‘I’ve always loved finishing jobs’: ‘Doc Martin’ star on ending beloved British show

If one ever needed proof that actors are not the people they play, Martin Clunes is the pudding. Braithwaite has overseen “Doc Martin” from the beginning, which Clunes calls “a testament to my wife’s genius.” “I don’t think any one producer has procured quite so many hours of television on her own as she has, and kept her standards up,” he added. In so many respects, you’re the exact opposite of the person you play on “Doc Martin,” who hates them. We said, “Right, the next one will be the last.” And ITV was sort of unhappy about that and said, “Would you do a Christmas episode as well?” But a lot of thought went into the arc of the series and the arc of the individual characters to make sure everyone was heading in the same direction and we didn’t just fizzle out like a bad firework display. I just thought it was a stroke of genius that makes it uniquely “Doc Martin” and very Christmas-y as well, which is quite hard when you’ve got a Scrooge-like main man.