Tony Shalhoub returns as everyone’s favourite obsessive-compulsive sleuth in Mr Monk’s Last Case
NEW YORK, United States (AP) — Fourteen years ago, Tony Shalhoub said goodbye to one of his most beloved creations — the obsessive-compulsive private detective Adrian Monk.
Monk’s last TV appearance in 2009 was even called “Mr Monk and the End.”
There was talk over the years of a potential reboot and some possible scripts were floated. But Shalhoub said there wasn’t enough of a compelling reason to return to his phobia-obsessed character.
Then the pandemic hit.
Monk suddenly wasn’t the only germaphobe wiping down their groceries, stocking up on antibacterial wipes and shuddering at the sight of crowded places.
“Monk, in a way, was the canary in the coal mine,” Shalhoub tells The Associated Press. “He seemed so out of touch and so neurotic and so forth. The pandemic was the great equaliser. Everybody got to sort of see the world through Monk’s eyes.”
Viewers have caught up with Monk and so fans get another goodbye with the 90-minute Mr Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie hitting Peacock on Friday.
Shalhoub reunites on a new murder case with a millionaire as the prime suspect and original stars Ted Levine, Traylor Howard, Jason Gray-Stanford, Melora Hardin and Hector Elizondo.
Shalhoub laughs that when the rock band Eagles got back together in 1994, founding member Glenn Frey said they’d never broke up, they just took a 14-year vacation. “That’s how I felt at the first table read when we all got back together again. We just kind of folded right back into it.”
Monk helped the San Francisco Police Department solve crimes because his fixations enable him to observe things that others overlook. He walked away after solving his last case — the murder of his beloved wife.
Shalhoub collected three Emmy Awards for his work as Monk over eight seasons. After the show ended in 2009, Shalhoub went on to earn three Tony Award nominations. The début of Mr Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie begs the question: Is this really a final goodbye to Monk? Shalhoub isn’t sure.
“I thought the door was closed. I really did for a lot of years. But now that we’ve cracked it open, I’m just going to leave that door open,” he says. “I think the next one would have to be called ‘Monk’s Really, Really Final No Kidding Case – This Time We Mean It’ or something like that.”
