Monk (season 3)
| Monk – season 3 | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Country of origin |
 United States |
| No. of episodes | 16 |
| Release | |
| Original network | USA Network |
| Original release | June 18, 2004 – March 4, 2005 |
| Season chronology | |
The third season of Monk originally aired in the United States on USA Network from June 18, 2004, to March 4, 2005. It consists of 16 episodes. Tony Shalhoub, Ted Levine, and Jason Gray-Stanford reprise their roles as the main characters, and Traylor Howard joins the cast. Bitty Schram left the show due to a contract dispute during the Winter hiatus. A DVD of the season was released on July 5, 2005.
Crew
Andy Breckman continued his tenure as show runner. Executive producers for the season include Breckman and David Hoberman. NBC Universal Television Studio was the primary production company backing the show. Randy Newman's theme ("It's a Jungle Out There") continued to be used, while Jeff Beal's original instrumental theme can be heard in some episodes. Directors for the season include Randall Zisk, Jerry Levine, Michael Zinberg, and Andrei Belgrader. Zisk received an Emmy award-nomination for his work on "Mr. Monk Takes His Medicine." Writers for the season included Andy Breckman, David Breckman, Lee Goldberg, William Rabkin, Joe Toplyn, Daniel Dratch, Hy Conrad, and Tom Scharpling.
Cast
Tony Shalhoub returned as the titular character and OCD detective, Adrian Monk. Ted Levine and Jason Gray-Stanford reprised their roles as Captain Leland Stottlemeyer and Lieutenant Randall "Randy" Disher, respectively. Bitty Schram portrayed Monk's nurse, Sharona Fleming, for the first half of the season, but left due to a contract dispute. Traylor Howard was then cast as Natalie Teeger in a main role as Monk's new assistant. Andy Breckman, the show's creator, stated, "I will always be grateful to Traylor because she came in when the show was in crisis and saved our baby [....] We had to make a hurried replacement, and not every show survives that. I was scared to death."[1]
Guest stars for season three are in even more abundance than the previous two. Stanley Kamel reprised his role as Monk's psychiatrist, Dr. Charles Kroger, in nine episodes, while Kane Ritchotte continued to play Benjy Fleming, Sharona's son. Emmy Clarke entered the series as Julie Teeger (Natalie's daughter), and Melora Hardin returned as Monk's beloved deceased wife, Trudy Monk. Tim Bagley made his first two appearances as Harold Krenshaw, Monk's main rival. Jarrad Paul portrays Kevin Dorfman, Monk's annoying upstairs neighbor, while Glenne Headly continues to portray Karen Stottlemeyer, the captain's wife. Other guest stars for the season include Brooke Adams, Scott Adsit, Kelly Albanese, Amy Aquino, Moon Bloodgood, James Brolin, Emma Caulfield, Jonathan Chase, Maree Cheatham, Enrico Colantoni, Frank Collison, Alicia Coppola, Carmen Electra, Patrick Fischler, Rosemary Forsyth, Sutton Foster, Neil Giuntoli, Michael A. Goorjian, Parker Goris, Harry Groener, Eileen Grubba, Saverio Guerra, Bob Gunton, Philip Baker Hall, John Michael Higgins, Rick Hoffman, James Intveld, Sung Kang, Chris Kennedy, Edward Kerr, Lance Krall, Olek Krupa, Mako, Ken Marino, John Maynard, Larry Miller, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Glenn Morshower, Lochlyn Munro, Niecy Nash, Arthel Neville, Patrick Thomas O'Brien, Raymond O'Connor, Nick Offerman, Faith Prince, David Purdham, Judge Reinhold, Mark Sheppard, Nick Spano, Josh Stamberg, Nicole Sullivan, Alanna Ubach, Jill Wagner, Michael Weston, Mykelti Williamson, Adam Wylie, and Rachel Zeskind. The band Korn also makes an appearance.
Episodes
| No. in series |
No. in season |
Title | Written by | Directed by | Original air date | U.S. viewers (millions) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30 | 1 | "Mr. Monk Takes Manhattan" | Andy Breckman | Randall Zisk | June 18, 2004 | 5.54[2] |
| Monk takes on The City That Never Sleeps, or rather, washes its hands, as he investigates Warrick Tennyson's (Frank Collison) role in Trudy's murder. But he first must investigate the shooting of a foreign ambassador. | ||||||
| 31 | 2 | "Mr. Monk and the Panic Room" | David Breckman and Joe Toplyn | Jerry Levine | June 25, 2004 | 4.70[2] |
| When a music producer is shot dead in his own panic room, Monk finds himself in the monkey business when the man's pet chimpanzee is the primary suspect–even surpassing the producer's wife (Carmen Electra). | ||||||
| 32 | 3 | "Mr. Monk and the Blackout" | Daniel Dratch and Hy Conrad | Michael Zinberg | July 9, 2004 | 4.55[3] |
| Sparks fly when a power company spokeswoman (Alicia Coppola) is attracted to Monk as he investigates a string of bombings at a local power plant that are the work of an anti-radical bomber that faked his death years earlier to escape prosecution. | ||||||
| 33 | 4 | "Mr. Monk Gets Fired" | Peter Wolk | Andrei Belgrader | July 16, 2004 | 4.68[4] |
| Even after his private practice license is pulled, Monk is determined to solve the cases of an arson murder, a limbless torso.... and the new commissioner's (Saverio Guerra) stolen hat. | ||||||
| 34 | 5 | "Mr. Monk Meets the Godfather" | Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin | Michael Zinberg | July 23, 2004 | 4.73[4] |
| An FBI agent (Rick Hoffman) coerces Monk into infiltrating an organized crime family to get to the bottom of an apparent mob hit. | ||||||
| 35 | 6 | "Mr. Monk and the Girl Who Cried Wolf" | Hy Conrad | Jerry Levine | July 30, 2004 | 5.40[5] |
| The shoe is on the other foot when Sharona starts seeing apparent hallucinations of a blood-soaked man with a knife in his chest and a screwdriver in his ear. Meanwhile, Monk hires a temporary replacement (Niecy Nash) and meets a fellow patient (Tim Bagley) of Dr. Kroger. | ||||||
| 36 | 7 | "Mr. Monk and the Employee of the Month" | Ross Abrash | Scott Foley | August 6, 2004 | 5.77[6] |
| Monk takes a job at a Mega-Mart department store, where his disgraced former partner (Enrico Colantoni) is head of security, to solve the murder of the former Employee of the Month. | ||||||
| 37 | 8 | "Mr. Monk and the Game Show" | Daniel Dratch | Randall Zisk | August 13, 2004 | 4.85[7] |
| Trudy's father Dwight Ellison (Bob Gunton) is producer of a Jeopardy!-type game show called Treasure Chest, but when he suspects that the host (John Michael Higgins) is helping a contestant cheat, he asks Monk to investigate. Monk and Kevin Dorfman accompany Dwight to Los Angeles to investigate. | ||||||
| 38 | 9 | "Mr. Monk Takes His Medicine" | Tom Scharpling and Chuck Sklar | Randall Zisk | August 20, 2004 | 5.88[6] |
| When Captain Stottlemeyer gets shot in a drive-by shooting, the police scramble to determine what ties the shooting to a suicide committed a few minutes beforehand. But they won't be able to rely on Monk because he's taking a new medication that alleviates the symptoms of his obsessive-compulsive disorder but impairs his ability to solve crimes. | ||||||
| 39 | 10 | "Mr. Monk and the Red Herring" | Andy Breckman | Randall Zisk | January 21, 2005 | 5.50[8] |
| When Natalie Teeger (Traylor Howard) kills an intruder in her house, Monk is brought in and finds that she might just be cut out to be his next assistant. But before he can hire her, he must figure out why the intruder wanted Natalie's daughter's goldfish. | ||||||
| 40 | 11 | "Mr. Monk vs. the Cobra" | Joe Toplyn | Anthony R. Palmieri | January 28, 2005 | 4.10[9] |
| When all signs in the investigation behind a murder point to a deceased Kung Fu movie star, Monk must find the real culprit. | ||||||
| 41 | 12 | "Mr. Monk Gets Cabin Fever" | Hy Conrad | Jerry Levine | February 4, 2005 | 5.00[9] |
| When Monk witnesses a Chinese mob killing, he is put under the United States Federal Witness Protection Program and brought by Agent Grooms (Josh Stamberg) to a remote cabin in the woods, where he uncovers another murder. Meanwhile, Randy begins seeing a woman (Moon Bloodgood) who may not be who she says. | ||||||
| 42 | 13 | "Mr. Monk Gets Stuck in Traffic" | Tom Scharpling and Joe Toplyn | Jerry Levine | February 11, 2005 | 5.02[10] |
| Monk gets stuck in a traffic jam and finds that the cause of the standstill is murder. Along the way, he meets a personal injury lawyer (Larry Miller) and the band Korn. | ||||||
| 43 | 14 | "Mr. Monk Goes to Vegas" | Tom Scharpling, David Breckman, Daniel Dratch, and Joe Toplyn | Randall Zisk | February 18, 2005 | 5.40[11] |
| When a millionaire Las Vegas casino owner's (James Brolin) wife is strangled to death in an elevator by her own scarf, Captain Stottlemeyer, who is in hangover mode, suspects foul play and brings Monk out to investigate. While solving the murder, Monk must also help Stottlemeyer remember what he did during his hangover and help Randy overcome a gambling addiction issue. | ||||||
| 44 | 15 | "Mr. Monk and the Election" | Nell Scovell | Allison Liddi | February 25, 2005 | 4.85[12] |
| When Natalie runs for school board against Harold Krenshaw (Tim Bagley), Monk must figure out who's behind an attempt on her life. | ||||||
| 45 | 16 | "Mr. Monk and the Kid" | Tom Scharpling | Andrei Belgrader | March 4, 2005 | 4.44[13] |
| Monk unravels a baffling mystery after a toddler finds a severed finger in a park. The investigation leads him to a woman (Brooke Adams) whose son has been kidnapped. | ||||||
Unfilmed episodes
One episode that was written but never filmed for the first half of season 3 would have been an episode called "Mr. Monk Is At Sea". The premise would have been that Monk and Sharona would investigate a murder committed on a cruise ship. A script was made for the episode, but it was never filmed because no cruise line was willing to loan a ship to the production crew to use for shooting, out of sensitivity to the idea of murders being committed on-board or people falling overboard. They refused to budge even when the victim count was reduced and the killer's identity was changed. This script became considered the series' "white whale" or 126th episode. It only came to light in early 2014, when it was rewritten and published by Hy Conrad as Mr. Monk Gets on Board, which maintains most of the original plot, but substitutes Natalie for Sharona, and adds in a subplot involving a book collector.
Awards and nominations
Emmy Awards
- Outstanding Actor - Comedy Series (Tony Shalhoub, won)
- Outstanding Directing - Comedy Series (Randall Zisk for "Mr. Monk Takes His Medicine", nominated)
Golden Globe Awards
- Best Actor - Musical or Comedy Series (Tony Shalhoub, nominated)
Screen Actors Guild
- Outstanding Actor - Comedy Series (Tony Shalhoub, won)
References
- ↑ Kaufman, Joanne (January 9, 2009). "Here's What Happened: How Natalie Rescued Monk". The Wall Street Journal. News Corp. Retrieved June 1, 2010.
- 1 2 Fitzgerald, Toni (June 30, 2004). "Monk, tics and all, is USA's main man". Media Life Magazine. Retrieved April 18, 2015.
- ↑ Romano, Allison (July 13, 2004). "USA's Missing Persons Find Big Audience". Broadcasting & Cable. NewBay Media. Retrieved March 23, 2014.
- 1 2 Fitzgerald, Toni (July 29, 2004). "July's hot cable surprise: Nick at Nite". Media Life Magazine. Retrieved April 18, 2015.
- ↑ Romano, Allison (August 3, 2004). "USA Records Dramatic Victory". Broadcasting & Cable. NewBay Media. Retrieved March 23, 2014.
- 1 2 Fitzgerald, Toni (September 9, 2004). "In a rainy August, a hotter FX Network". Media Life Magazine. Retrieved April 18, 2015.
- ↑ Romano, Allison (August 17, 2004). "USA Gets Cable Ratings Gold". Broadcasting & Cable. NewBay Media. Retrieved March 23, 2014.
- ↑ Becker, Anne (January 25, 2005). "Monk Debut Tops Cable". Broadcasting & Cable. NewBay Media. Retrieved March 23, 2014.
- 1 2 "Development Update: February 9". The Futon Critic. February 9, 2005. Retrieved March 23, 2014.
- ↑ Vasquez, Diego (February 16, 2005). "For NBC, it's also the little blunders". Media Life Magazine. Retrieved April 18, 2015.
- ↑ Becker, Anne (February 23, 2005). "TNT Shines with All-Stars". Broadcasting & Cable. NewBay Media. Retrieved March 23, 2014.
- ↑ "Cable Series by Total Households: week of 02/21/05-02/27/05". Zap2it. Tribune Media Services. Archived from the original on March 7, 2005. Retrieved March 23, 2014.
- ↑ "Cable Series by Total Households: week of 02/28/05-03/06/05". Zap2it. Tribune Media Services. Archived from the original on March 14, 2005. Retrieved March 23, 2014.