Martin Clunes

Doc plans screen break

Martin Clunes just loves playing the grumpy TV doctor who has proved such a hit with viewers. "I'm not a happy hero. I'm rather refreshed by the fact that he's just so wrong and bad," grins the star of Doc Martin. Better make the most of the new seven-part series, filmed and set in Cornwall, as there won't be another one for at least a year or two. Martin says he wants to take a break from acting, having also recently been on our screens in the New Zealand drama The Man Who Lost His Head.

Doc Martin steps back into the limelight

Medicine man Martin Clunes loves not having to prescribe a smile. "That's fun for me. It's liberating," says the star of award-winning comedy drama Doc Martin. He's back in the role of curmudgeonly Dr Martin Ellingham, still failing to display any sort of bedside manner as a GP in a small Cornish community, having been forced to give up his high-flying city surgical practice.

In itself, it's quite enjoyable; and I dare say there isn't a single person in Britain who won't enjoy watching Martin Clunes enjoying himself in the novel role of a curmudgeon, but, really. A plot where a man in the village starts to grow a cracking pair of tits? Tsk.

Tim Firth's outstanding Neville's Island (ITV), a feature-length special adapted from his recent West End play, was a treat. A terrifically funny script, with a classic shading of pathos and beautifully constructed moments of narrative tension and resolution, was matched to tremnendous performances from four first-rate actors: David Bamber, Jeff Rawle, Timothy Spall and Martin Clunes - who showed that he can do more dramatically than just be a man behaving badly.