User:DReifGalaxyM31/Mr. Monk Goes to a Wedding

"Mr. Monk Goes to a Wedding" is the seventh episode of the fourth season of the television series Monk.

Plot
At a resort hotel in Pebble Beach, a local photographer, Frank Ruttle, is taking shots of a wedding party. He receives a call on his cell phone from a mysterious person, and they arrange to meet in the hotel spa, since it is deserted at this time of day. Ruttle heads down to the spa, and picks up an envelope hidden under a towel, but it is empty. He receives another call on his cell, and angrily accuses the other person of ripping him off. He demands significantly more money from the mysterious person in return for not going to the FBI with what he knows. The line goes dead, and a phone starts ringing. As Ruttle walks over to investigate, someone grabs a rock and knocks him out from behind, and tips him into one of the spa’s mud baths, drowning him. The attacker then places an "Out of Order" sign next to the bath to delay the discovery of the body.

Meanwhile, at the police station in San Francisco, Adrian Monk, Natalie Teeger and Captain Stottlemeyer throw a surprise birthday party for Lieutenant Disher. Monk and Natalie bring out the cake, which has been fully Seran-wrapped in what Monk calls a "spittle shield". Stottlemeyer comments that he plans on investing in the spittle shield. Randy blows out the candles, and this results in his cake catching fire. Randy makes a futile attempt at putting out the flames, which are only put out when Stottlemeyer uses a fire extinguisher, also causing him to reconsider his investment.

Natalie receives a call from her date to her brother Jonathan’s wedding, who has to cancel on account of appendicitis. Unable to face her family alone, Natalie resorts to accepting Disher’s offer to accompany her (after Stottlemeyer rejects her first two considerations (a married parole officer and a cute burglary suspect who wasn't cute enough to make bail). Disher spots the name "Davenport" on the invitation. It seems that he, Monk, and Stottlemeyer are all aware of the Davenport Toothpaste brand, and all three detectives are mildly surprised to find that Natalie is a scion of the Davenport family. Embarrassed, Natalie admits that she is not on good terms with her parents; they cut her off after she married Mitch, who wasn’t good enough for them.

Down in Pebble Beach, Natalie's mother, Peggy Davenport, is busy ordering everyone around. She appears to be trying to avoid a Bridezilla incident, and the wedding photographer is missing in action. They are interrupted when Natalie and Randy, accompanied by Julie, show up. It becomes clear that Natalie's parents haven't contacted her in a while, as Peggy still thinks Natalie is bartending until Natalie points out that she works for Monk (although she doesn't refer to Monk by name). We also get to learn about Theresa Scott, Jonathan's fiancee, whom he met a few weeks earlier in Hawaii. Bobby, Natalie's father, notes that Theresa has been living on a healthy trust fund since her parents died in a plane crash in 1995. While all of this is happening, someone steals a set of car keys from a coat in the cloakroom.

Back in San Francisco, Monk is so bereft without Natalie that Stottlemeyer drops in on him, and they look over pictures from Monk and Trudy’s wedding. Stottlemeyer brings up how he met his wife at a wedding. Back in Pebble Beach, Randy is unloading his suitcases from the car and walking across the parking lot, observed by the driver of a Volvo V70. At the precise moment, the driver floors on the gas pedal and rams Randy, pinning him against a parked van and knocking him unconscious. The driver promptly steps out of the car and runs from the scene.

Monk and Stottlemeyer rush to Pebble Beach upon hearing about the accident. Before Randy is loaded into the ambulance, Stottlemeyer tries to ask him questions about the driver's physical description, but is unsuccessful. He notes to Monk and Natalie that Randy suffered a fractured right arm and left leg, but had he not had two suitcases to minimize the force of the impact, his injuries could have been far worse. Analyzing the crime scene, Monk finds several clues that suggest that the crash was deliberate - he smells condensation, which suggests that the driver had the air conditioning running. This suggests that the car had been idling for at least 20 minutes, indicating that the driver was waiting for Randy to cross the parking lot. Furthermore, Monk concludes from the tire tracks that the driver peeled out at full speed. Unable to believe what he sees, Stottlemeyer wonders why anybody would want to harm Randy when it had only been an hour since he had arrived. Monk also notes some green mud near the pedals in the car.

The local investigator, Lieutenant Bristo, comes over to them, and after exchanging greetings with them (during which Stottlemeyer makes it clear that Monk will be staying), he notes that Natalie's Aunt Madge reported that someone had stolen her car keys from the cloakroom. Monk wonders which car is Madge's, since he doesn't see any Volvo markings on the keys of the death car. Bristo also notes that it's unlikely that any of the resort staff could be responsible - there was a staff meeting in progress at the time of the incident. Natalie is dismayed to find that the police believe that someone in her family is responsible for the attempt on Randy's life.

Later, at the rehearsal dinner, Natalie is angered when she finds her mother carrying an evidence bag with Randy's pants. She tries without success to return the bag to the police. Monk is reluctantly dragged into being Natalie's date at the rehearsal dinner (during which he cannot help but try to separate the food of the boy sitting next to him). Theresa addresses the family at the rehearsal dinner, hoping they will all be great friends, and invites Natalie to a bachelorette party in her room.

After the rehearsal dinner, Monk and Natalie find Stottlemeyer posing as a photographer and taking photos of wedding guests. He confides that he overheard Peggy mentioning the missing photographer, so he has volunteered in his place, and is using a borrowed CSI tech's camera. His primary reason for the undercover work is because Randy (confined to his bed) believes he can identify the driver - a medium-build man wearing a red baseball cap and sunglasses.

After Stottlemeyer leaves, Monk and Natalie meet Jonathan and Theresa. When talk turns to Randy, Theresa incorrectly refers to him as a sergeant, until Monk corrects her. However, as soon as she leaves, Monk becomes suspicious about how Theresa has no living family. Monk asks, and Jonathan confirms that Theresa had an uncle, but he died with Theresa's parents in a Pan American World Airways plane crash in 1995 while en route to Madrid. Monk realizes he's caught Theresa in several lies - Pan Am went out of business in 1991 in the aftermath of the Lockerbie bombing. He wonders if Theresa is up to something. Down in the hotel spa, a woman disregards the “Out of Order” sign next to the only vacant mud bath and lowers herself in – causing Frank Ruttle's dead body to surface supernaturally.

Up in Randy's room, Stottlemeyer flips through the shots of the wedding guests, but Randy doesn't recognize any of the photos, while Monk makes a futile attempt at writing his name on Randy's arm cast. With none of the guests visibly responsible, Monk asks Stottlemeyer to check the photos of Theresa. Looking through these photos, Stottlemeyer suddenly realizes that he has no good photos of Theresa (we see one photo of her where her head is turned away). Stottlemeyer agrees to check up on Monk's suspicions about Theresa.

Their session ends when Stottlemeyer gets a phone call about Ruttle's body. Monk collects Natalie from Teresa’s bachelorette party and, mistaking the male stripper there for an on-duty cop, drags him along as well.

Downstairs, the body has been placed on a table. They haven't identified Ruttle yet, as Bristo theorizes the wallet is still in the mudbath. Stottlemeyer believes that the mud of the mud baths is a perfect match for the sample of green mud that Monk found in the car. However, he notes that the victim is definitely not the hit-and-run driver: he has been dead for at least 36 hours. Monk notices developer fluid stains on the dead man's fingers quickly deduces that the victim is the missing wedding photographer. Bristo promises to get search warrants by the next morning.

The next morning, Monk, Natalie and Julie attend the ceremony, with Natalie and Julie walking down the line as Monk picks up the dropped flower petals after them. Meanwhile, Stottlemeyer and Bristo meet outside Frank Ruttle's studio to execute the search warrant. They find some interesting things about Ruttle's life - for one thing, Ruttle was broke, living paycheck to paycheck. Stottlemeyer notices that Ruttle had been reading listings for houses he couldn't afford, suggesting that he planned on coming into some money. They find their smoking gun when Stottlemeyer finds a newspaper article with a wedding photo of Theresa from an earlier marriage, with her hair dyed bonde. He also notices two other things about the article - it's about the groom’s fatal fall from a hotel balcony in Philadelphia a few years earlier, and also mentions that the fall has been ruled a murder and the bride is being sought for questioning.

Stottlemeyer rushes back to the resort to inform Monk and Natalie that Theresa is a black widow. The primary investigator in the case shown in the newspaper article is none other than Randy, at the time a sergeant with the Philadelphia police (a brief glimpse can also be seen of a photo of Randy in the article, showing his old mustache).

Peggy refuses to believe any of this, feeling that Natalie is trying to sabotage her brother’s wedding for petty reasons, even as Monk and Natalie try to remind her that Randy was the lead investigator into the death of Theresa's earlier husband five years ago, and if the article is true, it means that she tried to kill him because she feared he would identify her despite her changed appearance. Later, at the ceremonial dance, Monk offers to dance with Theresa. While holding wipes to gently dance, Monk notes that Theresa's dress still fits, and he reveals that he recognizes the dress from the newspaper photo. He informs her that he knows that five years earlier (at the time of the article), Theresa was going by the alias name "Darlene Coolidge". He's also figured that Frank Ruttle discovered Theresa's real identity, and he was blackmailing her for protection money.

Monk and Natalie meet Stottlemeyer, who has recovered a plastic bag from Theresa's hotel room with all of the elements of the disguise she used when she attempted to kill Randy. He admits that one doesn't need a warrant to search a hotel room after checkout time. He produces the baseball cap, and a sample of green mud that they know will match the sample from the mud bath and the car, and Natalie prepares to rush in and arrest Theresa, but Stottlemeyer stops her and informs her that the disguise isn't enough to prove anything - Randy needs to identify her as Darlene Coolidge if they want to arrest her.

Monk stalls with a long-winded toast, while Stottlemeyer has to drag and carry the injured Randy downstairs and into the reception hall. Just as Monk reaches the end of his invention, and Theresa starts to drag Jonathan out, Stottlemeyer pushes Randy in on a bellman’s dolly, dumping him on the floor. Randy, as predicted, positively identifies her as Darlene Coolidge, the center of two previous homicide investigations.Theresa seizes a knife and holds it to her new husband’s throat, demanding that “Dad” get his private jet ready for her. Natalie steps in and seizes the knife, subduing Theresa.

Later, in her family home, Natalie is idling on the piano in the living room, when her mother takes Mitch’s photo off the wall and places it on the piano with the rest of the family.

Reception
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