. I've never had therapy or discussed with anyone who had so hard to comment on the pace of it, the revelations of history but nevertheless, soooo well acted by Alison Dowling.

Me neither. I will listen again too. Always liked Lizzie.

Phew! yes that certainly packed a punch.

More prosaically, yes, bittermints, you're more than welcome to start the next thread - thanks for keeping it going so reliably.

That was good! There's s bit here from Alison Dowling on playing it: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/2ZSffDbrnlDRvVWmr415hhx/alison-dowling-on-the-challenge-of-playing-elizabeths-mental-illness

Echt,I thought the pace was OK for a first session, when there tends to be lots of very obvious things to mention, some of which the client may surprise themselves with. I thought Elizabeth's resistance to talking about things was realistic and in character for her.

If you want to hear what therapy really sounds like then the Susie Orbach series In Therapy is excellent and still available to listen to: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07v33xy/episodes/player

It's improvised, so she has no idea what they are going to say!

Thanks for offering Bittermints, I'd love you to start the next thread. I don't mind doing one again but if you're happy to do it then go for it (name changed 🧙‍♀️)

"My understanding of depression and anxiety is that being ‘locked inside your own head’ is the worst of all prisons."
It appears that Freddie is not the only imprisoned Pargetter. I suppose you could describe Lily as imprisoned, too.

How is she getting therapy? Is she paying for it herself? If not, it's remarkably quick, there's usually a long waiting list. And NHS preferred therapy for depression is CBT which that certainly was not.

Bit of a pang at "they're not to blame for having a faulty child"

Yes, Kenton and David referred to the fact that going private meant she wouldn't have to wait.

Tonight's episode may have brought a small tear to my eye.

Really good acting during the therapy session tonight. Just marking my place too!

Excellent writing too. Being surprised by what comes up is spot on

They covered a surprising amount given they only had 13 minutes.

I also thought the therapist was Dame Jenni.
The episode was just heartbreaking and so well done. I my have shed a tear or two.

Apparently the actress who played the therapist has been a regular in Doctors for eight years but made her last appearance there today!

Just listened having got in late tonight. Is there a radio actors' award? Alison Dowling should get it, absolutely acting her socks off. Good as Juliet Stephenson's bumpy, snotty misery in her therapy session in Truly, Madly, Deeply.

Boop for that episode - the archivist lives! How refreshing to have some drama that is character driven rather than trumped up from some unlikely turn of events which requires everyone to play out of character. Everything in that episode rang true. Hurray.

Going back a bit, thanks so much, chemenger, for all that really enlightening information about gin distilling. People on this thread really are fantastic for coming up with information on all our queries, I've learned a lot.

Happy to help! To be honest Toby would be much wiser to consider a micro brewery to make beer rather than making the spirit for gin, but even that would need investment and nobody in Ambridge seems to have spare cash at the moment. Nobody would lend Toby money, surely.

nobody in Ambridge seems to have spare cash at the moment

Bridge farm may still have some of its land sale cash... hm, Montbelliard whey gin, irresistible. not.

Great acting, but I'd have thought the pace of Lizzie opening up wasn't realistic - that was a heck of a lot in 13 mins, history and unbolting.