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Natalie Jane Teeger ''(née Davenport)'' is a fictional character on the American crime drama/comedy ''Monk''. She becomes Adrian Monk's personal assistant midway through season three. She is portrayed by Traylor Howard. Traylor Howard was introduced after USA Network released actress Bitty Schram, who portrayed Sharona Fleming, mid-way through the show's third season, stating they wanted to take the character in new directions. Natalie was hence introduced in the role of Monk's assistant to fill in the void left by Schram's departure. ==Relationship with Adrian Monk== Natalie first meets Monk in the episode "Mr. Monk and the Red Herring", after two men break into her house. The first man pretends to be a water meter inspector, but she catches him snooping in the living room. The second guy, Brian Lemmon, breaks in through a side window. Natalie happens to walk in on him and unintentionally kills him in self-defense with a pair of scissors. Captain Stottlemeyer and Lieutenant Disher, baffled, suggest to Natalie to take her case to Monk. Monk's former assistant Sharona has just left, and Monk asks Natalie if she would become his new assistant. Initially, she refuses, but over the course of the investigation, Monk proves himself kind to Natalie's daughter Julie, which makes Natalie change her mind and accept the position (not to mention, an opportunity to get out of her current job as a bartender, which she admits to hating). However, the transition from Sharona to Natalie is not a very smooth transition, as Monk and Natalie's chemistry is shown to be uneasy until at least the end of the episode "Mr. Monk Gets Stuck in Traffic." In the novel ''Mr. Monk and the Two Assistants'', Natalie mentions that for a while, Monk, Stottlemeyer and Disher frequently compared her to Sharona, but finally accepted her for who she was. Over the course of the show, Natalie becomes an extremely devoted friend, as well as a devoted assistant. On several occasions, Natalie says explicitly that she loves him, though she might mean that in a platonic sense. Such an example of this is in "Mr. Monk and the Man Who Shot Santa Claus". There have been occasions where Natalie is the only person to support Monk's ideas (such as in "Mr. Monk and the Other Detective," when Monk suspects loser-private eye Marty Eels of cheating), and she hence proves a valuable ally in helping him gather the evidence needed to make an arrest. She is also shown to be rather cunning, and is able to trick other people into doing things that help Monk with a case. In "Mr. Monk and the Bad Girlfriend," when Monk suspects Linda Fusco of murdering her partner, Natalie lures Linda away from her house by pretending to look at an apartment listing, giving Monk time to search her place. Later, at Linda and Stottlemeyer's going away party, Monk and Natalie set up an ingenious sting operation to arrest Linda, where Monk pretends to talk to Natalie from Linda's house on a webcam (though in actuality, he is sitting in the back of an impounded rental truck that Linda had used to trick Monk, Natalie and Stottlemeyer into supplying her with an airtight alibi).〔"Mr. Monk and the Bad Girlfriend"〕 In the season seven episode "Mr. Monk and the Bully," when Monk and Natalie are trailing Roderick Brody's wife, Natalie tricks a businessman at a bar into taking a photo of their target. The episode also establishes that she has picked up some basic legal knowledge working with Monk, as evidenced in a scene where Natalie tries to withhold Roderick's name from Captain Stottlemeyer on the grounds of client confidentiality. Despite their platonic relationship, there have been instances throughout the series where other characters believe that Natalie suppresses romantic feelings for Monk through gestures and comments, or even think they are a couple, though Natalie herself tends to be highly amused by the suggestion: for instance, in "Mr. Monk and the Class Reunion", when Dianne Brooks (Cynthia Stevenson) first spots Monk and Natalie together, Dianne asks "Ahhh, oh, so you two aren't..." and points between them as if to indicate "dating"; Natalie grins and firmly replies "No!" In the season seven episode "Mr. Monk Gets Lotto Fever," when Natalie (as a lottery hostess) is signing autographs and Monk grabs some wipes from her, one of Natalie's fans asks her if Monk is her boyfriend, only for Natalie to correct her. Usually, when the two deny these comments, the asker will look suspiciously at Natalie, as if he or she thought there was something more in her denial. There are even instances when Stottlemeyer and Disher will give each other looks as if they think they see something in Natalie's reactions to Monk's situation or how she talks about him. Natalie's family has also given similar reactions, as well as characters from various episodes. While this may be a coincidence of Traylor Howard's acting style, it is definitely a noteworthy aspect of Natalie's relationship with Monk. In the season six episode "Mr. Monk Goes to the Bank," when Monk goes undercover as a guard at his bank to determine which employee might be an inside man, Natalie is impressed enough that she spends several minutes complimenting Monk on his appearance while wearing the uniform. She asks if he will be allowed to keep it after he ends his assignment. While this adds to the ambiguity in any potential attraction, it could also be interpreted as being that Natalie is attracted to men in uniform. Over the course of her relationship with Monk, Natalie is shown to also pick up a few detective instincts of her own on the way. In fact, in the novel ''Mr. Monk in Outer Space'', Stottlemeyer asks Natalie to try to figure out what happened at one crime scene, and she makes an accurate guess of what happened (without making much of an effort, mostly because this particular murder happened to be a straightforward shooting). By the time of the novel ''Mr. Monk and the Dirty Cop'', Natalie has picked up enough skills to start asking herself questions about the case at hand. In the 2011 novel ''Mr. Monk on the Couch'', a subplot has Natalie attempting to figure out the identity of a man found dead in a seedy hotel room with a phony ID. Monk and the police are not interested in pursuing the case, given that said man is determined to have died of natural causes. At the same time, Natalie helps Monk investigate a series of violent knifings occurring in the general vicinity of her neighborhood. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Natalie Teeger」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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