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Why I Love...Doc Martin

Martin Clunes as Dr Martin Ellingham
  • Posted at 2:57pm
  • 22 October 2007
  • by JackSeale-RT
  • 9 comments

Doc Martin looks at first glance like dull, patronising pap. It's got simple plots, an absurdly beautiful rural setting - Port Isaac in north Cornwall, renamed Portwenn for the show - and a supporting cast who talk in Somerset accents, as do all TV actors asked to play people from Cornwall, or Norfolk for that matter. (Nobody ever uses authentic Cornish idioms, either: "teasy"; "hell-er"; "bleddy"; "he in't daft" etc.) In short, it seems perfect for Sunday nights on ITV1.

Thankfully, someone noticed that despite its cosy medical-drama trappings, it's too edgy and, frankly, too good for the Sunday cocoa-and-moccasins crowd. (It started on Thursdays and now airs on Mondays.) Doc Martin is one of the most satisfying comedies on telly. It's much more sharply scripted than it's given credit for and has an endlessly funny central character.

Dr Martin Ellingham (Martin Clunes) is a British Gregory House. The laughs come from him being spectacularly rude to everyone, and each week someone approaches with a problem that looks like one thing, but turns out to be something else.

In House, everything starts by looking like lupus before being diagnosed as 23 different things you've never heard of, until the annoyingly clever doctors might as well be talking in Venusian and you begin to hope that the patient dies. Doc Martin sticks to everyday ailments, and twists that keep our interest by being almost guessable. It's humbly unpretentious and all the better for it.

Yet Ellingham's brusqueness is well up to scratch. He once addressed an officious NHS inspector as an "unctuous, platitudinising eunuch", and that was in the Christmas special! On ITV1! You could almost hear nans choking on their eggnog. Each week he delivers merciless diagnoses and acid put-downs; Clunes's clipped, unwavering delivery is a delight.

Much of Dr Ellingham's ire is aimed at alternative medicine and superstition, such as in a recent episode where the Doc tore apart some credulous ninnies who hadn't given their kid the MMR jab. It shouldn't be left to a bucolic evening drama to deliver valuable public-service announcements. Sadly, given the amount of cod science on TV perhaps it is, but it's cheering to see Doc Martin step up and do the business.

In fact, there's something heroic - nay, superheroic - about Ellingham. In a society populated by cartoonish yokels and sinister crooks, he single-mindedly pursues his quest to improve Portwenn's wellbeing. Reason, logic and scientific fact are his weapons. A tight blue suit and ears like table-tennis bats are his amusing and vaguely camp costume. The sight of blood is his cruelly ironic weakness.

Ellingham's refusal to engage in chitchat, even if it makes him unpopular, is also very superhero-esque. He's got a stiff superhero gait. And, now he and mimsy schoolmistress Louisa look like getting together after two series of rather touching failed romance (he kept scuppering things by spotting her embarrassing illnesses at crucial moments), he's got a sidekick! His rudeness and her niceness combine to combat minor health crises. They're like Batman and Robin, but with even more sexual tension.

Doc Martin: tough, effective comedy medicine in an accessible sugar coating.

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Comments

  • Posted on 05 August 2008
  • at 7:25pm
  • by EWA

The genius of it is that Doc Martin is really only rude to people who deserve it -- time-wasters, malingerers, and the ignorant or credulous. If he were uniformly rude to everyone, he'd come across as arrogant, but he doesn't.

He has no bedside manner, and for people who really just need to be listened to and have their hand held, he's useless... but one could well argue that his limited time and the taxpayer's money should not be spent on them.

  • Posted on 15 July 2008
  • at 11:17am
  • by Syringea

I adore Doc Martin and watch the repeats ad nauseam. The cast are terrific and must have great fun making the programmes in such beautiful surroundings. A new series please ASAP.

  • Posted on 11 July 2008
  • at 12:38am
  • by BuyViagra

Hello! Personally I fully agree with recent comments.

  • Posted on 21 January 2008
  • at 12:05pm
  • by dianneotherday

And then for those of us who live in Cornwall, there's the 'bin there' factor, and the extra spotting. Both these activities render the repeats that much more watchable.

And yes jsmall, why isn't this man a scriptwriter!!!!!

  • Posted on 09 November 2007
  • at 11:12am
  • by asterix

re Caroline Catz. It was not Caroline Catz but it was the death of the casting director!

  • Posted on 06 November 2007
  • at 8:08pm
  • by marykate

No sex or violence, lovely scenery, relaxing to watch and all this with an excellent cast. Will there be any more? I too saw the note at the end of the last episode stating that the series was dedicated to Caroline Catz. What happened to this lovely girl?

  • Posted on 06 November 2007
  • at 3:21pm
  • by asterix

After the programme did we read that it was in memory of Caroline Catz who played Louisa? If so will there be any future series

  • Posted on 28 October 2007
  • at 9:46pm
  • by jsmall46

Just read JackSeales Doc Martin Blog & I'm a Blog virgin so bear with me. Agreed with everything he said...a great programme to curl up in front of the telly with - but the line that the Doc & Louisa are like Batman & Robin but with "even more sexual tension" nearly finished me off! And sadly I'm old enough to know what he meant. Is this man a scriptwriter & if not why not?

  • Posted on 25 October 2007
  • at 11:23am
  • by Ionaclio

We first watched this series while holed up in the Gatwick Hilton waiting for an early morning flight and were quite captivated by Doc Martin. He is such an irascible but yet lovable rascal who stands no nonsense from his patients as Jack says. Not for Doc Martin to write any acronyms in the patient's notes which only another Dr would understand, eg NFN (Normal for Norfolk!) He tells the patient to his/her face exactly what he thinks of them and would not say I'd like you to see a specialist, meaning, that gets you out of MY hair. No, he'd tell it to 'em straight! The milk bottle incident this week had me diving under a cushion as it was so yucky. It is a vastly entertaining programme though and I hope there will be another series, but does anyone else think that Louisa's Cornish accent reminds them of Alice on the Vicar of Dibley?

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