MARTIN CLUNES WHY I HAD TO LEAVE
As he says farewell to Doc Martin, exciting new opportunities have come his way
As Doc Martin prepares to launch its final season in the UK, the show’s long-serving actor Martin Clunes has assured his devoted fans that he won’t be away from our screens for too long! Martin, 60, who has played the cantankerous, bloodfearing surgeon on the much-loved British medical comedy ever since it premiered in 2004, revealed he’s set to make a major career pivot by starring in a gritty drama centred around a drug trafficking cartel in Wales.
“It’s about the County Lines drug-selling business model in rural Wales,” the actor told media recently, adding that it’s already been commissioned with a “few scripts in place” and is scheduled to shoot next summer.
TIME TO SAY GOODBYE
The news may provide little comfort for the fans who have followed Doc’s journey through 10 critically acclaimed seasons, but Martin explains it sadly was a “good time” for it to come to an end, particularly as his wife, Philippa Braithwaite, who served as the show’s scriptwriter since its pilot episode almost two decades ago, was finding it increasingly hard to write new storylines around his character.
“Poor Philippa, she’s worked on every single script, 84 of them and none of them are easy,” he explains.
“You’ve got a main protagonist who doesn’t like anybody and nobody likes him so it certainly hasn’t been easy – it’s been tough.”
The actor adds he and Philippa, who share a daughter, Emily, 23, wanted to end on a high and not “repeat ourselves” and says the 10th and final season “closes the circle” cleverly.
Ever since it began, Doc Martin (season nine is currently on ABC iview) has developed an enormous fan base, who dub themselves “Clunatics”, some of which have gifted Martin with Lego models of himself!
It’s also estimated to have brought in $200 million in tourism to the seaside village of Port Isaac, Cornwall, where the show is mostly filmed.
THE CLINIC IS CLOSED
The impact the show has enjoyed hasn’t been lost on Martin either, with the veteran actor acknowledging there will be great sadness when he shuts his clinic’s doors for the last time.
“I know that in terms of what it’s done for us personally, but also just in the sheer joy of it – not being in a city to film it, and being allowed to make something funny in front of a camera, which is my favourite work experience,” he says.
‘It certainly hasn’t been easy – it’s been tough’