In recent years, Weekend has been named news supplement of the year at the Press Awards in 2015, and at the British Society of Magazine Editors in 2015 and 2018. Last month, Melissa was voted the 2019 British Society of Magazine Editors “editors’ editor”, the society’s top award.
When did you join the Guardian? What had you done beforehand? How did you come to this role?
I joined the Guardian on 10 September 2001, so the world changed on day two. I’d been hired as features editor on Weekend, with a focus on getting celebrity interviews; overnight, access to Hollywood stars felt like a low priority. But the role expanded to include features commissioning more broadly – everything from crime to politics, lifestyle trends, first-person writing, Dave Eggers’ short-short stories, and coordinating special issues. After that, I was the Guardian’s arts editor for seven years. I’ve been editing Weekend since 2013.
What do you enjoy most about the job?
The variety and the degree of collaboration, both within our team of 20 (editors, subeditors, picture editors, designers), with other Guardian desks and with other publishers – such as last summer’s takeover by the gal-dem collective. At its best, it feels like conducting a great orchestra: the talent is all around you – the writers, photographers, designers – and it’s my job to pull it together.
I love working with writers on our long reads, some of whom need very little help; other stories might go through multiple drafts and feel like a co-production from the off. We pay a lot of attention to the amount of time readers spend with a story online: almost invariably, the work put into getting a story right pays off. Some recent highlights would include Hannah Jane Parkinson’s piece about her experiences of mental illness, and Paul Lewis’s series of articles on the dystopian side of Silicon Valley.
I also love the visual aspect – the conversations we have about covers and photoshoots, where we share our bad drawings (I actually think mine are pretty good), Instagram bookmarks, and ideas from elsewhere. Some stories are harder to illustrate than others – for instance, a piece on how political pollsters are learning from past failures wasn’t obvious. Shooting the interviewees would have been one way to go, but it’s a chewy subject and a lot of headshots could look too like the news pages. So we commissioned a photograph of the metaphor that kept coming to mind: pink jelly nailed to a wall, published with the headline Mission Impossible. For our first-look cover story on The Crown, we had only a handful of images from the set – none strong enough for a cover. So we commissioned a designer to produce a first-class stamp with a Queen Olivia Colman turning to face the reader. I had no idea the Queen reviewing her new stamp would be the first scene in the new series.
Who have been your favourite interviewees?
Some are memorable because it took such a long time to persuade them: Monica Lewinsky’s 2016 interview with Jon Ronson came after a two-year conversation. More recently, Taylor Swift gave her first UK interview in years after months of discussion with deputy music editor Laura Snapes: their encounter was refreshingly candid about the loneliness of the longterm celebrity.
The magazine is blessed with brilliantly smart interviewers, so there are too many to mention (and not all of them celebrities), but these are recent ones that have stayed with me: Jacinda Ardern, Ant and Dec, Naomi Campbell, Keanu Reeves, Michelle Obama, Alia Ghanem, the mother of Osama bin Laden; and less recently, Amanda Knox, Rachel Dolezal, Susan Klebold, Sadiq Khan, One Direction, Tom Hanks. Every interview is a negotiation of some kind, and we have a high bar in terms of the access we need to be able to put the reader in the room. And fortunately there are still plenty of people who get that, and who are up for a real conversation. Lizzo, we’re here when you’re ready.
Which piece(s) are you proudest of?
Much of the best work has been a huge team effort. The gal-dem issue, led by Liv Little and Charlie Brinkhurst-Cuff, and deputy Weekend editor Ruth Lewy, was months in the planning. In 2014, we collaborated with the National Film Board of Canada on a magazine and film project on the seven digital deadly sins, and won a Webby award. I was proud to work on our November 2017 cover story, The Tower Next Door, which took readers deep into the lives of the residents of Whitstable House, a building that neighbours Grenfell, in the aftermath of the fire. An idea from editor Mike Herd led to months of immersive reporting by writer Simon Hattenstone, filmmaker Alex Healey, photographer Christian Sinibaldi, digital designer Feilding Cage,and many others.
Weekend’s themed issues can be a lot of work, but also the most rewarding: this summer’s climate special was full of great reporting and original angles on the crisis, but for a long time it was lacking a strong cover: very late in the day, commissioning editor Joe Stone persuaded Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Greta Thunberg to talk – a conversation that not only gave us a scoop but injected much-needed hope.
What have been the highlights of your career to date?
Working with so many writers I admire, both in and out of the Guardian: Elena Ferrante, Roxane Gay, Clive James, Molly Ringwald, Stephen King, Zadie Smith, Andrea Dworkin, Meera Sodha. Interviewing David Lynch at his home off Mulholland Drive; and writer Grace Paley at her cabin in Vermont. Reporting on rape trials in Newcastle a couple of years ago – though I was too optimistic that conviction rates were about to improve.
It never stops being exciting to land an exclusive, to be the first to read brilliant copy (or a 10/10 Blind Date), to see a photoshoot that exceeds expectations.
Do you get much feedback from readers? What makes Weekend such a valuable part of the Guardian?
I do. Partly through our letters page, partly through the comments below the line, partly through social media. I’m very conscious of having two audiences – a UK-based, print-buying one, and a global digital audience who don’t know that they are reading a Weekend article. Unlike, say, the Times or New York Times, we don’t have a distinct magazine page on the website. Everything has to stand on its own feet online.
Readers have submitted great ideas, family stories, many, many suggestions for improvement: we take it all on board, and it informs what we do. We’ve just put together our fifth conversations special (out next Saturday) because of the enthusiastic response, even though it is a gargantuan effort (we will typically approach about 100 people to take part, starting in the summer). I just got a great letter from a tall reader with a short husband who would like to see more shapes and sizes on our fashion pages, which I’ll follow up. A reader also suggested a tribute to Deborah Orr’s time as Weekend editor, which will run on 28 December.
I’ve talked a lot about the features because that’s the bit we have to reinvent every week – but much of the feedback reminds me that it’s our columnists who are the glue, as well as regulars such as Experience and Blind Date. (I once sat in on a focus group where a reader was asked what the first thing he turned to in the Saturday paper was. “The scores,” he said. Was he a big football fan, the moderator asked. No, he said: the Blind Date scores).
I came to Weekend first as a reader, and understand the loyalty the magazine has inspired through successive editors, and how important it is to keep the heart, the warmth, the fun and surprises – while not shying away from the serious. It should be a treat – a part of the Guardian where we have a little more time and space to dig deep, to look beyond the reflexive, to be creative with our commissioning. We have fun doing it, and I hope that shows.