Doc Martin

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Doc Martin

Series title card
Format Comedy Drama
Created by Dominic Minghella
Starring Martin Clunes
Ian McNeice
Caroline Catz
Stephanie Cole
Joe Absolom
Katherine Parkinson
Stewart Wright
Selina Cadell
Theme music composer Colin Towns
Country of origin Flag of the United Kingdom United Kingdom
No. of episodes 21 x 50 min, 1 x 92 min
Production
Producer(s) Philippa Braithwaite
Running time 50 mins
Broadcast
Original channel ITV
Original run September 2, 2004 – present
External links
IMDb profile

Doc Martin is a British television comedy drama starring Martin Clunes. Created by Dominic Minghella, it is filmed on location in and around the fishing village of Port Isaac, Cornwall, with filming of most interior scenes and production carried out in a converted barn at a local farm. So far, there have been three series of the show, and a feature-length special that first aired on Christmas Day 2006. Shooting for the third series, which was seven episodes in duration, finished in July 2007, and it began on 24 September 2007 on ITV. A fourth series has been commissioned[1] but no dates for filming or broadcast are known publicly at present.

Contents

[edit] Synopsis

Clunes plays (fictional) Portwenn's local GP, Martin Ellingham, who was once a successful London surgeon until he developed a phobia of blood that prevented him conducting operations. After retraining as a GP, he applied for a post in the sleepy Cornish hamlet of Portwenn, where he spent childhood holidays.

Much of the show's humour revolves around Ellingham's interaction with the local Cornish villagers. Despite his surgical brilliance, Ellingham lacks vital personal skills and any semblance of a bedside manner, and often fails to understand other people. Dr Ellingham (referred to as 'Doc Martin' by the friendly locals), much to his disgust, finds the surgery is in disarray. The medical equipment is beyond repair, and the patients’ records are a mess. To top it all he inherits the world’s most incompetent receptionist, Elaine Denham, who clearly resents Doc Martin moving in.

As the village's new doctor steps into the village he is encountered by a dog who seems to become besotted with him, following him into his house, car, surgery and even in his bed throughout both Series 1 and 2. Despite Doc Martin's bitterness towards the dog, he ends up reluctantly liking it, after giving up with the villagers thinking Doc Martin is its owner.

The community is united in horror at their miseryguts of a new GP. Doc Martin soon finds he needs all the allies he can get as he tries to negotiate his way around village life with humorous consequences.

Martin is joined by a cast which includes Stephanie Cole as his Aunt Joan, who provides him with emotional support in the face of the disquiet among the villagers. Caroline Catz plays pretty primary school teacher Louisa Glasson. Doc Martin is attracted to her, but he is hopeless at personal relationships.

[edit] Background

Clunes' character was originated as Dr. Martin Bamford in the 2000 film Saving Grace. He then appears in two "prequel" television films made by BSkyB, Doc Martin and Doc Martin and the Legend of the Cloutie, in which viewers learn that Bamford, a successful obstetrician, finds that his wife has been carrying on extramarital affairs behind his back with his three best friends. After confronting her with the news, he decides to leave London and heads for Cornwall, which he remembers fondly from his youth. Shortly after he arrives, he gets involved in the mystery of the "Jellymaker" and, following the departure of the village's resident GP, decides to stay in Port Isaac and fill the gap himself.

Although the original deal was to produce two television films per year for three years, Sky Pictures folded after the first two were made, so Clunes' company tried selling the franchise to ITV who generally liked it, but felt the character of Martin Bamford needed a little something more to him than just being a "townie" who is a little out of his depth in the country. ITV wanted something a little more edgy, so Clunes came up with the idea of the doctor being unusually grumpy. In the process, the doctor's last name was changed from Bamford to Ellingham, (perhaps for copyright reasons, perhaps to avoid confusion for those who remembered the previous telefilms) and a new writer, Dominic Minghella, was brought in to re-work the Doc's backstory and create a new village of supporting characters. The surname "Ellingham" is an anagram of "Minghella".

Quite often during the series there are references to people being "a bit Bodmin". This is a reference to the fact that Bodmin was once the centre of mental health care for the South West, and was based at the former St Lawrences Hospital site and now at Bodmin Hospital.

Although Clunes' character is the only one to carry over (with significant back-story changes) from the telefilms, Tristan Sturrock joins Clunes as the only actor (thus far) to appear in both versions of Doc Martin.

[edit] Commissioning

ITV have recently confirmed that they have commissioned a fourth series. However, when interviewed on both television and radio in order to promote the Series 3 DVD, Martin Clunes stated several times that he is taking a break from acting. This is due to the fact that his daughter Emily hasn't had a proper summer holiday with her parents (Martin's wife being the producer of the show, Philippa Braithwaithe) since they started filming Doc Martin. Therefore it is unlikely a new series will be shown before 2009. Martin is also known to be working on at least one other project currently (a TV documentary about dogs) so no filming or broadcast dates for a fourth series are yet known.

In the UK the show has been a ratings success for ITV1, the third series achieving ITV1's best midweek drama performance in the 9pm slot since December 2004.[2]The final episode of the third series was watched by over 10 million viewers and netted the programme's highest-ever viewing figures.[3]

[edit] Episodes

Twenty-two episodes have aired with a fourth series in production, to be aired in Autumn of 2009[1].

[edit] Series 1 (2004)

# Title Writer Director Viewers Original airdate
1:1 "Going Bodmin[5]"  Dominic Minghella Ben Bolt 9.93 million[6] 2 September 2004
Martin attends an interview for the post of GP. Having unwittingly offended local teacher Louisa Glasson, he spontaneously diagnoses her glaucoma. Although pleased to renew his acquaintance with his Auntie Joan with whom he spent holidays as a boy, he is less than enamoured of the other locals he encounters and the state of his predecessor's surgery. Disillusioned he decides that he has made a mistake and will return to London.[4] 
1:2 "Gentlemen Prefer[5]"  Dominic Minghella Ben Bolt 8.98 million[6] 9 September 2004
 
1:3 "Sh*t Happens[5]"  Dominic Minghella Ben Bolt 8.91 million[6] 16 September 2004
???.[4] 
1:4 "The Portwenn Effect[5]"  Dominic Minghella Ben Bolt 9.31 million[6] 23 September 2004
???.[4] 
1:5 "Of All The Harbours In All The Towns[5]"  Kirstie Falkous
John Regier		 Ben Bolt 9.45 million[6] 30 September 2004
???.[4] 
1:6 "Haemophobia[5]"  Dominic Minghella Ben Bolt 9.31 million[6] 7 October 2004
Martin is forced to confront his fear of blood, both when the town plays a prank on him involving ketchup as a fake injury, and when Peter, a young lad of the town suffers a ruptured spleen that needs to be urgently operated on.[4] 

[edit] Series 2 (2005)

# Title Writer Director Viewers Original airdate
2:1 "Old Dogs[7]"  Dominic Minghella
Edana Minghella		 Ben Bolt 8.86 million[6] 10 November 2005
 
2:2 "Loco[7]"  Richard Stoneman Ben Bolt 8.19 million[6] 17 November 2005
 
2:3 "Blood Is Thicker[7]"  Jack Lothian Ben Bolt 9.26 million[6] 24 November 2005
 
2:4 "Aromatherapy[7]"  Dominic Minghella
Edana Minghella		 Ben Bolt 8.99 million[6] 1 December 2005
 
2:5 "Always On My Mind[7]"  Richard Stoneman Ben Bolt 8.56 million[6] 8 December 2005
 
2:6 "The Family Way[7]"  Dominic Minghella
Edana Minghella		 Ben Bolt 8.83 million[6] 15 December 2005
 
2:7 "Out Of The Woods[7]"  Jack Lothian Minkie Spiro 8.11 million[6] 22 December 2005
 
2:8 "Erotomania[7]"  Dominic Minghella
Edana Minghella		 8.60 million[6] 5 January 2006
 

[edit] Feature-length special (2006)

# Title Writer Director Viewers Original airdate
n/a "On The Edge"  Jack Lothian Ben Bolt 5.88 million[6] 25 December 2006
Nesting Choughs - Louisa's father 

[edit] Series 3 (2007)

# Title Writer Director Viewers Original airdate
3:1 "The Apple Doesn't Fall"  Richard Stoneman Ben Bolt 8.10 million[6] 24 September 2007
[4] 
3:2 "Movement"  Nick Vivan Ben Bolt 8.58 million[6] 1 October 2007
[4] 
3:3 "City Slickers"  Richard Stoneman Ben Bolt 8.84 million[6] 8 October 2007
[4] 
3:4 "The Admirer"  Jack Lothian Ben Bolt 8.81 million[6] 15 October 2007
[4] 
3:5 "The Holly Bears A Prickle"  Ben Bolt Ben Bolt 9.21 million[6] 22 October 2007
[4] 
3:6 "Nowt So Queer"  Keith Temple Ben Bolt 9.92 million[6] 29 October 2007
[4] 
3:7 "Happily Ever After"  Jack Lothian Ben Bolt 10.37 million[6] 5 November 2007
[4] 

[edit] Regular cast

[edit] Guest stars

The programme has featured many notable guest stars including: Celia Imrie, John Alderton, Hugh Lloyd, Jeff Rawle, Doreen Mantle, Christian Rodska, Roger Lloyd-Pack, Mary Woodvine, John Woodvine, Ben Miller, Chris O'Dowd and Kenneth Cranham.

[edit] International broadcasters

  • In Australia, Doc Martin aired on ABC1 on Saturday nights.
  • In New Zealand, Doc Martin aired on TV One on Saturday nights.
  • In Canada, Doc Martin airs on VisionTV and Knowledge Network in British Columbia.
  • In Germany, Doc Martin airs as Doktor Martin, the name of the Doc is Martin Helling, on ZDF on Wednesday evenings. It's an adaptation of the original series with Axel Milberg as Doktor Martin Helling a surgeon from Berlin.
  • In Italy, Hungary, Russia, Malaysia, and other countries where available, Doc Martin airs on the Hallmark Channel.
  • In Belgium, Doc Martin airs on the public channel één.
  • In Finland, Doc Martin airs on the public commercial channel MTV3.
  • In Norway, Doc Martin airs on the public channel NRK1.
  • In Denmark, Doc Martin airs on the public commercial channel TV2 Charlie1 on Thursday evenings.
  • In Romania, all Doc Martin series aired on the Hallmark channel

[edit] DVD Releases

Series 1, 2 and 3 have been released on region 2, Series 1 and 2 on region 4 and Series 1 on region 1. Series 3 for region 4 will be released in May 2008.

The feature-length Doc Martin 2006 Christmas special has not been released on DVD in the UK, but is available in some countries e.g. Australia. A source from Momentum Pictures stated that the 'On the Edge' special will not be included on the Series 3 release, they are however hopeful of either releasing it as a stand-alone product, or included in a boxset by the end of the year.

[edit] Awards

In 2004 Doc Martin won the British Comedy Award for Best TV Comedy Drama, having also been nominated as Best New TV Comedy. In the same year, Martin Clunes won the Best TV Comedy Actor award, primarily for his portrayal of Doc Martin. (He had also starred in 'Beauty', part of the Trapped trilogy on ITV.)

Doc Martin, in the form of 'Doc Martin's path to love' has been nominated as one of ITV's Clips of the Year for 2007 at itv.comThe winner is determined by public vote.

[edit] References

  1. ^ http://GM.TV Interview with Martin Clunes, November, 2007.
  2. ^ "Doc Martin breaks 9m barrier", Media Guardian, 2007-10-30. Retrieved on 2007-11-01. 
  3. ^ "Weekly viewing summary", BARB. Retrieved on 2007-11-22. 
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Doc Martin episode guide. Radio Times. Retrieved on 2008-01-07.
  5. ^ a b c d e f itv.com Episode guide.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v BARB Terrestrial Top 30.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h itv.com Episode guide.

[edit] External links