The Archers Could Ambridge survive without Lynda Snell?
Boom! The enormous blast that shook my radio sounded as if it came from the BBC sound effects library filed under “Dunkirk”. But this wasn’t war; this was The Archers on Radio 4. In the mind’s eye, it seemed enough to render the whole of Borsetshire a desolate wasteland, in which only Jill Archer’s lemon drizzle cake survives in the smoky ruins.
But it turned out to be worse than that. Much worse. The mystery explosion, which came from the kitchens of Grey Gables, Ambridge’s country house hotel, threatens not just the imagined fabric of Ambridge, but its very real soul. For it threatens the legendary Lynda Snell (Carole Boyd), whose life now hangs in the balance.
It’s too terrible to contemplate. Is Lynda soon destined to be directing the great Christmas production in the sky, surrounded by divine llamas and resplendent in eau de nil?
Monday night was one of those episodes that make you shush your family and turn up the radio in shock. Trapped in the destroyed and burning staff room, Freddie Pargetter (Toby Laurence) coughed up smoke and realised that Lynda was pinned under a table, unconscious. He struggled to get her out but the doorway was blocked. The man who had been doing building work in the kitchen – nobody could remember his name – was also unresponsive nearby.
Eventually, a wounded Roy Tucker (Ian Pepperell) managed to guide Freddie out, carrying Lynda, just as the emergency services began to arrive. Lynda was badly burned and not breathing, and in last night’s episode, her life was still in danger.
It was highly exciting drama, which, in The Archers, is great, but also always a reason to be a little nervous. The series has been accused of turning into Eastenders before, notably during the deeply upsetting domestic abuse storyline between Helen Archer (Louiza Patikas) and Rob Titchener (Timothy Watson), and it’s something that every Archers listener worries about whenever anything very extreme happens. These big moments do a lot to get people talking about the show, and to get casual listeners tuning in, and it’s well worth it when they’re as deftly done as this week’s episodes have been.
But there is always a risk that the fallout will upset the whole delicate ecosystem of Ambridge, and that something essential could be lost in the process. Because The Archers is emphatically not Eastenders or Emmerdale, and plenty of us love it for exactly that reason. It’s the most requested radio programme on BBC Sounds, in fact, as the BBC recently disclosed. So it should have moments of great excitement, of course, but its enduring popularity really comes from being all about the characters and their lives, and smaller things like the Flower and Produce Show and the gossip in the pub.
Lynda Snell is at the centre of that side of Ambridge, which is why her possible demise, and certain serious injury, is so worrying. Lynda may be a Snell and not an Archer, but The Archers would be diminished without her. Killing off major characters can lead to ratings success for TV soaps, but in The Archers it’s more complicated than that. The repercussions of character deaths are long-felt. I’m still smarting from the death of Freddie’s father, Nigel Pargetter, at New Year in 2011, which felt unnecessary, and some characters still talk about the unexpected death of Grace Archer in a fire, and that was in 1955.
Having been a resident of Ambridge since 1986, Lynda Snell (played with consistent excellence by Boyd) has come to epitomise the spirit of The Archers. Her disapproving busybody sniff is as much a part of the soundscape as bleating lambs and lowing cattle. She can be pretentious, snobbish, and generally infuriating, and is a relentless campaigner who seizes upon any possible just cause, most recently the renaming of The Bull pub. All this means she’s often much-needed comic relief. And yet she is also community-spirited and thoroughly kind. Without her, Ambridge would be without a guiding star.
To think of her trapped and motionless as the fire took hold was awful. The normally insufferable and selfish young Freddie, in an extraordinarily moving performance from Laurence, became a hero as he desperately tried to revive her and take her to safety, despite the recent conflicts and misunderstandings between the pair. Those scenes were absolutely gripping, and after Lynda was brought from the wreckage, her silence and Freddie’s despair were overwhelming. The drama was magnificent, but I’m not sure I can bear what happens next.