Mr. Monk Goes to a Fashion Show

The murderer in this episode, fashion designer Simon Hodge, is a hybrid of the obsessed character Roy Scheider plays in "All That Jazz" and real-life designer, Isaac Mizrahi.

I also borrowed some of Hodge's view of women as disposable objects from James Bond villain, Francisco Scaramanga ("Man With the Golden Gun"). Ian Fleming gave Scaramanga three nipples, which would have been an interesting situation for Monk to be confronted with, but I couldn't figure out a way to work it into my script.

Television is probably better for it.

I know next to nothing about the world of design, so for research I read a lot of fashion magazines. "W" has great photography and is very strong on gossip. This year's fashion issue of "New York Magazine" was also good reading. It had lots of real-life stories about neurotic fashion perfectionists I knew nothing about, like Marc Jacobs and Roland Mouret and the downtown fashion collective, As Four. They're all deadly serious about their craft and I'm sure a little bit of each of them worked its way into Hodge's DNA.

"Vogue" was my favorite of the fashion monthlies. It's incredibly readable and, just like Lieutenant Disher, I thought its movie, food and travel columns were terrific.

But that's where my similarity with Disher stops. The lieutenant is, and always will be, better dressed than me. It's one of those things I'll just have learn to live with.

I also got the chance to research techniques of DNA evidence retrieval, how a clothing inspector performs his job and how many sleeping pills it takes to kill a 115-pound woman. As Hodge instinctively knew, the job is much easier if you wash them down with vodka.