--- title: "Doctor Foster" year: 2015 kind: "series" canonical: "https://film.one/tv/doctor-foster" fi1m_score: 75 critics_score: 80 critics_reviews: 6 published: "2026-09-17T19:39:01.553643+00:00" updated: "2026-09-17T19:39:38.277576+00:00" region: "US" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Doctor Foster (2015) Created by Mike Bartlett · 54m · Drama **Fi1m score: 75** · Critics 80 from 6 reviews *In a sentence:* Never has a single blonde hair done so much damage to such a nice kitchen > Mike Bartlett’s domestic thriller about a GP who suspects her husband is being unfaithful is carried a long way by Suranne Jones, who plays jealousy as a clinical procedure. The plotting is less careful than she is, and the town is smaller than any town. ## Synopsis Dr Gemma Foster (Suranne Jones) is a GP in a small English town, running her practice alongside Ros Mahendra (Thusitha Jayasundera), married to property developer Simon Foster (Bertie Carvel), mother to their son Tom (Tom Taylor). One morning she finds a long blonde hair on Simon’s scarf. It is not hers. Over the first episode she checks his phone, his diary, his story about a work trip, and finds nothing she can prove and nothing she can let go. She enlists a young patient, Carly (Clare-Hope Ashitey), to help her look. Kate Parks (Jodie Comer), a young woman on the edge of the family’s circle, comes into view. Gemma wants the truth; Simon, smiling, keeps giving her his version instead. ## Review Dr Gemma Foster (Suranne Jones) has a practice, a son called Tom (Tom Taylor), a large light house and a husband, Simon (Bertie Carvel), who develops property and calls her darling. Then she finds a blonde hair on his scarf. Mike Bartlett, who created the series, builds five episodes of 54 minutes out of that hair and what Gemma does about it, and Tom Vaughan directs them at a clip that does not leave much room to ask questions. It is a good, tense, occasionally silly piece of television, worth five evenings if you like watching a marriage taken apart by somebody who knows where the joints are. Jones is the reason to watch. Her Gemma is a doctor first and a wife second, and she treats her suspicion the way she would treat a lump: examine, test, rule things out, do not panic in front of the patient. Watch her in the consulting room in the early episodes, listening to somebody else’s symptoms while plainly running through her husband’s, and then watch her at home doing the same thing to Simon across the dinner table. The performance is nearly all held back. When it is finally let out, it counts. Carvel has the harder job and does it well. Simon is genial, boyish, hands in pockets, the sort of man who kisses you on the forehead on his way out of the door. Carvel plays him so that every scene can be read two ways, as a good husband being persecuted or a liar who has got comfortable, and he keeps that going for longer than we thought he could. The moment Gemma pulls the hair from the scarf and looks at it, and Jones’s face does almost nothing, our stomach went, because we already believed in the house and the marriage enough to mind. Ben Wheeler photographs all of this in bright, clean daylight. The kitchen is white, the surgery is white, the light comes through big windows and nothing is ever in shadow. One or two critics found this too bright for a story this dark, and we see their point; a thriller usually wants a corner you cannot see into. But it suits what Bartlett is doing. Gemma can see everything in her life quite clearly and still cannot tell what is true, and the flat cheerful lighting makes that worse rather than better. The supporting cast is used unevenly. Thusitha Jayasundera’s Ros, Gemma’s colleague at the practice, is the one person who notices what Gemma is becoming and says so, and Jayasundera makes a small part feel like a whole person. Clare-Hope Ashitey’s Carly, the patient Gemma draws in, is a good idea that the script does not quite know what to do with. Jodie Comer, as Kate Parks, spends the first half being looked at rather than listened to, which is the point but is also a waste. The plotting is where it wobbles. Everybody in this town is somebody’s patient, and Gemma’s access to their records and their bodies is used as a plot engine more often than is decent. We were appalled the first time she opened a file she had no business opening, and then we were appalled at how quickly the series stopped minding. People make speeches at each other in kitchens that sound written rather than said. And the second half of the series takes turns we will not describe, except to say that the coincidences start arriving two at a time. A second series followed on 5 September 2017, in the same five-episode shape. It is louder and less careful, and Jones and Carvel are still worth the time. We would not start there. It is a 15. Watch it two episodes a night rather than all at once; taken in a single sitting, the small town gets smaller with every hour, and you will start counting the people Gemma has not yet treated. *Fi1m score 75, published 17 September 2026.* ## What the critics say The reviews are uniformly positive, and the praise gathers around Suranne Jones. Most critics find her performance as Gemma the engine of the series: volatile, compelling, and believable even when the plotting is not. Bertie Carvel draws nearly as much approval as the husband, and several reviews single out the writing for the way it tightens from domestic drama into something closer to a psychological thriller. The slow poisoning of a marriage by suspicion is the element most often admired. The spread is narrow, and the reservations concern plot rather than people. The Telegraph finds the script stagy and the twists implausible while staying gripped to the finale; The Guardian worries the later episodes may tip into melodrama; The Times, the warmest of the lot, thinks the direction too bright for material this dark. The i Paper, returning for the second series two years on, finds it still tense and the leads as strong as before. ### Reviews we read (6) - **The Times**, Andrew Billen (★★★★★): The review highlights spirited bonking, a woman scorned and a poisonous GP practice in this fiery series full of intrigue and unlikely plotting. It invokes dark Jacobean drama despite the director's over-bright realisation. [Read](https://www.thetimes.com/culture/tv-radio/article/tv-review-doctor-foster-a-very-british-map-cvlzv7llvqv) - **The Guardian**, Sam Wollaston (85/100, inferred): The critic finds it a brilliant and gripping portrait of a marriage slowly being poisoned by suspicion and doubt. Strong performances by Suranne Jones and Bertie Carvel are singled out for praise amid concerns over possible later melodrama. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/sep/10/doctor-foster-review-suranne-jones-bertie-carvel) - **The Independent** (80/100, inferred): The critic calls it compelling, tightly scripted drama more like a psychological thriller than cosy TV, with naturalistic script and strong lead performances. Direction by Tom Vaughan and the portrayal of jealousy-induced isolation are praised. [Read](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/reviews/doctor-foster-tv-review-a-trite-title-but-this-gone-girl-tribute-looks-like-being-an-affair-to-remember-10493810.html) - **The Telegraph**, Michael Hogan (75/100, inferred): The series is described as thoroughly compelling to the end despite its stagy script and implausible twists. Jones's explosive performance as the volatile wife and the relentless pace are highlighted in the explosive finale review. [Read](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/tv-and-radio-reviews/11918000/Doctor-Foster-episode-five-review.html) - **Radio Times**, Ben Dowell (70/100, inferred): The reviewer praises the tense and emotional thriller setup with Suranne Jones delivering a compelling performance as Gemma, noting the smart writing and effective shift in tone as suspicions mount. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/doctor-foster-episode-one-review-suranne-jones-sets-the-pulse-racing-in-bbc1s-new-tense-and-emotional-thriller/) - **The i Paper**, Finlay Greig (70/100, inferred): The critic finds the second series a tense and breathless return, praising the continued strong performances by Suranne Jones and Bertie Carvel in a drama that effectively shows the lasting impact of betrayal and abuse. [Read](https://inews.co.uk/culture/television/doctor-foster-series-2-review-tense-and-breathless-return-89009) ## Details - **Created by:** Mike Bartlett - **Creator:** Mike Bartlett - **Director:** Tom Vaughan - **Cinematography:** Ben Wheeler - **Cast:** Suranne Jones as Dr Gemma Foster; Bertie Carvel as Simon Foster; Clare-Hope Ashitey as Carly; Isabelle Estelle Corbusier as Kiki Farren; Thusitha Jayasundera as Ros Mahendra; Martha Howe-Douglas as Becky; Jodie Comer as Kate Parks; Tom Taylor as Tom Foster - **Runtime:** 54m - **Release (the US):** 9 September 2015 - **Genres:** Drama ## Where to watch in the US - BritBox: streaming, hd - The Roku Channel: add-on, hd - Amazon Prime Video: add-on, uhd - Apple TV: add-on, hd - Apple TV: buy, sd *Checked 2026-09-17.* Also available in: AU, BE, CA, CH, DK, ES, FI, FR, GB, IT, NO, NZ, SE, US, ZA. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## Awards - BAFTA Television Awards 2016: British Academy Television Awards (nominated) ## If you liked this - *Scenes from a Marriage* (1973): Bergman’s marriage falls apart in close-up, without a single scarf or hair - *Gone Girl* (2014), Fi1m 84: A missing wife, a smiling husband, and a plot that enjoys being unfair — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/gone-girl.md) - *The Affair* (2014): Two accounts of the same infidelity, neither of which you should trust - *Apple Tree Yard* (2017): Emily Watson’s scientist makes one bad decision and pays for it at length - *Medea* (1988): Von Trier’s television film of the play this series keeps glancing at --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/tv/doctor-foster