Mary Berry

by A. S. Dagnell

  With TV cookery shows being constantly updated and becoming ever more popular, especially competitive formats such as MasterChef and later Paul and Mary’s Great British Bake Off, it seemed only a matter of time before the world’s number one TV mogul wanted a slice of the pie. Simon Cowell is the force behind huge reality hits Pop Idol, The X Factor and the Got Talent franchises, which have since been bought by scores of other countries around the world. Seeing the power of cookery to entertain, Cowell has now made his first moves into the world of TV cookery with a new show. Screened by the BBC’s main rival, ITV, Food Glorious Food involves a team of culinary experts touring the country in search of the best family recipe, with the winning dish sold nationwide in supermarket chain Marks & Spencer. Speaking about his new project, Cowell insisted it was ‘not a show for snobs’. Food shows, he insisted, should be accessible to everyone. He wanted Food Glorious Food to celebrate simple, everyday cooking, adding: ‘I like home food, I love it. My mum’s roast potatoes. Shepherd’s pie. Cornish pasties. I want stuff like that on the show.’ Never one to miss a trick, the first judge Cowell signed up for the new show was none other than … Loyd Grossman. Cookery shows appear to have entered a new realm, where it’s not just about the food – competition and drama are just as vital ingredients as the dishes that are being prepared.

  Perhaps the beauty of Mary’s TV career is that she hasn’t had to change with the times to remain a success. The simplicity of her recipes and overall approach have a kind of timelessness – something that has allowed her to maintain a loyal and ever-growing following. As a result of her appearances on Afternoon Plus, not only did she win fans among the viewers, but among the show’s makers at Thames Television, too. They decided they wanted Mary to feature regularly in their programming – not just on Afternoon Plus. This led to them offering her a series of shows in which she would be the star. It was a huge crossover moment for Mary. No longer would she be featuring on someone else’s show; she would be presenting her own. In total she hosted seven series for Thames Television. The format didn’t alter greatly from what viewers were used to on Afternoon Plus. Mary would guide the audience slowly, step by step, through recipes that could easily be prepared at home in the viewers’ own kitchens. Decades before Delia Smith presented her Summer Collection from the kitchen of her Norfolk cottage, or Nigella welcomed the cameras into her West London townhouse to cook dishes from her latest book, the backdrop to these shows starring Mary was often her own home at Watercroft.

  But there was a particular subtle difference that, once again, marked Mary out as a true pioneer. For the first time, her cookery books were released to tie with her TV series. It had rarely been done with any success before Mary. But for the first time she released Television Cook Book in October 1979, to coincide with one of her Thames Television series. The simplicity of the title shows just how new a concept it was. There was no need for a fancy title – the very fact that it was a cookbook linked with a TV show seemed unique and novel enough to market it successfully. Television companies and publishers alike would quickly start seeing the benefits of this combined approach. Fans of Mary’s cookbooks would tune in to her TV series, and fans of her TV series would now start buying her cookbooks. It’s a format that has been replicated both here in the UK and around the world ever since. Nowadays celebrity cooks and chefs, from James Martin to Lorraine Pascale, rarely have a cookery series without a book to tie in with it. Once again Mary had proved that she was a trailblazer.

  And after a long and successful run of series with Thames Television, the BBC also wanted a slice of the Mary Berry pie – they too recruited her for a string of series. These included Mary Berry at Home and Mary Berry’s Ultimate Cakes. Both series had eight episodes and were all filmed at her family home in Buckinghamshire. But even though these series were filmed some years after Mary had first started to feature on TV regularly, she always kept her shows simple. In Ultimate Cakes, for example, she dedicated a whole episode to making scones. Mary’s recipe for these light, fluffy delights has since become legendary and there was a public outcry when Paul Hollywood’s recipe was used instead of Mary’s in one episode of the Great British Bake Off. Another episode in the series was dedicated to baking cakes involving fresh fruit, including a Raspberry Meringue Roulade. Meanwhile, later in the series, a programme focused on baking for fundraising events and also ‘fast bakes’ – cakes that could be easily prepared by those who didn’t have much time on their hands. In contrast, other cooks such as Nigella Lawson would later successfully give viewers the confidence to tackle more opulent recipes.

  But while Mary was becoming a star in her own right, she would also feature on another long-running series. Houseparty became a huge hit on daytime TV from the late 1960s to the 1980s. It had a similar format to ITV1’s Loose Women, a show that rose to great popularity during the 2000s. This panel show consists of four women discussing topical issues, interviewing guests and, often, being outspoken about the news stories of the day. It has made celebrities of the panellists and is often seen as the ‘crown jewel’ in ITV1’s current daytime scheduling. It was based on the format of another successful panel show in the US, called The View, which became popular with housewives who felt they could empathise with the similarly-aged female panellists. But some 30 years before these programmes, Houseparty appears to have paved the way, with production company Southern seeing the potential in the format. One website, TV Cream, recalled the show fondly, saying: ‘Here was one independent afternoon banker that was as unglamorous as the medium ever got. August 19, 1969 saw Southern’s first colour transmissions hit the air with the orange and brown finery of the Houseparty kitchen-cum-lounge, a modernist, open-plan affair complete with Formica surfaces and hessian wall-weave, lovingly re-created in Southampton’s Studio 1. Punctuated by the occasional guest-introducing doorbell (“I wonder who that could be?”), the mumsy Ann Ladbury and the patrician former model Cherry Marshall (later joined by daughter Sarah) led a genteel, open-ended stream of chat among half a dozen personable housewives over the Poole pottery chinaware, with the viewer as casual eavesdropper.’

  The concept of the viewer ‘eavesdropping’ on the women was central to the show’s whole premise. The show would go off air with the ladies still talking and would often start with them mid-sentence. These were ladies who were going about their business and the viewers were just ‘dropping in’. As with all daytime TV, cookery was an integral part of the show. The producers needed someone who could fit in with the conversational style of the programme while also convivially pulling together a recipe in the ‘house’s’ makeshift kitchen. As Mary’s profile as a popular TV cook continued to rise, she seemed like the obvious choice. She was picked and took part in a few series alongside her other TV and radio commitments, while also writing more and more cookbooks. Sadly the show’s run eventually came to an end, leaving Mary to focus on other projects. Nevertheless it is still fondly remembered by TV buffs as being the precursor to big shows like The View and Loose Women – even if the very heated debates sometimes seen today were strictly off the menu then. The TV Cream website continued: ‘Instead, knitwear, cookery and macramé were the order of the day, the raciest it ever got being when bras were tried on for size (over the twin-sets, of course). Sadly, even this seemingly non-stop cosy camaraderie had to come to an end when Southern lost its franchise … and the final programme was appropriately emotional – no tears or anything of course, that wasn’t the Houseparty way, just a few rather touching goodbyes and one last round of tea. Well, they didn’t like to make a fuss.’

  It’s fair to say that Mary had plenty of experience under her belt when it came to live television, even by the end of the 1970s. With her relaxed style she appeared a natural, and it was no wonder that more and more cookery show producers came knocking for years to come. However, Mary revealed that she never fully felt comfortable taking part in shows that weren’t pre-recorded. In fact, she went so far as to suggest that she almost had a phobia o
f taking part in live television programmes. In an interview with the Scotsman, she was asked what kept her up at night, to which she replied: ‘The knowledge that I have to cook on live television the next day.’ Despite her obvious experience both in the kitchen and in front of the camera, by her own admission combining the two would never be something with which she would be totally at ease. And the fact that Mary remains a little daunted by live television despite her obvious ability is probably part of what continues to endear her to both viewers and cookery show producers alike.

  Indeed, Mary has achieved something else over the years that has eluded many female TV stars – career longevity. Despite her age, she’s still working at a high level. Arguably, real TV superstardom only came for Mary in 2010 when she was picked for the Great British Bake Off, aged 75. In Britain, she is probably one of the few exceptions to the apparent rule that older women can’t make it in TV. Much has been written about a perceived ageism in the TV industry in the UK – especially towards women. High-profile stars have often spoken out about being sidelined; feeling as though they have been replaced by younger presenters who are more more fresh-faced but with less experience. Things appeared to come to a head in 2009, when the longtime presenter of BBC1’s Countryfile, Miriam O’Reilly, was dropped from the show. She successfully sued the BBC for age discrimination, saying at the start of her court case that she could no longer watch the programme after being axed from it, as it was too emotionally painful. During the hearing, former BBC1 controller Jay Hunt was called as a witness, and O’Reilly accused her of ageism and sexism and alleged that she ‘hated women’. In January 2011, the day after Hunt began working at Channel 4, O’Reilly’s claims of age discrimination and victimisation were upheld. She has since been vocal about what she believes is an endemic culture of age discrimination in the TV industry. She said that ‘the public want to see women who aren’t young, blonde and buxom, but who know what they’re talking about’, in an interview with the Sunday Mirror. ‘I don’t think having wrinkles is offensive,’ she added. ‘Being dropped from the programme, I believe because of my age and sex, really affected my confidence.’ Meanwhile Carol Smillie, once the Queen of DIY shows who presented the primetime hit Changing Rooms on BBC1 during the 1990s and early 2000s, also bemoaned the lack of work for female stars over 50. She too insisted she had been pushed to one side in order to make way for more youthful presenters. ‘TV is crazy … it’s not the real world. It’s such a fickle, shallow world sometimes,’ she told the Sunday Mirror. ‘I was young, fresh-faced and in demand … and now I’m older and I don’t get so much work. Well, quelle surprise! There’s ageism in TV and there always has been. There’s a dark side to the industry that’s not attractive.’

  Others agree. Ex-newsreader Anna Ford, 68, slammed BBC bosses for not doing enough to put older women on screen. And in 2009 the hugely experienced Arlene Phillips was at the centre of a media storm after her contract as a judge on BBC1’s ballroom hit Strictly Come Dancing was terminated. At the time Arlene was 66, with a long career as a choreographer behind her, and she was swiftly replaced by thirtysomething Alesha Dixon, who had only taken up ballroom dancing when she had competed on the show and won it the previous year.

  The rise of reality TV, some have suggested, has been the precursor to the end of women working into their old age in TV land. ‘Reality TV has a lot to answer for … fame is instant,’ Smillie continued in her interview in the Sunday Mirror. ‘I’m sounding really old now, like a dinosaur, but kids don’t wait for anything now. Once you had to earn your stripes. But it’s not like that anymore. I think it’s sad. We’ve become so used to seeing a pretty young woman co-host with a father-figure-type older guy. It wouldn’t be acceptable in any other profession. The proof of the pudding is in the eating and these people don’t last because they don’t have any real experience. There’s a lot of back-slapping and people thinking they’re fabulous.’

  For her part, Mary is defiant. She insists she has never encountered ageism in television work. In fact, Mary thinks quite the opposite – it was reality TV of sorts that got her back on to the screen in the form of GBBO. ‘I’m always reading about women being dropped from TV shows for being too old,’ she said in an interview with the Daily Mail. ‘I find it rather bemusing because I’m older than all of them. I think it’s good to have all ages on television – you need someone who has been in the business of baking a long time, don’t you?’

  But others have suggested that the only way for female TV stars to survive is, in fact, to make sure they look younger. And if that means cosmetic surgery, so be it. The tough-talking host of BBC1’s consumer show Watchdog and quiz show Weakest Link Anne Robinson has often spoken of how she has embraced surgical facelifts wholeheartedly … implying that others on TV her age should do so as well. ‘The way you survive in television is by having plenty of tricks in your bag and not doing things for too long. There’s a lot of moaning about women and ageism on television,’ she told the Daily Mail. ‘We could have a “Why aren’t there more old, fat or ugly women on television?” argument if you like … but why should there be?’

  For her part, Mary insists she’s never had to change the way she looks in order to progress. While the likes of Nigella Lawson have had plenty of media attention for how they look in front of the camera, Mary says she has never felt the pressure to dress differently while she’s filming. ‘I fuss about my hair, but otherwise I don’t worry about what I look like,’ she told the Daily Mail. ‘I’m a bit scraggy around the neck and my husband always tells me I should wear a scarf, but I’ve no intention of doing anything about my wrinkles. I think cosmetic procedures are a waste of surgeons’ time. I don’t really have any aches and pains; I just feel terribly fortunate.’ In another interview, with the Press Association, Mary added: ‘Obviously I want to look good. You’ll always see me blonde, I’ll tell you that much, and I bother about my nails. The rest looks after itself.’

  It wasn’t just on the small screen that Mary started to forge a broadcasting career – she was soon snapped up for radio too. As technology developed, during the 1980s and 1990s, ‘phone-ins’ on radio shows became fashionable. The format was simple – the show would have an expert or a panel of experts in the studio to answer questions from the listeners. Alongside this, the appetite for TV cookery shows had filtered through into radio as well. Often cookery would be combined with a phone-in … and this was the case on one show in particular.

  Woman’s Hour on BBC Radio 4 has become something of an institution on British radio. On air since just after the end of the Second World War, the magazine show covers all aspects of women’s lives. An article celebrating the show’s history in The Journal gives a comprehensive run-down of its most ground-breaking moments. It was first broadcast in 1946, bizarrely – it would seem – by a man. It was, wrote one of the show’s presenters, Martha Kearney, ‘scheduled at a time when morning chores and the lunchtime washing up would be finished and the children wouldn’t be home from school’.

  Among the show’s early items was ‘Cooking with whalemeat’, which might seem strange now but was of interest because rationing was still widespread at the time, as well as features such as ‘I married a lion tamer’ and ‘How to hang your husband’s suit’.

  On top of these were regular interviews with high-profile female celebrities – everyone from Eleanor Roosevelt in the 1940s to Winnie Mandela in the 1980s, before pulling off a huge coup with an exclusive with President Bill Clinton’s former staffer Monica Lewinksy in the 1990s. Other female figures were put on a pedestal. The show mapped Margaret Thatcher’s ascent to leader of the Conservative Party and onwards to become prime minister. While her popularity wavered over the years, her role as a woman defining politics was a hot topic on the show that would run for years.

  Ratings have remained consistently high, and Sue MacGregor CBE, who presented Woman’s Hour from 1972 to 1987 before going on to host the morning news show Today, has said that she believes the programme
’s popularity stemmed from the early days when it was one of the first radio shows to cultivate an interactive relationship with its listeners. ‘One of the first decisions the women listeners made was that they didn’t want a man as the main presenter of their programme,’ she told The Journal. ‘Bizarrely, the first presenter was a middle-aged writer called Alan Ivieson who the listeners thought sounded patronising – they soon made their feelings apparent and he lasted just a few months.’

  It seemed that one aim of Woman’s Hour was to help women embrace being back in the home after the tumult of the Second World War. Some have said that the government wanted the BBC to put the show on as a way to encourage women to get back to what they were doing before the country came under attack and they had to get involved in the war effort by working in factories, making and flying aircraft, or working on the land in a way that they never had previously. So the show was a way of enticing women back to being homemakers.