Jonathan Creek

Mondays at 8pm

In this mystery series, instead of "who dunnit," the question more often is "how he dunnit." Jonathon Creek ran from 1997-2004 and won the BAFTA Best TV Drama award in 1998. But the series bleeds over into comedy, thanks in part due to star Alan Davies's experience as a standup comic; the series was twice nominated for a the British Comedy Award.

Davies plays Jonathan Creek, a retiring, 30-something, mop-headed illusionist — that means the guy who creates tricks for a magician, in this case his foil, a sleazy womanizer. Jonathan leads a quasi-bohemian lifestyle, lives in a lighthouse, always wears a trademark duffle coat and deploys his genius to solve "locked room mysteries" — solving the puzzles of seemingly impossible crimes from which the perp seems to have magically vanished. And the clues? Oh, a piece of gum, a drawer full of socks, a torn fingernail, a spam sandwich — that sort of thing. The situations that punctuate the storylines are remarkable: Accusations of unnatural relations with a kipper, disfigured prostitutes, miraculous hair growth, alien skeletons, 30-year-old virgins, a torrid affair between a man and his niece, yada yada yada.

For the first three seasons, Jonathan's partner is Maddy Magellan, an investigative journalist with a penchant for lying her way into any crime scene. He's a nerd and she's an ordinary-looking woman, and their great chemistry makes you wonder what sort of sleuthing they'd get up to between the sheets. In the fourth season, Maddy goes off on a book tour to the U.S. and is replaced by Carla, a theatrical agent. (But don't think for a moment that Maddy and Carla are the only ones who succumb to Jonathan's nerd charms.) Check out Wikipedia'sepisode synopses for more tidbits.

What else have cast members done? Find out with the Internet Movie Database:

Alan Davies' big break for a dramatic role was with Jonathan Creek, but he's just as well known for stand up comedy. Davies was a regular guest on a comedy quiz show called Quite Interesting hosted by comedian Stephen Fry.
In addition to her roles on Jonathan Creek and numerous television series, Caroline Quentin (Maddy Magellan) also played Dorothy on Men Behaving Badly.
And what is so familiar about Julia Sawalha If you're a fan of Absolutely Fabulous, you might remember her as Edina's incredibly uptight, nerdy daughter and Patsy's arch enemy, Saffy.