The Indian Doctor

I noticed this on a Canadian television schedule one Wednesday evening and I taped it to watch later. I had seen it on the TV guide before but had not looked at it closely. Once I did I realized I recognized the two Indian actors from previous work and knew they were British. I love the British dramas so was ticked off I'd obviously missed the first episode.

Nevertheless I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was a pretty good show and I figured out the characters and story lines quickly. Beautifully shot and acted, I'm very impressed. I do miss Heartbeat and The Royal and this is a good replacement. The first series just finished and I'm looking forward to series 2 starting next week.

I'm not a daytime TV viewer but I block-recorded this from a Sky channel because the trailers of beautiful rural Wales, Sanjeev Bhaskar and BBC Drama looked intriguingly promising. It's certainly delivered. Sanjeev Bhaskar is always good, in my opinion, and coupled with an excellent and fabulous Ayesha Dharker and a very solid cast, they bring the stories to life nicely without getting clichéd or all Heartbeat. The simultaneous claustrophobia and freedom of their situation is clear but not overworked. There's no sixties tracks lazily ladled over every scene, possibly because the lovely Welsh village and breathtaking scenery are a far better way of creating the atmosphere. Period drama that doesn't feel like a period. Look out for the quality from Mali Harries and Naomi Everson and immerse yourself in a good story.

I loved this programme! The casting is excellent, from the doctor and his wife, to the receptionist and her boyfriend, to the mine boss and his wife, to the miners, to Dan, the little boy.

There is no shortage of subplots in this series. We meet a supercilious mine boss with his pathetic wife. We meet a young receptionist in her search for love. We meet an Indian doctor and wife who are newly-arrived in a small Welsh village, suffering the difficulties of fitting into a new culture, and the townspeople who, in many ways do not know what to make of the foreigners. In addition, a young boy and his father are struggling with life with little money and troubles of their own.

The music in this series is of its time. Excellent choices of music run throughout, adding to the authenticity of the series.

I recommend The Indian Doctor highly, and hope that the BBC sees fit to continue it. There are many loose ends left to tie up!

The strength of the series lies mainly in the casting. Both of the two leads, Sanjeev Bhaskar as Dr. Prem Sharma and Ayesha Dharker as his wife Kamini, have wonderful charisma - you can't help but like and admire them. In the first series, Mark Williams was born to play the nauseating Richard Sharpe. (He plays him so well I wish a spin-off series could be created for this character everyone loves to hate.) The second series, that I have just finished, features Mark Heap as an intensely irritating vicar who has a 'Jesus is my penicillin' attitude during a small-pox outbreak in the village. My favorite, however, is Mali Harries who plays Megan Evans, the lady in the village who carries a torch for Prem so bright it could light the way from Piccadilly to Hadrian's Wall!

The first couple of series are great. Plenty of humour and Deana in equal measure as new arrivals begin to fuse in rural Wales. The third series is one too many for me. The humour had gone, some cast members had left and the music sequences somewhat short for nostalgia fans with the story basically following on the same way as before, short on ideas. A great watch for those of a certain vintage in a similar vain to the long-running Heartbeat. Good escapism for everyone except the baddies.