30 Facts About Adrian Monk

Adrian Monk, portrayed by Tony Shalhoub, is the title character and protagonist of the USA Network television series Monk.

Adrian Monk is a renowned former homicide detective for the San Francisco Police Department.

Adrian Monk was included in Bravo's list of The 100 Greatest Television Characters of All Time, and Shalhoub has won various awards for his portrayal, including a Golden Globe Award, three Primetime Emmy Awards and two Screen Actors Guild Awards.

Adrian Monk was originally envisioned as a "more goofy and physical" Inspector Clouseau type of character.

USA Network's executive vice president Jeff Wachtel stated that looking for the right actor to portray Adrian Monk was "casting hell".

Adrian Monk's first assistant, Sharona Fleming, is a single mother and practical nurse by profession, hired by the police department to help Monk recover from the three-year catatonic state he lapsed into after Trudy's death.

Adrian Monk carries out futile and endless attempts to make the world "balanced".

Adrian Monk is fixated with symmetry, going so far as to always cut his pancakes into squares.

Adrian Monk strongly prefers familiarity and rigorous structure in his activities.

Adrian Monk has great difficulty in standard social situations, so much so that he must write down common small talk phrases on note cards in an attempt to successfully socialize.

Adrian Monk has a photographic memory, and can reconstruct entire crime scenes based on little more than scraps of detail that seem unimportant to his colleagues.

Moments of extreme stress can cause Adrian Monk to enter a dissociative state, as seen in the Season 1 episode "Mr Adrian Monk and the Earthquake"; he begins speaking in gibberish during these periods, severely hindering his investigative skills.

One breakthrough is shown in the season 8 episode "Mr Monk Goes to Group Therapy", when Adrian is locked in a car trunk with his fellow OCD patient and personal rival, Harold Krenshaw.

Possibly due to this, as well as the many cases Adrian Monk has solved over the years, he is reinstated as detective first class by Stottlemeyer in the season 8 episode "Mr Adrian Monk and the Badge".

Adrian Monk has a brother, Ambrose Adrian Monk, an agoraphobic who has not left his house for thirty-two years.

Adrian Monk's parents were very strict and over-protective, although his mother was emotionally distant and seemed to have difficulty expressing affection.

Adrian's father, Jack Monk, abandoned the family when Adrian was eight years old when he went out for Chinese food and did not return.

Adrian Monk has an agoraphobic brother named Ambrose, from whom he was estranged for seven years following Trudy's death.

Adrian Monk hugged Ambrose, and told him he is not responsible for Trudy's death.

Adrian Monk calls it "a temporary suspension" and hopes to be reinstated.

Since Trudy's death, Adrian Monk has been consulting with San Francisco police detectives on various cases.

Adrian Monk discovered that the car bomb was indeed meant for Trudy and was built by a man named Warrick Tennyson, who was hired by a six-fingered man named Frank Nunn.

Once Adrian Monk is cleared in Nunn's death, the police find correspondence from Nunn dating back to the era of Trudy's death.

Adrian Monk learns that the older, married, Rickover had an affair with Trudy when she was in her 20s, and that Trudy gave birth to and subsequently adopted out an infant daughter, Molly Evans, on January 2,1983.

Adrian Monk later meets and forms a paternal relationship with Molly in the series finale.

Adrian Monk describes himself as Nelson's second-biggest fan and Trudy as his biggest.

Adrian Monk is ranked number 99 on Bravo's list of The 100 Greatest Television Characters of All Time.

Adrian Monk was named one of TV's Smartest Detectives by AOL.

Adrian Monk has been nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series each year from 2003 to 2010, winning in 2003,2005 and 2006.

Adrian Monk received the 2004 and the 2005 Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series, with nominations in the same category in 2003,2006,2007,2008 and 2009.