The following is a list of characters from Monk, an American comedy-drama detective television series created by Andy Breckman and starring Tony Shalhoub as Adrian Monk. Monk's assistant Sharona Fleming, portrayed by Bitty Schram, was replaced by Natalie Teeger, portrayed by Traylor Howard, halfway through the third season. The rest of the principal cast remained consistent throughout the series.
Adrian Monk is the only character to appear in all 125 episodes.
Main characters Name Portrayed by Occupation/Status Seasons Film 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Adrian Monk Tony Shalhoub Private detective colspan="9" Sharona Fleming Bitty Schram colspan="3" colspan=4" SFPD lieutenant colspan="9" Leland Stottlemeyer Ted Levine SFPD captain colspan="9" Natalie Teeger Traylor Howard Adrian Monk's personal assistant colspan="2" colspan="7"
Adrian Monk
Sharona Fleming
Sharona Fleming, portrayed by Bitty Schram, is Adrian Monk's nurse and his assistant during the first three seasons.
Monk was in a catatonic state for three and a half years until Sharona began taking care of him. Monk was able to resume detective work and remarked, "When she found me, I was drowning. She saved my life." The series started a while after she took the assistant's job, and just how she got it and what their early relationship was are never explained, although it is revealed that Captain Stottlemeyer originally engaged her as a nurse for Monk.
It is revealed in the novel Mr. Monk is on Patrol that one of the criteria that the SFPD had for employing Monk as a consultant was that he had to have Sharona with him, in case he has a breakdown. Sharona helps out, sometimes doing independent investigations and sometimes even using her sex appeal to get information that Monk cannot. She also does all kinds of things that Monk's OCD and phobias prevent him from doing as she has few such reservations herself. However, in the season 2 episode "Mr. Monk Goes to the Circus," Sharona is revealed to have a fear of elephants, due to seeing a girl falling into an elephant pit when she was seven years old. She takes up smoking after Monk reacts insensitively to her fear of elephants, telling her to "suck it up".
Sharona drives a tan 1990 Volvo 740 GLE Wagon, which in "Mr. Monk and the 12th Man" is shown to have 100,000 miles. The counter says 99,999, prompting Monk to move the car forwards and backwards until the number is even while staking out Henry Small's house.
She has 'quit' her job as Monk's assistant at least twice; in the episode "Mr. Monk and the Candidate" and "Mr. Monk and the Billionaire Mugger" (this was due to a pay dispute (her paychecks had bounced regularly); she temporarily got a job at a lamp store). Sharona's 'quitting' became a running gag in the show, until she finally left in 2004 to remarry her ex-husband, Trevor Howe, following "Mr. Monk Takes His Medicine". This was because Bitty Schram quit the show over contract disputes. Subsequently, Traylor Howard was introduced as Natalie Teeger, Monk's new assistant, beginning in "Mr. Monk and the Red Herring".
Sharona is mentioned again after her character left the show in "Mr. Monk Is On the Run (Part Two)", having sent flowers for the "deceased" Monk and flying in with Benjy to attend his funeral.
Sharona made a special guest appearance in "Mr. Monk and Sharona", in season 8, in order to meet her lawyer about a lawsuit involving her uncle, Howard Fleming. In this episode she explained what she had been doing since she left. She meets Natalie Teeger, Monk's new assistant, and it seems that they are going to get along until it is revealed that Monk paid Sharona $20 a week more than Natalie. Later, they begin to bicker about assisting styles, the settlement money, etc., The two women later reconcile their differences and note that each woman was just what Monk needed at the time they worked for him, and that Sharona's seeming toughness got Monk to a place where he didn't need a full-time nurse at his side. There was also a surprise hug between Monk and Sharona, which shows the first time Monk has returned a hug given by anyone, and also a surprise kiss between Sharona and Randy Disher, with whom she regularly traded teasing barbs and banter in the first seasons.
In "Mr. Monk and the End", it is revealed that Randy spent two weeks on vacation, having landed in New Jersey (where Sharona lives), and that he and Sharona had found a home which they would share when Randy moves to New Jersey sometime after Monk's last case.
Natalie Teeger
Natalie Jane Teeger (née Davenport), portrayed by Traylor Howard, is Adrian Monk's personal assistant from the third season onwards. Howard had not yet seen the show when urged by her manager to audition for the role. Series creator Andy Breckman has 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."
Natalie was born into the wealthy Davenport family, the owners of the successful Davenport Toothpaste company. She was a nudist during her time as an exchange student in Greece when she was nineteen years old, and she worked as a blackjack dealer in Las Vegas for two years. Natalie became estranged from her family when she married Lieutenant Commander Mitch Teeger, whom her parents disapproved of, though they would later reconcile. Following Mitch's death in 1998 in the Kosovo War, Natalie was left as the single mother of their daughter, Julie, and bounced around between a number of odd jobs, including working in an office, housesitting, and bartending.
After two intruders break into her house within the same week – one of whom she kills in self-defense – Natalie convinces Monk, who is still reeling from Sharona's departure, to take her case. Monk takes a liking to Natalie during their investigation and offers her Sharona's position as his assistant. Though she initially refuses, Natalie changes her mind, quits her job as a bartender, and accepts Monk's offer after witnessing his kindness to Julie.
Natalie proves more deferential and patient with her boss than Sharona was, often referring to him as "Mr. Monk". She is not hesitant to call him out when she feels he is being unfair or unreasonable, however, as she is at first frustrated by Monk's apparent selfishness and his refusal to pay her expenses. It is only after Monk risks his own well-being to save Natalie that the two begin to grow closer and bond over the loss of their spouses.
Natalie soon becomes an extremely devoted friend to Monk and develops a strong faith in his observational abilities. There have been several occasions where she is the only one to support her boss' theories. She is also shown to be rather cunning, and is often able to trick people into doing things that help her and Monk with their investigations.
Towards the end of the series, Natalie begins dating Mitch's oldest friend in the navy, Lieutenant Steven Albright, as Julie leaves home to study theatre arts at UC Berkeley. As of the follow-up film Mr. Monk's Last Case: A Monk Movie, Natalie has married Steven and works as a real estate agent in Atlanta, Georgia, having moved there to be closer to Julie.
Captain Leland Stottlemeyer
Captain Leland Francis Stottlemeyer, portrayed by Ted Levine, is a captain of the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD)'s homicide detail. He is a longtime and long-suffering friend of main protagonist Adrian Monk from their days on the force together, when Stottlemeyer served as Monk's fourth partner and later as watch commander. Stottlemeyer's second-in-command, Lieutenant Randy Disher, is a source of much comedic strife. In the tradition of superior officers in detective television shows, Stottlemeyer often punctuates comedic moments by shouting the protagonist's last name in an annoyed tone.
Not much is known of Stottlemeyer's life before he joined the SFPD in the series, though in an interview, Ted Levine stated it was his own belief that Stottlemeyer had served in the military and was later discharged, lived on the East Coast, then moved to California as a young man, joining the police force. In "Mr. Monk and the Class Reunion", it is implied that he has lived in the Bay Area since at least the 1970s; when he is trying to get information from reunion guests about a homicide investigation, he is booed off the stage when the projectionist displays some embarrassing pictures of him wearing riot gear and attacking protesters at an anti-nuclear warfare demonstration at UC Berkeley. In S05E13, "Mr. Monk is on the Air," Captain Stottelmeyer has multiple pictures of helicopters on the wall of his office, as well as a picture of a F-22 Raptor (likely a souvenir from S04E14, "Mr. Monk and the Astronaut"). Such keepsakes are common among former service members. Incidentally there is a print on his office wall of a number of helicopters, but these are U.K. Royal Naval helicopters.
In "Mr. Monk Makes the Playoffs", it is mentioned that he has not lived in Los Angeles for almost 30 years. The novel Mr. Monk and the New Lieutenant reveals that Stottlemeyer's father was a bartender named Hamish. Stottlemeyer mentions in "Mr. Monk Gets Cabin Fever" that he was the youngest officer in the history of the SFPD to make detective, giving him at least a few years of seniority on Monk. As Stottlemeyer mentions in "Mr. Monk Goes to the Carnival", when Monk was promoted to detective, he was partnered with Stottlemeyer and right away showed off his amazing abilities when he proved that a prostitute's apparent suicide was murder. It is mentioned in "Mr. Monk Takes His Medicine" that Stottlemeyer was Monk's fourth partner on the force, and this came two weeks after Monk made detective (Monk says that his first three partners were good enough guys but that their professional chemistry did not work).
Stottlemeyer was later promoted past Monk. At the time Trudy was murdered, Stottlemeyer reluctantly suspended Monk from duty, though the two remained friends. Stottlemeyer also looked up Sharona Fleming and hired her as Monk's practical nurse, which helped Monk to recover from a state of near-catatonia caused by Trudy's death.
The two men have a deep respect for one another, as evidenced by Monk's description of Stottlemeyer as "the best cop I know" and Stottlemeyer's comment that Monk is "the best detective in the free world".
Especially in the early episodes of the show, there is a certain degree of tension between Stottlemeyer and Monk. Stottlemeyer resents being forced (frequently by the higher-up characters, such as the mayor, the chiefs, or the commissioner) into calling on Monk's assistance, and he is frequently exasperated by Monk's many quirks. Also inherent in this hostility is a certain degree of jealousy; Stottlemeyer appears only too aware that he is not nearly the detective that Monk is. In the novel Mr. Monk and the Dirty Cop, he starts to feel a little hostile towards Monk after taking a lot of ribbing from Paul Braddock (and at one time, Braddock actually insults Stottlemeyer, accusing him of using Monk as a metaphorical crutch). As a result, later in the story, upon learning that Monk's consultancy contract has been ripped up, Sharona takes her anger out on Stottlemeyer, accusing him of using the latest round of budget cuts as an excuse to cut Monk (and her) loose as a result of Braddock attacking his abilities.
Stottlemeyer is also skeptical of Monk's ability to perform as a police officer, aware that Monk's psychological problems are a very serious handicap; in "Mr. Monk Goes to the Carnival", he reveals his misgivings about allowing Monk back into the police department to the panel evaluating Monk's request.