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The Detective Who Walks
By Himself
by Christine Alice Corcos
Monk, the detective series featuring the obsessive-compulsive
disorder-ridden former police officer played by Emmy winner Tony
Shalhoub, has been a hit for the USA network since its debut
on July 12, 2002. Heavily influenced by classic series that went
before, including Columbo, which still makes occasional
appearances on TV (although the latest seems to have been in
2003), Monk adds to the formula of the brilliant detective
with a few quirks the brilliant detective with quirks that threaten
to make him almost completely non-functional.
 Monk's premise is that
the former police officer turned private detective left the force
when his wife died in a car bombing meant for him. Adrian Monk
(who carries, perhaps significantly, two clerical names) was
already rather strange. For example, we learn in the episode
"Mr. Monk and the Other Woman" that he doesn't
like different types of food to touch on his plate. Most of us
got over that little oddity when we were relatively young. I
think my nephews, who are nine and seven, are over it by now.
But not Adrian Monk. His wife Trudy, however, loved him in spite
of this foible, and in spite of his other weirdnesses, such as
his need to make certain that all the hangers in his closet face
the same way-I suppose that could be helpful in an emergency-and
the need not to step on cracks, and to touch all the parking
meters that he passes on the street. After Trudy's death, he
just gets stranger and stranger, and he refuses to take any medication
to calm him down. In one episode, "Mr. Monk Takes His
Medicine", we find out that this is not such a bad idea-medication
robs him of his ability to solve crimes even as it evens out
his OCD. Monk's peculiar personality makes him a trial to deal
with, certainly, but he has a good heart, and his friends recognize
his kindness, which earns him their loyalty. His nurse, Sharona,
and later his assistant, Natalie, his police officer friends
Lieutenant Disher and Captain Stottlemeyer, and the various people
he meets during his adventures, Trudy's parents, and even his
even weirder brother Ambrose, who suffers from agoraphobia, all
truly love him, and he loves them. Actor Tony Shalhoub's talent
sells Monk as a character-otherwise the detective would grate
on the viewer very quickly, because frankly, he is one odd bird.
He's afraid of over a hundred things, as Natalie points out,
though not public speaking: heights, dark places, crowds, germs-and
milk.
What motivates Monk is the desire to find his wife's killer.
While he seeks the person or persons responsible, he takes other
cases, high profile or not, particularly those that interest
him. Things that don't match, people who do things out of character,
push him to investigate. At the same time, he is often reluctant
to involve himself in a case that would force him to confront
a phobia. He doesn't like shaking hands, or elevators, or airplanes.
In many ways, Monk is frightened of life. Decisions paralyze
him. What unparalyzes him is the need for justice.
Many critics have hailed Monk as ingeniously plotted.
True, the writers have done many of the episodes quite cleverly,
but other entries been derivative. In particular, the two episodes
featuring Monk's brother Ambrose (John Turturro) were essentially
the same story. In both, the killer tries to reclaim evidence
of a crime that has gotten away from him; Monk has to retrace
the killer's steps and put together the crime from these clues.
The episode "Red Headed Stranger", featuring
country singer Willie Nelson, draws on several Columbo episodes
including "Swan Song" (1974) in which guest
star country singer Johnny Cash ("The Man in Black")
played a country singer who murders his wife, and "A
Deadly State of Mind" (1975) in which George Hamilton
sets Lesley Ann Warren up for murder. Nelson returns as a voice
on the tube in a later episode ("Mr. Monk and the Blackout").
Monk's obsessive-compulsive disorder and his inability to react
appropriately while on duty (for example, he can't bring himself
to fire his weapon even when someone's life is at stake) are
the reason for what is turning into his quasi-permanent suspension
from the San Francisco Police Force (note to the writers: he
would have been an inspector, not a "detective" while
on the force). He is on medical leave, which gives him certain
rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act. So why does
the Police Commissioner treat him so cavalierly in "Mr.
Monk Gets Fired" by "yanking" his private
detective's license? Let's leave aside exactly what his employment
relationship is with the department, and whether a police officer
can also hold a p.i.'s license. The San Francisco Police Commissioner
is not authorized to do that under California state law. Only
the Director of Professional and Vocational Standards may revoke
or suspend a p.i.'s license, and s/he surely wouldn't do it for
the reasons in this episode (Monk accidentally deleted some police
files from a computer, but the computer wasn't adequately backed
up. Sounds like improper police procedure, not Monk-i-shines,
to me.)
This program's major assets are not necessarily the plotting,
although it is usually clever, and considerable. They are the
acting talents of everyone concerned, not just Tony Shalhoub.
Ted Levine as the bemused Captain Stottlemeyer, Jason Gray-Stanford
as Lieutenant Randy Disher, the man who overestimates his own
abilities to solve crimes and who longs for a date with any pretty
girl who wanders into his field of vision, Sharona (Bitty Schramm),
the matter of fact nurse who spent two years dealing with Monk
before returning to her ex-husband, another man who has trouble
dealing with life, Natalie (Traylor Howard), recently hired on
as Monk's new assistant, Dr. Kroger (Stanley Kamel) as Monk's
long suffering psychiatrist, who just wants to get his patient
to a goal-any goal and himself to a summer vacation--these are
all worthy colleagues on the series. The guest stars are always
entertaining, from Adam Arkin as "Dale the Whale",
a marvelous bad guy who may hold the key to the identity of Trudy's
killer, to Lolita Davidovich as a beautiful trapeze artist, to
Glenne Headly (in an occasional role as Stottlemeyer's wife Karen).
Monk does not believe in coincidence. He does not believe in
psychic powers. He does not believe in accident. He believes
in logic. He believes in reason. He may have OCD and he may have
personal problems, but when he has a crime to solve it occupies
all of his attention. In the episode "Mr. Monk and the
Psychic," for example (aired July 19, 2002), Monk becomes
suspicious when a psychic claims that a dead woman's "aura"
leads her to the woman's body. He unravels the crime by deducing
that the victim's husband, a former police commissioner, murdered
her and used the psychic to deflect attention from himself. Monk
expresses his attitude to Sharona in a wonderful line. "You've
got to be a little skeptical, Sharona. Otherwise you end up believing
in everything--UFOs, elves, income tax rebates."
Some of the episodes are downright weak in terms of plot. The
March 16th episode, "Mr. Monk Gets Jury Duty,"
for example, featured Monk as a jury member unable to focus when
he realizes that someone has secreted a body in a dumpster just
below the window of the jury deliberation room. Since he has
already made a nuisance of himself, the bailiff won't pay any
attention to him. So he calls out to his assistant Natalie, who
is in the street below as she is bringing him lunch. (Why is
she bringing him lunch? Lunch should be provided by the court,
but of course, Monk's dietary requirements have already been
explained to the judge).
Of course, jury members are not supposed to contact anyone but
the bailiff during their deliberations, as both Monk and Natalie
know very well. But the contact goes on. Natalie summons Captain
Stottlemeyer, and Stottlemeyer communicates with Monk while Monk
is in the jury room. Eventually the judge spots Monk and the
police discussing the body and he sequesters the jury, who are
consequently enraged with Monk. The judge should probably have
declared a mistrial, but that would be the end of the episode,
and Monk would not get the chance to solve the other mystery
in the story, which is why one of the jurors keeps changing her
vote just as everyone else agrees on a verdict. Monk is, incidentally,
instrumental in convincing them that the case on which they are
deliberating is a frame-up: it's highly reminiscent of Twelve
Angry Men, down to the functional identifications of the
other jury members ("Postal Worker Juror", "Sports
Fan Juror", etc.).
The Monk writers and directors often indulge in these
kinds of popular culture references as if to invite the audience
into their tight little world. Guest stars like Tim Daly (with
whom Shalhoub co-starred on Wings) and Danny Bonaduce
play themselves. But one of the things that rapidly becomes annoying
is the lack of credibility that Monk enjoys week after week.
Monk is always right-so why don't people who have heard of him
believe him when he says he thinks he knows who the killer might
be? And why don't they run interference for him? In this country,
which caters so much to celebrities, it's very difficult to understand
why Monk has so much trouble getting himself heard. We know the
answer-the plot would evaporate because Monk would have many
fewer difficulties. His weird little phobias must also earn him,
if not enemies, then adversaries. Otherwise, things would be
much too easy. Those adversaries, if they are the criminals,
do eventually grant him their respect, as in "Mr. Monk
and the Astronaut." But it takes the entire episode,
and coupled with Monk's phobias, it can become wearying for the
viewer. This particular element-the criminal's lack of respect
for the detective, which sometimes degenerates into taunting-again
recalls Columbo.
Through the four seasons that the show has been on the air, all
the recurring characters have grown. Stottlemeyer has learned
not to take his marriage or his wife for granted, just as she
has left him. Disher has learned a little something about the
intelligence and the emotional reliability of the opposite sex.
Monk himself has learned that his dead wife would have wanted
him to try to move on with his life. Coming to that determination
hasn't been easy, even deliberately with the assistance of his
psychiatrist, or accidentally through the mishaps attendant on
assisting his friends.
In "Mr. Monk Goes to the Dentist" Lieutenant
Disher thinks he sees his dentist kill someone, but no one believes
him. Out of a mixture of pique and a sense that years on the
force have earned him no loyalty from either his superiors or
his friends he quits to pursue a career in rock music (a very
bad decision). Natalie convinces Monk to investigate. Now Monk
is in the position of being the person who doesn't believe, but
who gives a friend the benefit of the doubt, and who discovers
that the friend is correct. Through that experience, he grows
just a little more, as does Disher, who realizes that rock music
is a fine hobby for someone who is a good enough musician to
know that he's not good enough to be a professional musician.
Monk is a very moral show. Adrian Monk is a very moral
man. He believes in justice and he goes after crime and criminals
no matter where they may be. Working in the private sphere, assisting
the professionals in the public sphere, he still yearns to return
to the police force, even though he can still interact with his
old friends unofficially, and some of them still respect his
work. He knows that the likelihood that he will ever to that
life is small. Meanwhile, he continues to take private cases,
and those on which Captain Stottlemeyer invites him to assist.
He overcomes his own fears to do it. His friends, Natalie, like
Sharona before her, Disher, Stottlemeyer, all help him, but ultimately
the detective who walks by himself, and works by himself, Monk,
does it alone, as we all must. Facing his fears, he calls them
by name. As we now know, they include just about everything.
Even milk.
Posted March 23, 2006
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