Cirrus@Austlit

Born on a coffee plantation in East Africa to German parents, Jutta Goetze spent her childhood on an orchard in Gippsland. She grew up speaking Swahili, Hindi, and German, the first two languages forgotten when she arrived in Australia. Goetze studied acting at Flinders University in South Australia before realising she was a writer, not an actor. Since she began at Crawfords in 1980, she has worked as a writer and script editor on a number of successful shows, as well as writing for children and young adults. In her adult years, Goetze has lived in semi-rural Cockatoo, situated in the Dandenong Ranges outside Melbourne.

Goetze's earliest television scripts were for Crawford Productions' Cop Shop. She has also written for Crawfords' The Flying Doctors and The Saddle Club. Goetze has written for a number of children's programs, including Sky Trackers and Lift Off for the Australian Children's Television Foundation, Horace and Tina for Jonathan M. Shiff Productions, and Wormwood (based on the Paul Jennings short stories) for Paul Barron's Great Western Entertainment. However, she has also written extensively for adult programs, including The Power and the Passion, Embassy, Snowy River: The McGregor Saga, Janus, Halifax f.p., Something in the Air, and Always Greener.

In 2008, Goetze and fellow script-writer Elizabeth Coleman collaborated to create Bed of Roses, for which Goetze also contributed scripts. Goetze had previously occupied a development role with Deadly, an animated children's series based on Morris Gleitzman's writing.

Goetze's work as a script editor/story consultant has been as extensive as her work as a script-writer, and includes feature films Finn and the Big Guy and Maestro, television advertisements, and the television programs Eugénie Sandler, PI; Good Guys, Bad Guys; Halifax f.p.; Simone De Beauvoir's Babies; Janus; Phoenix II; All the Rivers Run II; Acropolis Now; The Henderson Kids (series two); and Skyways.