‘Monk’ debuts unique private eye

Quirkiness has always been an element of TV detectives.

“Monk,” debuting with a two-hour movie at 9 tonight on USA, takes this to another level. Adrian Monk is TV’s first obsessive-compulsive detective.

Monk, played by Tony Shalhoub (“The Man Who Wasn’t There,” “Galaxy Quest”), was a legendary homicide detective on the San Francisco police force. But following his wife’s murder, Monk developed an abnormal fear of germs, heights and crowds, among other things.

The Dr. Watson to Monk’s Sherlock Holmes is Sharona Fleming (Bitty Schram, “A League of Their Own”), his nurse and “girl Friday.” As one of the few who understands Monk, her role is to work to ease him back into society while serving as an interpreter of his actions to others.

Monk gets brought in as a police consultant after an assassination attempt on a mayoral candidate. That’s despite the misgivings of his former captain, Leland Stottlemeyer (Ted Levine, “The Silence of the Lambs”), who is more than a little jealous of Monk’s detective skills.

“Monk” follows the detective’s attempt to overcome OCD and resume a normal life. Shalhoub, one of the busiest character actors in film, avoids playing Monk’s condition for cheap laughs, instead choosing to show the difficulties that the detective must deal with in handling simple, everyday tasks most of us take for granted. In fact, Monk is most comfortable on the job, not in his day-to-day life.

The trick that executive producers Andy Breckman (“Rat Race”), David Hoberman (“Bandits”) and Rob Thompson (“Northern Exposure”) must manage is walking that fine line between sensitivity and comedy. The audience needs to feel for Monk, not laugh at him, or the series will do a disservice to all those who do suffer from OCD. Based on the premiere, “Monk” looks like it can accomplish that laudable goal.