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00:00:00Hey, I think we're in the army.
00:00:17The thing that I loved about M.A.S.H. is that it could be very funny and very serious at
00:00:24the same time.
00:00:25Boy, you really are a sicko, mental.
00:00:28Just because I spend most of my waking hours fixing up small wounds so they can go back
00:00:31and get bigger and better wounds, you think I'm mental?
00:00:33Another thing I loved was we could work in every conceivable style.
00:00:37Bully!
00:00:38Burlesque, drama, melodrama, satire, and sometimes all at once, sometimes all in the same episode.
00:00:47Henry, you're not going to endorse this idiot's application, are you?
00:00:50That's major to you, Captain.
00:00:52Henry, you're not going to endorse this major idiot's application, are you?
00:00:55They said there weren't going to be any more casualties.
00:00:58Frank, if I were you, I'd sue North Korea for every penny they've got.
00:01:02You were dealing with the insanity of war.
00:01:05This neighborhood is going to hell.
00:01:08And you had to have a bunch of doctors who created their own insanity so as not to go
00:01:13crazy themselves.
00:01:15Where did you get those costumes?
00:01:17What costumes?
00:01:18The costumes you're wearing.
00:01:20These aren't costumes.
00:01:21We stopped shaving last month.
00:01:23Ah!
00:01:39Henry, get me a driver.
00:01:40Certainly.
00:01:43Count off.
00:01:44One, two.
00:01:45That's about it.
00:01:47Get me the hell out of here.
00:01:50They cared about one thing.
00:01:51They cared about saving lives.
00:01:53Pierce, you did good work.
00:01:55Oh, yeah.
00:01:56Another three or four wars, I'll be sensational.
00:01:58This will be a real test of my leadershipmanship.
00:02:01So?
00:02:05No booze.
00:02:07You always entertain first and deliver the message second, especially if you're doing
00:02:12a show about a real war.
00:02:14War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy.
00:02:18War and Peace?
00:02:19Yeah, well, Tolstoy was very flexible.
00:02:21He went either way.
00:02:22I have to give credit to the writers.
00:02:25I mean, we had great writers on MASH.
00:02:28I'm a communist.
00:02:29An atheistic, Marxist, card-carrying...
00:02:32Bolshevik.
00:02:33No, honest.
00:02:35The writing was good.
00:02:36The acting was good.
00:02:38The producing was good.
00:02:39The directing was good.
00:02:41Where can you go wrong?
00:02:42There's here Eisenhower spending a lot of time playing golf.
00:02:46More fun than playing president.
00:02:47What's his handicap?
00:02:48A lot of people say Nixon.
00:02:50We had become a social phenomenon.
00:02:52I'm damn proud of these.
00:02:54Nobody gave them to me.
00:02:56I earned them.
00:02:58And I'm just as much a major as any other major.
00:03:01As it was happening, we knew.
00:03:05We knew how lucky we were, how blessed.
00:03:09I make a motion that the war be ended.
00:03:11I second the motion.
00:03:12You can't end the war just like that.
00:03:14You've all heard the motion.
00:03:15Those in favor, raise your right hand.
00:03:17Aye.
00:03:18Those opposed.
00:03:19Nay.
00:03:20The ayes have it.
00:03:21Let it be recorded that the war was ended on this date at 9.32 p.m.
00:03:30Here they come.
00:03:32I don't hear nothing.
00:03:33Wait for it.
00:04:15This is the story of indispensable military surgeons.
00:04:19They have the army over a barrel.
00:04:22But do they take advantage of it?
00:04:24Yes.
00:04:26MASH, a motion picture that raises some important moral questions.
00:04:31And then it drops them.
00:04:33I thought the movie was funny.
00:04:35I thought it was terrific.
00:04:37The outrageousness of it.
00:04:39This isn't a hospital.
00:04:41It's an insane asylum.
00:04:45The film is its own thing.
00:04:47We copied the visual style using the same locations, the same sets.
00:04:51But we developed our own personality.
00:04:54Who are you?
00:04:55Captain Benjamin Franklin Pierce.
00:04:57Who are you, Sarge?
00:04:59What do you think this star means?
00:05:02You're Tinkerbell?
00:05:04The one man who is most responsible for the success of MASH is Gene Reynolds.
00:05:10Gene Reynolds brought all of the creative people together.
00:05:14I love seeing Gene at work.
00:05:16First of all, he's a great director.
00:05:18And he's a great producer.
00:05:20Fox asked me to shoot a pilot for MASH.
00:05:25And that was a very exciting invitation.
00:05:28A little hospital where the goal is to save lives.
00:05:32In the middle of a war where the goal is to destroy life.
00:05:36This format is just powerful, overwhelming, touching, funny.
00:05:40Gave us a wonderful opportunity.
00:05:42At this particular mobile army hospital,
00:05:44we're not concerned with the ultimate reconstruction of the patient.
00:05:47We only care about getting the kid out of here alive enough
00:05:49for someone else to put on the fine touches.
00:05:51We try to play par surgery on this course.
00:05:54Par is a live patient.
00:05:56We had an extra ingredient that most shows don't have.
00:05:59We were telling stories about people who really lived.
00:06:03This was Korea, early in July 1950.
00:06:07Among the first to arrive were the medics.
00:06:10Field surgeons, aid men, litter bearers, ambulance drivers.
00:06:14Nurses arrived in a mobile surgical hospital unit on the way to the front.
00:06:19I think we really wanted to respect them
00:06:21and be true to what they had lived through.
00:06:24How long have we been at this?
00:06:26I started surgery in 1932.
00:06:29I mean this session.
00:06:32M.A.S.H. was based on a book by a doctor who had served in Korea.
00:06:37I've seldom had characters handed to me
00:06:40as unique and outstanding as the running characters in M.A.S.H.
00:06:45And so my first challenge was who's going to write this pilot?
00:06:49You know, you can't miss if you've got good material.
00:06:53Larry Gelbart was an absolute genius.
00:06:56His talent and the depths of it.
00:06:58He could be wildly funny, but at the same time he had substance.
00:07:03I used to introduce him as my friend the genius.
00:07:06And he said, don't, don't say that.
00:07:08But he was just the most extraordinary creative force
00:07:12actors could hope to have around.
00:07:14Gene Reynolds asked me if I'd seen a feature film called M.A.S.H.
00:07:18As it happened, I had just seen it the night before.
00:07:20And he said, well, 20th Century Fox has talked with CBS
00:07:24and they'd be interested in financing the writing of a pilot script.
00:07:28Would I be interested?
00:07:29And I said, if we could retain the spirit of the film itself,
00:07:33I'd be very interested.
00:07:36We came up with an original story.
00:07:39We hammered that out in about a week.
00:07:41And I came back to L.A. to build the sets and to cast the show.
00:07:45But I was not receiving the script.
00:07:47Finally I called him and I said, look, we're building the sets,
00:07:51we're ready, we're getting warm here.
00:07:53And he said, how's it coming?
00:07:55And I said, I just mailed it and hung up.
00:07:59And then having said I mailed it, I realized I had to write it.
00:08:02We had talked so much about it and it had been marinating so long.
00:08:05I mean, it sounds boastful to say I wrote it in two days, but I did.
00:08:08Radar!
00:08:09Radar, don't do that.
00:08:11Yes, sir, you want to see me, sir?
00:08:13Yes, but let me say I want to see you before I see you.
00:08:16Mr. Hamilton.
00:08:17Hot lips.
00:08:19Hot lips.
00:08:22Your conduct in there was not only unbecoming an officer,
00:08:25it was equally reprehensible as a medical man.
00:08:28Frank, I happen to be an officer only because I foolishly opened
00:08:31an invitation from President Truman to come to this costume party.
00:08:35And as for my ability as a doctor, if you seriously question that,
00:08:38I'm afraid I'll just have to challenge you to a duel.
00:08:41It was a perfect pilot.
00:08:43Perfect.
00:08:44It was nothing, the best pilot I've ever seen.
00:08:47In the sense you didn't have to change anything.
00:08:49It was all there.
00:08:51We put it on the air.
00:08:53Our scheduling wasn't as good as the show,
00:08:55because the first year we put it on Sunday at 8 o'clock
00:08:58opposite really tough competition.
00:09:00We weren't too thrilled to be there, and of course it was confirmed
00:09:03by the numbers being kind of ordinary.
00:09:08Sir, we do have just a little bit of a problem here.
00:09:12In the course of that first season, and you're down in 50th place,
00:09:17your mind runs to the possibility of cancellation.
00:09:21Pierce, you're in very deep trouble.
00:09:28What do all these people want more than anything else?
00:09:30To go home.
00:09:32What do they really want?
00:09:35Sex.
00:09:38I actually didn't come on with a roar.
00:09:41We had people that liked the show very much,
00:09:44but the numbers didn't respond.
00:09:46I think Freddie Silverman, who was then the head of the network,
00:09:49deserves a lot of credit.
00:09:51It took a good network executive, and a lot of them don't have that,
00:09:54to hang in there. Not easy.
00:09:57In spite of the ratings, it started winning awards,
00:09:59and everybody was so high on it that we picked the show up
00:10:02and moved it to 8.30 Saturday following All in the Family the second year,
00:10:06and immediately was the number two show.
00:10:10We're a hit.
00:10:12We were in heaven because we were doing really, really well,
00:10:15and the show just kept building on itself for 11 years.
00:10:22It was a very entertaining show, which also happened to be about something.
00:10:26I firmly believe that people tuned in
00:10:29because they wanted to be entertained by these people.
00:10:31It's galling to hear officers ridicule command.
00:10:34I'm not an officer.
00:10:36Two guys from the draft board caught me with a big butterfly net.
00:10:39There you go. There's your lounge lizard at war.
00:10:43That hurts.
00:10:49I was in the Utah State Prison when they sent me the script,
00:10:53and it was the best script I'd read while in prison.
00:10:57I was making a movie in this prison, and I got the script,
00:11:01and I was really knocked out by it.
00:11:03Certainly the best pilot I'd ever read.
00:11:05Gee, I was standing around minding my own business,
00:11:07and all of a sudden, poof, a star is born.
00:11:10We tested 6 or 7 actors for that role,
00:11:14and Alan, he was a wonderful actor with great dimension.
00:11:18He could be funny, and he could be sensitive.
00:11:21He just really had every element of it that we could possibly hope for.
00:11:26Does every new nurse fall in love with you here?
00:11:29No, only the ones with taste.
00:11:32Do you think I have any?
00:11:34I don't know. Let me taste you.
00:11:36I was worried that it might be hijinks at the front
00:11:39that the show would slip into.
00:11:41So they reassured me that I didn't have to worry
00:11:44about it turning into McHale's Navy
00:11:46or shows that audiences enjoyed and that were fun,
00:11:49but that didn't deal with the reality of the situation
00:11:53in which the characters found themselves.
00:11:55Our willingness, our experience, our technique are not enough.
00:12:00Guns and bombs and anti-personnel mines
00:12:03have more power to take life than we have to preserve it.
00:12:07Not a very happy ending for a movie, but then no war is a movie.
00:12:12Hawkeye was a super-intelligent, extraordinarily gifted surgeon,
00:12:17an angry man who did not want to be where he was,
00:12:21made no bones about not wanting to be where he was,
00:12:24hated the war, hated authority,
00:12:26held most people above him in contempt.
00:12:29When I got into this war, I had a very clear understanding
00:12:32with the Pentagon, no guns.
00:12:35I'll carry your books, I'll carry a torch, I'll carry a tune,
00:12:39I'll carry on, carry over, carry forward, carry Grant,
00:12:42cash and carry, carry me back to old Virginia.
00:12:45I'll even harry-carry if you show me how, but I will not carry a gun.
00:12:49I think of Hawkeye as a flawed person, much more flawed
00:12:52than people seem to give him credit for.
00:12:55They think of him as a likable doctor of humanitarian,
00:12:59but he was a womanizer, he drank too much,
00:13:02he was way too much of a smart aleck
00:13:04to want to sit next to him for too long at dinner.
00:13:07I just don't know why they're shooting at us.
00:13:09All we want to do is bring them democracy and white bread,
00:13:12transplant the American dream, freedom, achievement,
00:13:15hyperacidity, affluence, flatulence, technology, tension,
00:13:19the inalienable right to an early coronary sitting at your desk
00:13:22while plotting to stab your boss in the back, that's entertainment.
00:13:26I've never worked with an actor before
00:13:28who didn't have to be told how to read a line,
00:13:31or underline a word, or italicize it, or give him the stage direction.
00:13:35It was remarkable.
00:13:36Alan not only brought a great sense of humor to the character
00:13:40and an intelligence to the character,
00:13:42he brought the joie de vivre, the life of the show.
00:13:47Why don't I trust you guys?
00:13:49Because we're not trustworthy.
00:13:55Trapper would walk in anywhere
00:13:57and you knew he was looking for trouble.
00:14:00They're both impossible!
00:14:01You stay out of this, Hot Lips,
00:14:03or I'll stop selling tickets to your shower day.
00:14:07There was that air about him.
00:14:09Okay, what can I do here to upset the apple cart?
00:14:13I'm taking 10 minutes.
00:14:15I'm on 10 minutes.
00:14:17Between us, we got 20 minutes. Let's go.
00:14:27Wayne and I got very close very fast.
00:14:29I've never had a martini that way, may I?
00:14:31Oh, please.
00:14:33Goes great with a soap chaser.
00:14:35We both realized that this relationship
00:14:38had to be a warm, close, real relationship.
00:14:41What could they do, send us to the front?
00:14:43We're at the front. Maybe they'll put us in front of the front.
00:14:46They enjoyed one another's company,
00:14:48both on screen and in real life.
00:14:51That was a chemistry that came through.
00:14:53I think the audience perceived that underneath all of this,
00:14:57that these are two people who genuinely liked each other.
00:15:00If we didn't, it wouldn't have worked.
00:15:02Forget it.
00:15:04I was too impressed to have you arrest me.
00:15:08We did it again. Screwed up in reverse.
00:15:11I keep telling you, we got to give up this preoccupation
00:15:13with keeping people alive, or we'll never get out of here.
00:15:16It's no use. We're doomed.
00:15:18Maybe we should start using rusty instruments.
00:15:20Stop washing our hands.
00:15:22Raise our prices.
00:15:23We would go to the dailies and look at a scene
00:15:26that we had already shot.
00:15:28It was in the can, gone.
00:15:30Nothing you can do about it.
00:15:32And we would go back and do that scene again.
00:15:35If I'd done this instead of that,
00:15:37or if you'd done this instead of that,
00:15:39it might have gone this way instead of that way.
00:15:41That was a constant massaging of trying to make it better.
00:15:45We were always trying to make it as good as we could.
00:15:49Ahem.
00:15:59Ahem.
00:16:04And this is the OR, which, of course, we use as an operating room.
00:16:07This war is getting very popular.
00:16:09Every half hour, another tour.
00:16:11Raider, on your way out, drop these by the gift shop, will you?
00:16:13These guys love to get you.
00:16:15All right, Corporal, I'll take over from here.
00:16:17Uh, if you like me, I can show her the ropes myself.
00:16:21But who's going to show you?
00:16:23He doesn't mean it.
00:16:24Get out.
00:16:25But she does.
00:16:26You had these sophisticated doctors
00:16:28in this horrible war experience.
00:16:33A void was there.
00:16:37What are you doing here?
00:16:39I was drafted, sir.
00:16:42Radar, we used Gary Berghoff,
00:16:46who had been wonderful in the film,
00:16:49and Gary was a very talented young actor that I knew of,
00:16:53and of course, he had established himself already in the part.
00:16:57Why, uh, Radar?
00:16:59Uh, sometimes I can tell what's going to happen
00:17:03before it happens.
00:17:04Is that so?
00:17:05Yes, sir.
00:17:06The officer's latrine is to the right, sir.
00:17:08Thank you.
00:17:09You're welcome.
00:17:11You needed a character that was from a reflectionary perspective,
00:17:16like a little kid.
00:17:18You, uh, always sleep with a teddy bear?
00:17:23Well, not when I'm on duty, sir.
00:17:26You needed a character where the experience of war
00:17:31registered on their face for the first time.
00:17:35They've already knocked out one of our generators.
00:17:38They smashed our water tank, and we got three people wounded.
00:17:42Well, listen, if you don't believe me,
00:17:45listen for yourself.
00:17:52Did you? Did you?
00:17:54Hello? Hello?
00:17:57Gary did it brilliantly.
00:17:59He was the, the, always the 19-year-old virgin.
00:18:04What do you want to be?
00:18:07A hot lover.
00:18:10Or even a cold one, I don't care.
00:18:12Radar was this captivating, naive,
00:18:15who loved being with the big guys.
00:18:18Drink, Radar.
00:18:19Oh, no, no.
00:18:21What's your problem?
00:18:22And keep in mind, we can't work miracles with height.
00:18:25And not sure what to do,
00:18:27except he knew how to do his job beyond the ability of any human being.
00:18:32But at the same time, he was innocent.
00:18:34He didn't know about drinking, he didn't know about women,
00:18:37he didn't understand war.
00:18:39We're under fire, sir!
00:18:40For hell's bells, we're a hospital!
00:18:48It's against the Geneva Convention.
00:18:51I'm not for it either, sir.
00:18:53His boyishness was such a delight.
00:18:55How could you not like Radar O'Reilly?
00:18:58Wow, a citation.
00:19:00I wonder what my mom's going to say.
00:19:02She'll probably say her boy has changed over here.
00:19:04And she'll be right.
00:19:06Yeah, I guess so.
00:19:08You still going to talk to us, now that you're a hero and everything?
00:19:10Oh, sure, I still talk to ordinary people.
00:19:13Radar, I'm going to do something now I've hardly ever done before.
00:19:17You're not going to kiss me, are you?
00:19:27Stay tuned for more MASH.
00:19:29Colonel Blake, you are not listening to me.
00:19:32You'll have to speak up, Frank, I'm not listening to you.
00:19:37I did not hear that, and if it comes to that,
00:19:40I will deny any complicity with or knowledge of
00:19:43that sort of cheap, low, sneaky, underhanded maneuver.
00:19:49Think you can do it?
00:19:52Colonel Blake personified this small-town doctor
00:19:56from Bloomington, Illinois,
00:19:58who should never have been over there
00:20:01and was totally incapable of being a commanding officer.
00:20:05Well, I'm afraid this is what you call your command decision.
00:20:09It's lonely at the top time.
00:20:11Strictly something for your leader.
00:20:16Well, Henry?
00:20:18Oh, golly, whatever you people decide is fine with me.
00:20:23His discomfort and his sense of his own inadequacy
00:20:27was very rich in terms of writing for him
00:20:30because he just had that marvelous bumpkin quality.
00:20:35This month's topic is marital sex and the family.
00:20:39Louder, Henry.
00:20:41And the family.
00:20:43The first part.
00:20:45Marital sex...
00:20:47Let's hear it for this month's topic!
00:20:52McClain, Stevenson.
00:20:54Oh, what a delight.
00:20:56Yes, sir.
00:20:58McClain was hilarious.
00:21:01At ease, men.
00:21:03Mack had a tremendous sense of comedic timing.
00:21:07Just give me the needle, huh?
00:21:09Edison Mack!
00:21:11Just give me the...
00:21:13Gordon! Mayday! Mayday!
00:21:1699, 98...
00:21:20His genius was in his reactions.
00:21:25He didn't have to make the thing, he just had to react to it.
00:21:29That was his brilliance.
00:21:31Not that there's a lot of pressure or anything like that,
00:21:34it's just that every now and then,
00:21:36say, your least little pressure will build up to the point
00:21:39where there's an incredible amount of pressure around here.
00:21:42Radar! Would you bring in some brandy, please?
00:21:45What was Radar's attitude towards Colonel Black?
00:21:48It was just basically doing the job for him
00:21:51that he knew Colonel Black needed to have done,
00:21:55whether he knew it or not.
00:21:57Blank papers? Yes, sir.
00:21:59Is that a good idea?
00:22:01It's a cut down on your workload.
00:22:03You sign them now, lady, you don't have to borrow.
00:22:06But should I have really signed blank papers?
00:22:08I can't answer that, sir.
00:22:10You're the one that signed them, I didn't.
00:22:12Colonel Black tried to be as officious and military
00:22:15as he possibly could.
00:22:17Radar could see through all of that,
00:22:19saw through him completely.
00:22:21Sir, I've alerted the general's pilot
00:22:23so he's ready to take off at any time.
00:22:25I want you to alert the general's pilot
00:22:27to be ready to take off at any time.
00:22:29He anticipated his every move, his every gesture.
00:22:31Oh, I was hoping to give you a box of your favorite.
00:22:35That was wonderful chemistry between the two of them.
00:22:38Colonel Black? Yes, sir.
00:22:41The timing was very important, and we learned...
00:22:45And we learned to augment each other's timing too.
00:22:48There's something inherently funny about 2 people
00:22:51talking almost about the same thing at the same time.
00:22:54Very, very good.
00:22:56I took all the golf clubs and I hid them,
00:22:59and then I sewed up the hole in the nurse's tent.
00:23:02It gave you great insight into his character,
00:23:04that he could anticipate what I was going to say.
00:23:07It also gave great insight into my character
00:23:09in that I wasn't listening to what anybody said.
00:23:12I was going to play a racking game,
00:23:14started with slot A and used washers 1, 2, 3.
00:23:17Tied her up, picked up the spits,
00:23:19and we got our own barbecue.
00:23:21You know, it was, you know, we just, we loved it.
00:23:25So long, Radar. I'll hold down the fort.
00:23:27Down the fort.
00:23:31The, uh, men detest me, don't they?
00:23:34Oh, no, sir.
00:23:36You can tell the truth, they hate me, don't they?
00:23:39Just your guts, sir.
00:23:43Frank Burns, tough part to play,
00:23:46because he was a villain, but he was a funny villain.
00:23:49That's the last tray you're going to upset, soldier.
00:23:52There's a war on, and we've no time for violence.
00:23:55Mm-hmm, he's an amalgam of basically
00:23:59every irritating putz I've ever known.
00:24:03We're all in this together with a common goal,
00:24:06to serve our country and repel the godless horde
00:24:08from the north that would engulf our way of life.
00:24:11Frank, he's okay, but you're making me sick.
00:24:15Godless horde.
00:24:18Oh, nerds to you.
00:24:21I designed the ultimate hypocrite,
00:24:23in kind of a way a guileless hypocrite,
00:24:25because he doesn't know that he is one.
00:24:27He's just trying like hell all the time,
00:24:30and he's, like, constantly wrong,
00:24:33but he doesn't know that.
00:24:35They're not going to like this.
00:24:37I didn't come here to be liked.
00:24:39You certainly came to the right place.
00:24:41Larry Linville had such a tough job on the show
00:24:45because that character was such an extreme character.
00:24:50I'll teach those dirty little enlisted rats to love me.
00:24:54It's amazing how he was able to fill it with humanity,
00:24:58because if there was a wrong position to take,
00:25:01that character took it.
00:25:03Army standard triage procedure is as follows.
00:25:06American wounded, first.
00:25:07Allies, second.
00:25:08Enemy, last.
00:25:09Repeat, last.
00:25:10Frank, that man is bleeding more than anybody in here,
00:25:13with the possible exception of your nose
00:25:15if you don't get out of my way.
00:25:16And he was tough on everybody,
00:25:19totally blind to how he offended people,
00:25:22how rough he was on Margaret.
00:25:24Take your face and...
00:25:26your married face and get out.
00:25:29A Beck plays ear, Miss Snake in the Grass.
00:25:32You should talk, you two-timing four-flesher!
00:25:38Frank.
00:25:41They saw this gem of an actor who can do this,
00:25:45so they kept feeding him those things.
00:25:48No, no, no, no, no, no, no!
00:25:49It's not fair, it's not fair, it's not fair!
00:25:51It's my magic, it's mine, it's mine, it's mine!
00:25:54I know, darling, there, there.
00:25:57Oh, I already wrote, Mommy.
00:26:00Oh, your mother will understand.
00:26:02I mean, my wife.
00:26:06Buzz off!
00:26:08And for Loretta to have to play opposite this,
00:26:11to think that she's in love with this character,
00:26:15now that's hectic, that's hectic.
00:26:19What date?
00:26:20I had no date with Major Burns.
00:26:23We're just acquaintances.
00:26:25Oh, we run into each other once in a while.
00:26:29Well, he can't run into you tonight.
00:26:37Oh, Loretta was absolutely fantastic.
00:26:39She brought so many different colors to that character.
00:26:42She could be very serious,
00:26:43and then she could be funny being serious.
00:26:45Colonel, colonel, come back in here, please!
00:26:47What is it, Major?
00:26:48It's Donald, he's hurt himself
00:26:49by hurting and doing a rope climb on the obstacle course.
00:26:52Donald, you're always training so hard.
00:26:54Colonel, request permission to go to him, please.
00:26:56We're very busy, Major.
00:26:57But he doesn't hurt you!
00:26:59He needs you here.
00:27:00He won't let me go, it's a stupid war!
00:27:02Hot Lips is a wonderful character
00:27:04because the character is unique.
00:27:06The woman has to have strength and courage
00:27:09and resolution and so forth to be an officer.
00:27:12But she's a woman, and she has femininity,
00:27:15and she has impulses.
00:27:16They want to keep us apart because we're symbols
00:27:20of what a decent man and woman can mean to each other.
00:27:25Without the tawdryness
00:27:26that fills their sordid little affairs.
00:27:29Yes, yes.
00:27:30Take one step closer and I'll bite your chest
00:27:33right through your shirt.
00:27:35Larry Linville and I were a joke,
00:27:38and I felt after the first,
00:27:42maybe even half of the second season,
00:27:45it was wearing thin.
00:27:47Oh, Frank, you're so above average.
00:27:51It started to be awkward.
00:27:53Why would this gal,
00:27:54with so much going for her, so much brights
00:27:58and so much integrity,
00:28:00hook up with not only a married man,
00:28:02okay, she's lonely, there's nobody else or whatever,
00:28:06but a nincompoop.
00:28:07Listen, I was sound asleep,
00:28:09and suddenly there's all these wounded!
00:28:11It's nearly midnight,
00:28:12why can't they fight from 9 to 6?
00:28:14Maybe the next war, Frank, maybe the next.
00:28:17The best description I can give you of Loretta
00:28:20is the fact that Hot Lips became Margaret.
00:28:23There were times I had to fight
00:28:24for the integrity of the character,
00:28:26there's no question about that.
00:28:28I'm in control, and I'm going as far
00:28:31in this man's army as any woman can go!
00:28:34One of the things I loved that Loretta did
00:28:36was she was relentless in wanting to make sure
00:28:39that the character of Margaret was a real woman
00:28:42and not a one-note joke.
00:28:44What do you suppose I am deep down?
00:28:46Deep, deep down? A woman.
00:28:48Go a little deeper.
00:28:50A major. I'm me.
00:28:53Sometimes a nurse, sometimes a major,
00:28:56sometimes a woman in love,
00:28:58sometimes all three at once.
00:29:00Sounds like it's crowded in there.
00:29:02And sometimes it's lonely in there.
00:29:04The maturation of her character,
00:29:06both from her perspective and from the perspective
00:29:09of the producers and writers of the show,
00:29:12was a tribute to Loretta.
00:29:14She wanted to be taken seriously as an actress
00:29:17as well as a character.
00:29:19Can you imagine what it feels like
00:29:22to walk by this tent and hear you laughing
00:29:26and know I'm not welcome?
00:29:30Did you ever once ever offer me
00:29:33a lousy cup of coffee?
00:29:36We didn't think you'd accept.
00:29:40Well, you were wrong.
00:29:47Ah, yes. MASH proving once again
00:29:50all's fair in love and war.
00:29:53Hey, soldier.
00:29:56You forgot your purse.
00:30:03Halt!
00:30:06Friend or foe?
00:30:08I am General Barker.
00:30:10How do I know you're not one of them
00:30:12with a clever makeup job?
00:30:14Corporal Klinger, isn't it?
00:30:16Ah!
00:30:22Okay, he's here. Let's have it.
00:30:24What's wrong with Klinger?
00:30:30What's wrong with Klinger?
00:30:33The premise of Klinger's existence was that his M.O.
00:30:37was that he wanted to get out of the Army
00:30:40on a Section 8, that he was nuts.
00:30:42Everybody know Klinger?
00:30:44Major Friedman?
00:30:45Ah, the psychiatrist.
00:30:47Still trying to get out wearing dresses, Klinger.
00:30:50Earrings with a sweater?
00:30:52Larry wrote this character, and the moment I saw it,
00:30:55I said, oh, that's beautiful, and I said,
00:30:57I got the guy for it, Jamie Farr.
00:30:59Jamie Farr has these skinny, bony legs,
00:31:02and he's got a large nose.
00:31:04He's a natural comedian,
00:31:05a wonderful comedian.
00:31:07He'd be great dressed as a woman.
00:31:09He's the guy.
00:31:10I'm Section 8, head to toe.
00:31:12I'm wearing a Warner bra.
00:31:13I play with dolls.
00:31:14My last wish is to be buried in my mother's wedding gown.
00:31:17I'm nuts.
00:31:18I should be out.
00:31:21Horse hockey.
00:31:23He was the court jester of the camp,
00:31:26and they certainly needed that.
00:31:29I love your gloves, Klinger.
00:31:31Sears catalog.
00:31:32They were having a white sale.
00:31:33You trace your hands on a piece of paper
00:31:35to give them your right size.
00:31:36However, if you want the black ones,
00:31:38which aren't on the white sale,
00:31:39you really don't care, do you?
00:31:40It was at best a sitcom character,
00:31:42and he pranced and danced and did all this silly stuff
00:31:45with the dresses and the hats and everything.
00:31:47But beneath it all, I want to go home.
00:31:49I don't want to be here.
00:31:50This is crazy being here.
00:31:51People are shooting at you.
00:31:52You know, for me, that justified it all.
00:31:56How did he try it this time?
00:31:57Pretending to be a business girl.
00:32:00Klinger, Klinger, where did your mother and I go wrong?
00:32:05Jamie was wonderful.
00:32:07He had so much humanity
00:32:09that would come up
00:32:11through the hijinks that he was doing.
00:32:15Another week in command,
00:32:16and I'd have had you out of that dress.
00:32:18I'm not that easy.
00:32:20laughter
00:32:23And I loved the way he did it,
00:32:26over the top quite often,
00:32:28but with such energy, such joy,
00:32:31that I just kind of had to laugh and say,
00:32:34oh, God, Jamie.
00:32:36Sir, you've got to let me go, sir.
00:32:38I just have to get married.
00:32:39You're not pregnant, are you?
00:32:41Don't be ridiculous, sir.
00:32:42Me?
00:32:43You're the one who looks like
00:32:44he just blew out a gun with a wind.
00:32:46There wasn't a character like Klinger on any show ever.
00:32:49It was an original character, as I say to people,
00:32:52because every time a man always put on a dress,
00:32:55it was as a disguise, but no one put on a dress
00:32:58and then played it straight.
00:33:00What are you doing?
00:33:03Can't a guy have a washing set
00:33:05without somebody biting him on the neck?
00:33:07Biting who?
00:33:08I was biting you.
00:33:09No, you weren't, you were biting me.
00:33:11Klinger, what are you doing in here?
00:33:13Just borrowing a little of your shampoo, Major.
00:33:15It's wartime, we all got to help each other.
00:33:17No, we don't!
00:33:18You get out of here, you pervert!
00:33:20Pervert?
00:33:21Who bit who, Major?
00:33:24My mother said, oh, Jamie's my favorite.
00:33:27I said, you mean next to me, of course,
00:33:30and she said, no, Jamie's my favorite.
00:33:32Thank you, Mother.
00:33:33Thanks, very nice.
00:33:34Disgusting!
00:33:35You have your nerve wearing white.
00:33:38Jealous.
00:33:39I hated that character, I hated it,
00:33:43until, until later on,
00:33:45when it became more than a one-joke character.
00:33:49With Klinger, we played out the dresses
00:33:52in the Section 8 for longer than was needed.
00:33:55It was easy for us to shake up Klinger's
00:33:58areas of responsibility
00:33:59and Klinger's whole attitude toward the war.
00:34:02I didn't want to lose, as he said,
00:34:04the Klinger spirit, but at the same time,
00:34:07I wanted to make it somewhat different.
00:34:10I know it's 6 in the morning, Lieutenant,
00:34:12but I've got to talk to General MacArthur.
00:34:14Just tell him Max Klinger's on the phone.
00:34:17Yeah, he knows me,
00:34:18I've been sending him love letters for a year.
00:34:21Hello? Hello?
00:34:23See if he gets my vote for dictator.
00:34:28Um, Tate, are you all right?
00:34:30Just out of breath, I ran from chapel.
00:34:33Happily, you ran for nothing,
00:34:35but I bring no last rites today.
00:34:37Oh, thank heaven.
00:34:39Uh, could I show you something in a get-well prayer?
00:34:46Bill Christopher is a totally unique human being
00:34:50with a totally unique sense of humor,
00:34:53a totally unique approach to acting,
00:34:56and a totally unique approach to life.
00:34:59We thank thee for guiding us safely to this place
00:35:02and ask thy blessing that we may continue to heal
00:35:05and do thy work and for a speedy end to this war.
00:35:09I mean, uh, police action.
00:35:11Uh, well, you know what I mean, Lord.
00:35:15Amen.
00:35:16Well, Bill, I've heard Bill say that he thought
00:35:19Nash was a series about a priest in Korea.
00:35:22I think he really believes it.
00:35:26Terribly sorry, Padre.
00:35:28That's all right, General.
00:35:30I'll just turn the other cheek.
00:35:32He played the character so honestly and wholeheartedly.
00:35:36Given our circumstances, the best of us can behave
00:35:40in erratic and irresponsible ways.
00:35:42That note that he was playing was,
00:35:45these are my children and my friends,
00:35:48and, um, they're not perfect,
00:35:50but that's what makes them interesting.
00:35:52Having heard about the callous prank
00:35:54you played on poor Major Winchester,
00:35:57I choose not to speak to you.
00:35:59For if I did, I would tell you
00:36:01you are a goon and a block-headed bozo!
00:36:05This is a man of God.
00:36:07I'm above name-calling on.
00:36:09Good day.
00:36:10He's a man who's out of his depth,
00:36:13uh, a lot of the time.
00:36:15I think Mulcahy felt that he had something to perform
00:36:18that was very special, but he does fumble occasionally.
00:36:22My friends, the Lord said this to Aaron,
00:36:26after the passing away of his beloved sons,
00:36:30Nadiv and Abihu.
00:36:33laughter
00:36:39It's rather warm in here.
00:36:41Some other individual might be able to do it better,
00:36:45but it's, he's the only one, he's the one they got,
00:36:48and he's, uh, he's willing to put himself on the line
00:36:51and just do his best.
00:36:53I have to say a prayer first.
00:36:55Make it a damn short one!
00:36:57I can't think of any.
00:36:59Oh, my God.
00:37:00Bless us, O Lord, and these thy gifts,
00:37:02which you are about to receive
00:37:03in thy bounty through Christ our Lord.
00:37:05Amen.
00:37:06That's grace!
00:37:08He just had a resilience that Bill captured perfectly
00:37:12of no matter how dark the moment,
00:37:15how, how difficult the situation,
00:37:17it was all gonna work out,
00:37:19and nothing was gonna defeat him
00:37:21because he had faith,
00:37:23literally and figuratively.
00:37:25You're going to have to believe, whether you believe or not.
00:37:28Fortunately, you've fallen into the hands
00:37:30of the best medical unit in Korea.
00:37:33I swear it.
00:37:34Just have a little faith in these doctors.
00:37:37Just a little.
00:37:39Try, okay?
00:37:40He was exactly the man that we needed in that circumstance
00:37:44with these kids who were wounded
00:37:46and with these doctors who were crazy
00:37:48and with his nurses who were angry and frustrated.
00:37:52He was like an island of both innocence and empathy.
00:37:57Great, great, sweet, kind empathy.
00:38:00Listen to me, B.J.
00:38:02I try to stay out of the way
00:38:03because what you people do here is so important.
00:38:06But understand, at a time like this,
00:38:08what I have to do is just as important.
00:38:11And no one, not you nor anyone else,
00:38:13is going to stand between me
00:38:15and the performance of my sacred office.
00:38:19I'm sorry, Father.
00:38:22This wasn't just going to be a comedy
00:38:25with a real war as a backdrop.
00:38:28They were going to show that horror.
00:38:32Pierce, are you scared?
00:38:34Don't be silly. I'm too frightened to be scared.
00:38:41Take it easy, kid. I'm a doctor.
00:38:44But I need Dr. Pierce.
00:38:46He's the only one who can help me.
00:38:48I'm Pierce. What's the problem?
00:38:50You're my problem. I think I love you.
00:38:53I think in terms of a show finding itself, it takes a while.
00:38:58And there were a few watershed moments along the way.
00:39:03I remember an episode called Sometimes You Hear the Bullet
00:39:07in which an old friend of Hawkeye's,
00:39:09they knew each other back in the States.
00:39:11They'd been pals.
00:39:12And he comes there as a freelance journalist.
00:39:15Listen, what I don't understand is what a guy like you
00:39:18with your background is doing here in the infantry.
00:39:21Why aren't you a correspondent or something?
00:39:23Look, if I was a correspondent, I'd be reporting the war.
00:39:26In the infantry, I'm living it.
00:39:28So what's the difference?
00:39:30Here.
00:39:32Here's the difference.
00:39:34You never hear the bullet. Is that a book?
00:39:37Yeah, it's about the war.
00:39:39And it's being written by a soldier, not a correspondent.
00:39:43That was the first real dramedy episode that we did.
00:39:48Attention, all personnel, all medical personnel.
00:39:50That's what I'm talking about.
00:39:52A whole regiment took it in the teeth a while ago.
00:39:54It's going to be a long night. Come on.
00:40:04And it was a departure. It was, it took guts.
00:40:08I heard the bullet coming.
00:40:14It's like in the movies.
00:40:18So you'll change the title of the book, that's all.
00:40:21Sometimes you hear the bullet. It's a better title anyway.
00:40:24Well, that was a very important show.
00:40:27It was the first time we really dealt with the doctors
00:40:31being touched and moved and not themselves again
00:40:36after a surgery, instead of just walking on saying,
00:40:39let's have a drink.
00:40:40Give me some retraction and suction.
00:40:42Father Mulcahy, I can't get a crush in.
00:40:47I've lost the pulse.
00:40:49I'm going to open the chest. Give me a knife.
00:40:53I said give me a knife.
00:40:55Pierce, go help McIntyre.
00:41:00It was the first time we killed a character who wasn't an extra,
00:41:06who most importantly was somebody that Hawkeye knew
00:41:10and that Hawkeye had great affection for
00:41:13and that Hawkeye then had an enormous reaction upon his death.
00:41:18I mean, I know why I'm crying now.
00:41:20Tommy was my friend and I watched him die and now I'm crying.
00:41:25I've watched guys die almost every day.
00:41:27Why didn't I ever cry for them?
00:41:29Because you're a doctor.
00:41:32What the hell does that mean?
00:41:34I don't know.
00:41:36If I had the answer, I'd be at the Mayo Clinic.
00:41:39Does this place look like the Mayo Clinic?
00:41:42Look, all I know is what they taught me at command school.
00:41:45There are certain rules about a war.
00:41:48There are certain rules about a war.
00:41:51There are certain rules about a war.
00:41:54And rule number one is young men die.
00:41:57And rule number two is doctors can't change rule number one.
00:42:03An executive from CBS said,
00:42:06let me tell you how you've ruined this show.
00:42:09You've ruined MASH because you can't kill people
00:42:13or you can't have serious stuff this serious
00:42:16and expect to stay on the air.
00:42:19We got certain negative comments about the show isn't as funny
00:42:22and it's gotten more serious,
00:42:24but then there were other people who did like it
00:42:27and the ratings kept going up.
00:42:29And that was really important in allowing us to realize
00:42:32that, wow, we can do serious stuff here, really serious stuff.
00:42:36Everybody knows war is hell.
00:42:38War isn't hell. War is war and hell is hell.
00:42:41And of the two, war is a lot worse.
00:42:43How do you figure that, Hawkeye?
00:42:45Easy, Father. Tell me, who goes to hell?
00:42:48Sinners, I believe.
00:42:50Exactly. There are no innocent bystanders in hell.
00:42:53But war is chock full of them.
00:42:55It was against war.
00:42:57It didn't matter whether it was World War I, II, III, IV, V
00:43:00or Vietnam or, you know, Afghanistan or anything.
00:43:04War is a terrible thing. People are getting killed.
00:43:07This sort of action is contagious.
00:43:09One man decides he's not going to fight, it catches on.
00:43:12Next thing, you know what you've got on your hands, peace.
00:43:15Some of us had been in the military in any way, shape or form.
00:43:18Some of us had been in the military.
00:43:20But I think all of what we did on MASH was say, war makes no sense.
00:43:25This killing, this bleeding, this horror,
00:43:28this maiming of human beings must stop.
00:43:31Hey, she's just a little kid.
00:43:33Eight years old.
00:43:35I got a granddaughter back home who was about eight.
00:43:37What happened to her?
00:43:39Somebody dropped a bomb on her village from an airplane.
00:43:41Who did it?
00:43:43Somebody dropped it, he didn't autograph it.
00:43:45No, I mean, was it one of theirs or one of ours?
00:43:47What difference does that make?
00:43:49A lot, it makes a lot of difference.
00:43:51Not to her.
00:43:53When the series went on the air in 1972,
00:43:55we were of course heavily involved in Vietnam,
00:43:57and this country was, you know, woefully short of heroes,
00:44:00and the medical people on the show
00:44:03represented that missing component.
00:44:06If you ask me, you guys are like Superman.
00:44:09You're all set.
00:44:13guitar plays softly
00:44:32Good night, Superman.
00:44:37I had gotten too big for my britches, I think.
00:44:40You could do anything with that show,
00:44:42and they did do anything.
00:44:44I was shocked.
00:44:46I got good news, honey.
00:44:48I'm coming home.
00:44:50Honest, for good.
00:44:56Colonel?
00:44:58Do you know what I found in this morning's mail?
00:45:00Ah, now that's a tough one.
00:45:02Now hum a few bars, will you, Radar?
00:45:05You're going home.
00:45:07I'm going home?
00:45:09You got all your points, they're discharging you.
00:45:11McLean Stevenson was wonderful as Colonel Blake,
00:45:14but he began getting restless
00:45:16and expressing the desire that maybe he wanted to move on.
00:45:19People were whispering in his ear,
00:45:21you can have your own show.
00:45:23But they didn't say, but you won't have Larry Gelbart.
00:45:26You won't have the cast around you, you won't have Radar,
00:45:29you won't have all these people around you,
00:45:31you won't have the same situation.
00:45:33There were a number of things that went into that.
00:45:36I had gotten too big for my britches, I think.
00:45:38I've never admitted that.
00:45:40I'm talking now to hopefully millions of people.
00:45:44Henry, we're giving you this party.
00:45:47You know why?
00:45:49Because I'm going home.
00:45:51Wrong.
00:45:53Because you're one hell of a human being.
00:45:55The thing I didn't realize
00:45:58was that people
00:46:02really didn't give two hoots in hell
00:46:06about McLean Stevenson.
00:46:08They loved Henry Blake.
00:46:10I got good news, honey.
00:46:12I'm coming home.
00:46:14Honest, for good.
00:46:16Yeah, the orders just came through this morning.
00:46:19I ought to be coming through the front door
00:46:21in about 3 days.
00:46:23I don't know what you've heard about this, but I was there.
00:46:26This was a show where McLean's character was leaving.
00:46:30It was also the last show of our season.
00:46:33A lot of mash has faded a little.
00:46:36I can't tell you the plots,
00:46:38but I can tell you to describe that day.
00:46:40Bless you, Henry Blake.
00:46:42Your work here will never be forgotten.
00:46:45Thank you, Father.
00:46:47So long, Henry. Good trip.
00:46:54When I looked at him, I saw radar,
00:46:57but I knew I was saying goodbye to Gary Burghoff.
00:47:00All that relationship that he and I had together
00:47:03that was so special to us,
00:47:05all the work that we did, we did together.
00:47:11Behave yourself, or I'm going to come back and kick your butt.
00:47:22Mac and I were finished, and we were leaving the set,
00:47:26walking out the door to our dressing rooms.
00:47:29As we approached the door,
00:47:31Larry Gilbert and Gene Reynolds were walking in
00:47:35And so I had this manila envelope
00:47:38with the last page in it that they'd ever seen,
00:47:41and I gave them each a copy, and they looked at it,
00:47:45and they were really, it's not often in your life
00:47:48that you see people stunned,
00:47:51and they really could not believe what was on the page.
00:47:55I was shocked.
00:47:57I didn't say anything.
00:48:00And I remember...
00:48:06Alan sort of asking why,
00:48:10and Larry answering the question.
00:48:13Well, to us, it shows the futility of war.
00:48:22Radar, put a mask on.
00:48:24If that's my discharge, give it to me straight. I can take it.
00:48:28I have a message.
00:48:34Lieutenant Colonel Henry Blake's plane
00:48:40was shot down over the Sea of Japan.
00:48:46It spun in.
00:48:51There were no survivors.
00:48:59Ah!
00:49:01Ah!
00:49:24This was a leading character that everybody loved,
00:49:28and they killed him.
00:49:30The reason we kept it a secret
00:49:32was to keep the actors from being influenced by that information.
00:49:36If they started to film the show
00:49:38knowing that Henry was a dead man by the end of the episode,
00:49:41their performances would have been quite different.
00:49:43Good as they are, you can't help it,
00:49:45because they would have been dealing with their emotions as people,
00:49:48as co-workers of McLean Stevenson.
00:49:50I could cry now. It was, um...
00:49:53It was devastating to us.
00:49:56On thinking about it,
00:49:58I think it showed how good a show we really had.
00:50:02We could do things that were so believable
00:50:08that we could emotionally affect
00:50:12even ourselves.
00:50:14I think it was a very grown-up thing to do, a very sensible thing.
00:50:17We had hundreds of letters from viewers saying,
00:50:19you tricked us, you sucked us in, we thought this was a comedy show,
00:50:22how dare you toy with our feelings.
00:50:24All those letters are in the Smithsonian Institute.
00:50:27And I'm very proud of that show.
00:50:31May I tell you the greatest compliment I ever heard for the show?
00:50:35I'm going into a restaurant,
00:50:37and a man approached me in the parking lot.
00:50:39He said, Mr. Berghoff, may I speak to you for a moment?
00:50:42I said, sure.
00:50:44He said, I was in the trenches in Korea.
00:50:47And he said, when I came back home, I was changed.
00:50:53And my wife knew that I needed to talk about it,
00:50:57and I couldn't bring myself to talk about it.
00:51:01And he said, when your show came on the air,
00:51:05it was the first time that I could reach over
00:51:08and touch her on the arm and say,
00:51:11see, honey, that's the way it was.
00:51:17We always tried to tie the entertainment value
00:51:21into the reality as much as we possibly could
00:51:24in our small way.
00:51:29See ya!
00:51:34I had this terrible thought
00:51:36that if MASH fails in its fourth season,
00:51:39I'm going to wear it around my neck for the rest of my life.
00:51:43And oh, my God!
00:51:45Can I have my pillow back?
00:51:47No.
00:51:52Are you kidding?
00:51:54Hey, would I kid you?
00:51:56Why didn't you think of it before we left home?
00:52:08When the series first started,
00:52:10it was with the assumption that Trapper John
00:52:13and Hawkeye would be equals.
00:52:15And over the course of time,
00:52:17it didn't seem to work out quite that way.
00:52:20The series kind of slanted more toward Hawkeye,
00:52:23so ultimately, Wayne decided that he wanted to leave.
00:52:27What's a scam?
00:52:29Just about to draw straws to see who's out and defuses the bomb.
00:52:33Boy, do I know when to come into a room.
00:52:36Because I didn't think I was fulfilling my time.
00:52:40I wasn't being used enough to satisfy what I wanted to do.
00:52:47That may sound a little nuts,
00:52:49and probably as I look back on it, it probably was a little nuts.
00:52:53Thanks, Trent.
00:52:55What?
00:52:57You made it bearable.
00:53:00I was lucky.
00:53:02You were honest and open.
00:53:07You let me lean on you.
00:53:11No charge.
00:53:14We lost McLean Stevenson, we lost Wayne Rogers,
00:53:19and the people who came in, not to replace them,
00:53:23but to add, you know, a new note
00:53:27to this cacophony of sound that we were already making,
00:53:31it just was like adrenaline.
00:53:34Fish, I'm just a little confused.
00:53:37Hawkeye, don't let a little confusion throw you, Captain.
00:53:40One of the first things you learn over here, B.J.,
00:53:43is that insanity is no worse than the common cold.
00:53:46B.J., welcome to Korea.
00:53:52First day, Gary Burghoff walked up, shook my hand,
00:53:56said how glad he was to have me there.
00:54:00Loretta did the same thing.
00:54:02Hi, Margaret, how the heck are you?
00:54:04You jerkface, you louse's mouth!
00:54:06Oh, you're just saying that.
00:54:08It was just like homecoming rather than me being the new guy.
00:54:17So pitch in, muddle through, pip, pip, and a whole schmear.
00:54:21Ours not to reason why, ours not to let him die.
00:54:26In other words, do your job as best you can...
00:54:29You got it.
00:54:33We looked a long time before we found somebody
00:54:36who could share the swamp.
00:54:38Mike was perfect.
00:54:39I'm here to discuss something besides underwear.
00:54:42Make it brief.
00:54:43Oh, that's very bad.
00:54:45Funny, but fast.
00:54:46It's a spiritual problem.
00:54:47Give me a minute and I'll come back as a nun.
00:54:50Careful, Klinger, dressing as a nun can be habit-forming.
00:54:53One of the first rules of making these switches
00:54:57is whatever you do, make it different.
00:54:59Doesn't mean you're going to get an actor who's better
00:55:02or the former actor was not as good.
00:55:04Just make it all as different as you possibly can.
00:55:07You?
00:55:08Me what?
00:55:09Never been unfaithful?
00:55:11To whom?
00:55:12Well, who could you be unfaithful to?
00:55:14Myself or Opener.
00:55:15No, come on, you know what I mean, to your wife.
00:55:17You mean if I ever strayed?
00:55:18Never checked in somewhere without a toothbrush?
00:55:20Never.
00:55:21Never been tempted?
00:55:23Tempted's another subject.
00:55:24Ah, you have been tempted.
00:55:26Never, but it's another subject.
00:55:28Hawkeye could be caustic and he could be sarcastic.
00:55:33I think Mike's character B.J. was gentler,
00:55:37who sometimes brought it down
00:55:39to more of a Norman Rockwell dialogue
00:55:42with his feelings toward his family.
00:55:44So there was contrast, but at the same time, the camaraderie.
00:55:48That must be some awful name you're hiding
00:55:50if you won't even tell your best friend.
00:55:52You're such a nudge.
00:55:53It's nudge.
00:55:54There, I told you something, now you tell me something.
00:55:57No use, I won't budge.
00:55:59Decency, that was the best word for Mike Farrell,
00:56:02I think, is that he had a quality of decency
00:56:04that was just remarkable,
00:56:05that we incorporated from his own personality
00:56:08into the character.
00:56:09At some point, Gene Reynolds came up to me and he said,
00:56:12how would you feel about it if B.J. was tempted?
00:56:15We had a scene where B.J. falls off the Fidelity wagon.
00:56:21And I said, it depends on how you resolve it.
00:56:26And they wrote a show where B.J. and this nurse,
00:56:30she was heartbroken and B.J. tried to console her
00:56:32and pretty soon the consoling her turned into something else.
00:56:36And then B.J. was wracked with guilt.
00:56:38Oh my God, what have I done?
00:56:40I'm miserable.
00:56:42I'm a happily married man, not like Frank Burns is happy
00:56:45because his wife owns real estate.
00:56:48I adore my wife and my kid and my marriage.
00:56:52I know.
00:56:53I don't like being unfaithful.
00:56:55I'm not looking around.
00:56:56I'm lucky to have what I've got.
00:56:58You're right, you are lucky.
00:57:00It was a great exploration of this character
00:57:04and his dedication to his wife
00:57:05and his desire to be faithful to her
00:57:08and his being a human being who screwed up.
00:57:12You were helping somebody and it got out of hand.
00:57:14You made a mistake.
00:57:15I sure did.
00:57:19What's that?
00:57:21I'm writing Peg about it.
00:57:22Wrong, wrong, wrong.
00:57:24Don't be an idiot.
00:57:26You made one lousy goof and you want to punish yourself,
00:57:28but don't punish her.
00:57:30Do not tell Peg.
00:57:32Don't tell anybody what you just told me.
00:57:34This will pass.
00:57:35Like a kidney stone.
00:57:37Simply take a vow.
00:57:39Raise your right hand.
00:57:40Come on, come on.
00:57:42I promise to be a good and faithful husband,
00:57:44to write nice, cheerful letters home,
00:57:46to think of Peg often,
00:57:47and to keep my fat hands off Nurse Donovan.
00:57:49Do you vow?
00:57:51I vow.
00:57:52I feel better about you already.
00:57:53Thanks.
00:57:54When Wayne left and Mike came in,
00:57:56now Mike and I had a similar relationship,
00:57:59although the characters were very different.
00:58:01You don't know me very well, do you?
00:58:03Maybe I know you better than you think I do.
00:58:04Oh, really, oh, you think so?
00:58:05Yeah, I think so.
00:58:06I always had to get the last word in.
00:58:07Yes, that's right.
00:58:08Oh, yeah, I can prove to you right now I don't think.
00:58:09Oh, come on.
00:58:10No, I can't really.
00:58:11Just say something and walk away.
00:58:12All right.
00:58:15I think you're a very competitive person.
00:58:17Fine.
00:58:18You just did it.
00:58:19Did what?
00:58:20Just got in the last word.
00:58:21That doesn't count.
00:58:22Then don't say anything.
00:58:23I knew we needed to develop a friendship, too,
00:58:25and that was very easy.
00:58:26We had a wonderful, joking relationship.
00:58:29Okay.
00:58:30Not another word!
00:58:32No problem.
00:58:33It's no use!
00:58:35Wrong.
00:58:36A lot of the affection between those two characters
00:58:39was what Mike and I felt for each other.
00:58:42You still love me for all my faults?
00:58:44What faults? You're perfect.
00:58:45Just for that, I'm gonna let you get the last word in.
00:58:48Thank you.
00:58:49You're welcome.
00:58:51Take that horn out of your ear.
00:58:56On your feet, soldier.
00:58:57I'm Colonel Potter.
00:58:59Oh, boy.
00:59:07Gee, sir, you sure know how to take care of your people.
00:59:09I got a soft spot for Klinger.
00:59:11He looks a little like my son,
00:59:13and he dresses a lot like my wife.
00:59:16You've got to be kidding me.
00:59:18He looks a lot like my wife.
00:59:20You can't mention any of these replacements
00:59:23like Harry Morgan without mentioning Burt Metcalf.
00:59:27Burt, casting genius, he has a real eye for casting.
00:59:32Very talented at that, always right on the mark.
00:59:35A year or two earlier, Harry Morgan had been cast
00:59:40as a general who was absolutely bonkers.
00:59:44I mean, he was a total nut.
00:59:47Well, we can stand and fight, or we can have lunch.
00:59:53Lunch!
00:59:54Yeah, I'm a little hungry myself.
00:59:57That was a very good episode and funny, and he was terrific,
01:00:01and I said, you know, I don't think it matters.
01:00:05Why don't we use Harry Morgan again?
01:00:07Well, Harry gave us a chance to have another kind of camp commander,
01:00:12a regular army man,
01:00:13someone who would stand up for the thing we were always knocking down.
01:00:17Wait a minute, Pierce, are you deef?
01:00:19I'm giving your hijinks the heave-ho post-haste!
01:00:22I'm the boss here!
01:00:23We were very honored to have him
01:00:25because he was such a well-known and accomplished actor,
01:00:28and he was wonderful in the part.
01:00:30There's a time to step in and a time to back off.
01:00:33Pull the reins too tight and the horse'll buck.
01:00:35You had good people under you,
01:00:37you should have let them go through their paces.
01:00:40You know, this is pretty good.
01:00:42Someone should be writing this down.
01:00:45To my golden tongue!
01:00:47He could take a line and do it in such a way
01:00:53that you had not imagined that line being delivered.
01:00:57Great logs of Limburger!
01:00:59Hot mustard!
01:01:01I think that's a lot of buffalo bagels.
01:01:03That is grade A 100% bull cookies!
01:01:06Mule fritters!
01:01:07Bourgeois!
01:01:08Wafer biscuits!
01:01:09Your turkeys gave everybody the trots!
01:01:11Holy hemostat!
01:01:13Horse hockey, pardon my French.
01:01:15He was my friend, my colleague,
01:01:20my, uh, my father sometimes, my...
01:01:24He was everything.
01:01:28What's with her?
01:01:29We're worried about you, Colonel.
01:01:31I appreciate that.
01:01:32I suppose.
01:01:33Now, if you'll all put the tear ducts on simmer,
01:01:36I'll lay out the whole story.
01:01:38Well, the one I liked the best,
01:01:41because I got an Emmy from it,
01:01:43was the thing we did called Old Soldiers,
01:01:46which was about a town team
01:01:48that I think five of us had made World War I.
01:01:52We were in France under a heavy artillery barrage.
01:01:56My buddies and I laid low in an old French chateau.
01:02:00We were quite a group, the five of us.
01:02:03Went through hell together
01:02:06and lived to get drunk about it.
01:02:09What a great bunch of guys.
01:02:11And I tell you, one time I started,
01:02:15I couldn't even get through the scene.
01:02:18Forgive me, I can't talk about this and him
01:02:23without a struggle.
01:02:26As much as my old friends meant to me,
01:02:31I think you new friends mean even more.
01:02:36So I'd like you to share this bottle with me.
01:02:40We'd be honored, Colonel.
01:02:42Colonel Potter was this wonderful, decent, thoughtful,
01:02:46talented, intelligent man
01:02:49who had had this extraordinary career
01:02:52treating us like comrades,
01:02:54treating us like his equals.
01:02:56Just one thing, I'd like to make the first toast solo
01:03:00to my old buddies.
01:03:02The idea was stunning to me, and I think to all of us,
01:03:07we were all wrecked by the end of that scene, wrecked.
01:03:11You were the friends of my youth.
01:03:14My comrades through thick and thin
01:03:18and everything in between.
01:03:21I drink to your memories.
01:03:25I loved you fellas,
01:03:28one and all.
01:03:36Okay, that's the old, now for the new.
01:03:40To love and friendship.
01:03:48A lot of shows would have faltered and died
01:03:52when you have major characters like that leaving.
01:03:56Not our show.
01:03:57I'm a surgeon, I'm not a circus roustabout.
01:04:00You're a clown.
01:04:01You're a buffoon, bozo.
01:04:02Bottle it!
01:04:07Blood and guts burns.
01:04:11Ha!
01:04:14Arrgh!
01:04:25Larry Linville was a wonderful actor
01:04:27who was so limited in a way in that part.
01:04:31I really was sorry to see him leave the show.
01:04:34You dirty rat, you!
01:04:36James Cagney.
01:04:38What I wanted to see was
01:04:40more sides to the character come out,
01:04:42more 3-dimensionality to it
01:04:44so he could have more fun as an actor doing it.
01:04:47Some people have said,
01:04:48you know, why didn't the role progress?
01:04:50Why didn't he become more humane,
01:04:52more compassionate, more sensitive,
01:04:54more comprehending, more understanding?
01:04:56And I said, what do you want him to be, Alan Alda?
01:04:59I said, if he becomes these things, then he's Hawkeye.
01:05:02He's no longer Frank.
01:05:03And I think maybe part of the reason he left
01:05:06was because he'd reached the end of the line
01:05:08with what he could do with the character.
01:05:10Give it another shot.
01:05:12Get it, get it, get it, get it, get it!
01:05:16I thought he'd never leave.
01:05:18I remember Bert coming up to us one day,
01:05:20and he said, I've got a guy
01:05:22who is going to be coming in here to replace Larry.
01:05:26What is that odor?
01:05:28North wind cesspool, east wind latrine.
01:05:31The wind is from the south.
01:05:33Oh, that's the kitchen.
01:05:36Sir, are you the doctor we've been waiting for?
01:05:39Quite likely.
01:05:43In comes David Ogden Stiers playing this naughty S.O.B.,
01:05:47you know, Charles Emerson Winchester III,
01:05:50who thought everybody was beneath him.
01:05:52Due to my background and breeding,
01:05:54it was inevitable that I attend the finest schools,
01:05:57Choate, Havard,
01:05:58the Massachusetts Institute of Snobbery.
01:06:01When they get this way, I usually just
01:06:03hit them with a rolled-up newspaper.
01:06:05I loved it that when David Ogden Stiers came into the show,
01:06:09he was not asked to play anything like the character
01:06:13that Larry Linville had played.
01:06:15Good evening, Lieutenant.
01:06:17Time for the changing of the guard.
01:06:19Pierce, I have come to relieve you.
01:06:21I'm sure the patients will be relieved as well.
01:06:23A creature of pattern, habit,
01:06:26um, regularity,
01:06:28who finds this all very disturbing.
01:06:31Hunnicutt, if there is a God,
01:06:33there will be a time in your life
01:06:35when you are in dire straits
01:06:36and in desperate need of a wealthy, influential friend.
01:06:39When that time comes, I pray that you will turn to me
01:06:43so that I can laugh in your face.
01:06:45That character that he created with the accent,
01:06:48I mean, he was just such a rip to work with.
01:06:52He was just so funny and wonderful.
01:06:54Okay, you can start with the bedpans and work your way up.
01:06:58Absolutely not, absolutely,
01:07:00and unequivocally not!
01:07:01Me wash and clean?
01:07:03I'm a doctor, not a woman!
01:07:05He's going to be every bit the surgeon you and Hawkeye are.
01:07:11Um, and so the competition between you
01:07:15is going to be on a very different level.
01:07:17Do you want it good, Colonel, or do you want it fast?
01:07:20Good and fast. This isn't Boston General.
01:07:22We're a mash unit. We do a volume business.
01:07:24Well, I'm sorry, I was not trained on an assembly line.
01:07:27Neither was I, Nurse Wrench.
01:07:28He's placed in a place that made him feel demeaned,
01:07:34exercising his honed talents in a manner far beneath him.
01:07:41But mostly I think it's his tolerance.
01:07:43He's not very well practiced at it.
01:07:45I feel I could be more useful in Tokyo or even the States.
01:07:49Not to me, Commissioner.
01:07:50This meatball surgery of yours
01:07:51is causing my skills to deteriorate.
01:07:53They're wasting away!
01:07:54Don't change the color of your face!
01:07:56I'm out of humber, and I'm out of patience!
01:07:58This place is driving me mad!
01:08:00Each of these cast changes was in a way fortuitous
01:08:05because it shook up the chemistry of the show.
01:08:09It made each actor have a new facet
01:08:12to his or her relationship to this new character.
01:08:16Instead of taking the easy way out,
01:08:18you stood up for a principle.
01:08:20Yes, I did, didn't I?
01:08:24Well, I certainly won't let that happen again.
01:08:27I have the perfect Christmas gift for you, Pierce.
01:08:31Crutches for your lame wit.
01:08:33Ha, ha, ha, ha.
01:08:37You scale the heights, Pierce.
01:08:39Allow me to take my leave
01:08:40before you decimate me with a says you
01:08:43or, God forbid, an oh, yeah, gentleman.
01:08:50You're going home.
01:08:52I'm going home, sir?
01:08:54You heard him right, Radar.
01:08:57Your time has come.
01:08:58People ask me, they've been asking me for 30 years
01:09:02why I left the show.
01:09:04Attention out there, would Corporal Radar O'Reilly
01:09:06please report to his going-away party?
01:09:08All of your friends would love to see you
01:09:10while they can still see.
01:09:12Bye-bye, bye buns.
01:09:13My life at that time,
01:09:15it was a beautiful picture that was all crooked,
01:09:18and I had to step back big time
01:09:21in order to grow as a human being.
01:09:24Part of my stepping back, unfortunately, included M.A.S.H.
01:09:28I didn't leave the show, my contract expired.
01:09:31You know, I had a 7-year contract.
01:09:33I just didn't renegotiate it
01:09:34because I was stepping back from everything.
01:09:39Hawkeye! Hawkeye!
01:09:42I hear them.
01:09:46Radar, there may not be time for me.
01:09:48I'll find you, Hawkeye.
01:09:52My goodbye party was interrupted
01:09:56because the wounded came in.
01:09:58I said to myself, what a wonderful moment!
01:10:00I can cry my eyes out,
01:10:02and I can do this wonderful dramatic moment.
01:10:05I could just completely fall apart.
01:10:08And the director said,
01:10:10if I were you, I would fight the tears.
01:10:13And I said, no, no, just let me do it, okay?
01:10:17So the next day in Daly's,
01:10:19I look at the screen, and it's awful.
01:10:21I mean, it is just terrible.
01:10:23The director was right, I was wrong.
01:10:25I turned to Bert, I said, please, can I do this again?
01:10:29And he said, yes, you may.
01:10:50We did some, maybe 15 or 20 shows
01:10:53in which we experimented radically
01:10:56with the way we told the story.
01:10:58You've read a lot of Hemingway
01:11:00and his reports from Madrid and the Spanish War.
01:11:03He romanticized that war, I think you might agree.
01:11:07He used to love reading Hemingway
01:11:11because he wrote so well.
01:11:14But now that I'm here, I can't understand
01:11:16why anybody would willingly go to a war,
01:11:20would go with enthusiasm,
01:11:23would want to be there while it's happening.
01:11:27I'd do anything to get out of here.
01:11:31Good evening, ladies and germs.
01:11:33I'm sorry I'm late, but my watch stopped.
01:11:35It had to, it's been running fast all week.
01:11:40We also had this wonderful alliance with the audience,
01:11:44at least one that I imagined we had,
01:11:47that you knew if you experimented on a show,
01:11:51and we did some, maybe 15 or 20 shows
01:11:54in which we experimented radically
01:11:56with the way we told the story.
01:11:58And we had the feeling that if it went too far for them,
01:12:02if it was too experimental, they knew we'd be back next week.
01:12:07Incoming!
01:12:15I adored every episode where we broke ground.
01:12:18There was one called Point of View.
01:12:20Okay, we're almost there.
01:12:22Listen, just relax.
01:12:23The surgeons here are the best, I mean the best.
01:12:26The whole episode was from the point of view of the patient.
01:12:30You never saw a reverse.
01:12:32It was always what he saw
01:12:34through his entire trauma and treatment.
01:12:37Hey, how's he doing?
01:12:39Better.
01:12:40I told you.
01:12:42There is another show we did.
01:12:44It was called Lifetime.
01:12:46It took place in real time,
01:12:48and we even put a ticking clock on the screen.
01:12:51The doctors were racing against that clock
01:12:53with only 20 minutes to find and transplant an organ
01:12:56to save the life of a wounded soldier
01:12:58and prevent him from being paralyzed.
01:13:01Congratulations, partner.
01:13:03Pour in the antibiotics.
01:13:05Kelly, time.
01:13:08It's 255 in 25 seconds.
01:13:12We're 3 1⁄2 minutes over, damn it!
01:13:15Maybe the hypothermia bought us some time.
01:13:18Yeah, on the other hand, maybe it didn't.
01:13:20Hawkway saved his life.
01:13:24Yeah, well, I guess that's something.
01:13:26It's more than something, it's everything.
01:13:29The following is in black and white.
01:13:32This is a room in Korea,
01:13:34a room most of the men fighting the second year of the war
01:13:38would rather not see.
01:13:40This is an operating room in a MASH,
01:13:43Mobile Army Surgical Hospital.
01:13:45We had seen a documentary that Ed Murrow had done in Korea
01:13:49called See It Now,
01:13:50and we'd always had the notion of doing a show like that.
01:13:53And the fact that they were doing it in black and white
01:13:56to take a chance and say,
01:13:57okay, we're going to do this like a newsreel,
01:14:00was very interesting.
01:14:02Bored?
01:14:03How many times can you watch those training films
01:14:05they send over here?
01:14:06VD is the enemy, and don't let this happen to you.
01:14:09I'd like it to happen to me, to break up the boredom.
01:14:12Just kidding, honey.
01:14:13So they gave us tape recorders,
01:14:15all the actors had tape recorders
01:14:17with questions to answer.
01:14:18Larry trusted us enough to know
01:14:20that we would respond from our characters.
01:14:22At that point, we understood our characters so well.
01:14:26This is my third war.
01:14:27I was in the big one,
01:14:28then the Second World War, and now Korea.
01:14:30I hope war is getting smaller as a trend.
01:14:33You've been here some time,
01:14:34somewhere between some time and eternity.
01:14:36Larry took all of that material that we had improvised
01:14:39into the tape recorders,
01:14:40but also the material that had been punched up by Larry,
01:14:44so it was more pointed, funnier.
01:14:46There's no harm in doctors being ordered
01:14:48to behave as patriotically as possible.
01:14:50Well, doesn't patriotism have to come from the heart?
01:14:54I don't have that problem.
01:14:56Number one with me is the toilet seats.
01:14:58They give you slivers and splinters,
01:15:00and you can't really reach around
01:15:01and take them out yourself.
01:15:02Boy, that's when you find out who your friends really are.
01:15:06Then the interviewer would ask us questions
01:15:09we hadn't expected,
01:15:10so we were on the spot, on camera,
01:15:12and some really good stuff came out of that.
01:15:15You've got to understand,
01:15:16I'm not working on sick people here.
01:15:18I'm working on hurt young people
01:15:20with essentially healthy bodies
01:15:21that have been insulted by ammunition.
01:15:24It was really a real piece of wonderful theater
01:15:30that allowed us as actors in character
01:15:34to talk about what we're experiencing
01:15:37in this god-awful place under these circumstances.
01:15:40When I first came here,
01:15:41I couldn't walk down a corridor full of wounded people
01:15:44without being sickened by it,
01:15:45and now I can walk down without noticing them.
01:15:48For me, I thought it was raw and beautiful and honest.
01:15:53I don't mind being the only priest here.
01:15:55It's sort of fun to have a corner on the market,
01:15:59but, well, what was the question?
01:16:02When I got my version, I found that
01:16:05there was this wonderful thing written there
01:16:08that I had nothing to do with.
01:16:10Laurie wrote it.
01:16:11When I read it, I was so moved.
01:16:15When the doctors cut into a patient,
01:16:20and it's cold, you know,
01:16:22the way it is now, today,
01:16:27steam rises from the body.
01:16:33And the doctor will,
01:16:36will warm himself over the open wound.
01:16:43Could anyone look on that and not feel changed?
01:16:48What a moment.
01:16:50What a television moment.
01:16:53And nobody could have, you know,
01:16:56done it more sensitively than Bill Christopher.
01:17:08Next on MASH.
01:17:18There it is.
01:17:19That's the sound of peace.
01:17:23Ladies and gentlemen,
01:17:24five minutes ago at 10-01 this morning,
01:17:27the truce was signed in Panmunjom.
01:17:29The hostilities will end 12 hours from now at 10 o'clock.
01:17:33The war is over!
01:17:40The Korean War was only about 3, 4 years,
01:17:43and here we had been at it for 11.
01:17:4511 years.
01:17:46At some point, you're going to be running out of jokes,
01:17:52out of stories.
01:17:53We're stopping because we feel,
01:17:56we feel that if we went further,
01:18:00we would risk squeezing it dry.
01:18:03Hi, I'm Burt Metcalf.
01:18:05I'm the executive producer of MASH.
01:18:07It's been my good fortune to be here for 11 years now.
01:18:12It seems like all on this stage.
01:18:14Sitting next to me is Alan Alda,
01:18:16whom I suspect you all recognize readily.
01:18:19We're talking to you from Stage 9,
01:18:2220th Century Fox in Los Angeles.
01:18:24This is the operating room, the OR,
01:18:26in which we've done a number of memorable sequences
01:18:30over the years,
01:18:31and we wanted to talk to you a little about
01:18:33what we hope will be another memorable show for you,
01:18:36a two-hour final expanded version of MASH
01:18:38in which we're going to bring to a conclusion
01:18:41the Korean War and the 11-year run of MASH
01:18:43on television.
01:18:44I mean, people are looking forward
01:18:46to an emotional experience
01:18:47when these people that they've been watching for 11 years
01:18:50and whose fortunes they've been following
01:18:53finally come to that point where they separate.
01:18:56I thought it would be too flippant for us
01:18:59to just say, ah, the war's over,
01:19:00that's nice, that's great,
01:19:01let's go home and pick up our lives.
01:19:03It seemed like something we ought to deal with.
01:19:05My hope was to tell a story
01:19:09that showed the war ending
01:19:11and the doctors and nurses going home,
01:19:13but to show that in some way
01:19:15everybody had been affected by the war,
01:19:18that they were all going home
01:19:20with some kind of a wound.
01:19:22Dear Dad,
01:19:23for the first time I understand what a nervous disorder is
01:19:27because it seems I've got one.
01:19:29I guess I'll be seeing you soon
01:19:30since I doubt if I'll let a surgeon operate
01:19:32whose cheese has slipped off his cracker.
01:19:35Dear Lord,
01:19:37I know there must be a reason for this,
01:19:40but what is it?
01:19:43I answered the call to do your work.
01:19:46I've devoted my life to it,
01:19:47and now how am I supposed to do it?
01:19:51What good am I now?
01:19:53What good is a deaf priest?
01:19:55I thought it was interesting having Father Mulcahy
01:19:57get that disability and be angry with God
01:20:01that God had thrown him a curve.
01:20:06No, no, no, no, no, no, wait!
01:20:10Now don't, now don't you do that!
01:20:12No!
01:20:21My God, they're musicians!
01:20:23Winchester had this great passion for classical music,
01:20:27and early on in the show
01:20:30confronts a group of Chinese POWs
01:20:35who are musicians,
01:20:37and he gets them to perform Mozart's clarinet quintet,
01:20:43and it's a marvelous portion of the story.
01:20:47Doctor?
01:20:51It wasn't even a soldier.
01:20:54It was a musician.
01:20:55Later on, he learns that they're all dead.
01:20:59It becomes an enormous emotional upheaval for him.
01:21:10They threw you curves,
01:21:12and that was what was so good about that show.
01:21:16I now pronounce you husband and wife.
01:21:22I thought it would be really fun to have him be the one,
01:21:27the one who was trying desperately to get out of Korea,
01:21:31to fall in love with a Korean woman
01:21:34and be the one who stayed in Korea.
01:21:46Goodbye, Margaret.
01:21:48Goodbye, Margaret.
01:21:49I know you've got your career in order,
01:21:52but don't forget to have a happy life too.
01:21:55Harry and I, again, Margaret and Potter
01:21:58had their very serious, loving relationship.
01:22:05You're a dear, sweet man.
01:22:08I'll never forget you.
01:22:10I had to get through saying,
01:22:12You're a dear, sweet man, I'll never forget you,
01:22:15and I still can't do it
01:22:17because I never will.
01:22:19I mean, he was just, we were just so close.
01:22:30Loretta, you have very tearful eyes now,
01:22:33so this has got to be a very tearful moment for you.
01:22:36No.
01:22:38Yes, it is.
01:22:40Very.
01:22:42Very.
01:22:44I'm not doing well.
01:22:46How much are you going to miss the show?
01:22:50How much would you miss your honor?
01:22:53It was, for me, it was this perfect ending
01:22:58to a perfect experience.
01:23:04To this day, the MASH series finale
01:23:07is the highest-rated telecast in the history of television.
01:23:12It's a record that will never be broken.
01:23:15Nobody really knows how big that audience was
01:23:17because there were people watching in town halls,
01:23:20hundreds of people in front of one set,
01:23:22and they only counted the TV sets
01:23:24and tried to figure it out from that.
01:23:26So I like to think that we don't really know
01:23:29how big the audience was, but it was pretty big.
01:23:31It was about half the country watching at one time.
01:23:34In exactly 8 hours, the Korean War will be officially over.
01:23:37It's a time for a summing up,
01:23:39and these are the most up-to-date figures we have.
01:23:42The cost of the war to the United States
01:23:44was $22 billion.
01:23:47Don't look at me. I only get $300 a month.
01:23:50In human terms, the cost was much greater.
01:23:53Some critics have said that MASH is more than a TV show,
01:23:56that it did something in terms of changing
01:23:59the attitude of the American television audience towards war.
01:24:02Do you agree or disagree with that,
01:24:04and how do you think it may have changed the American attitude?
01:24:06Well, that's a big question.
01:24:08I think that it's clear that MASH fitted into
01:24:10a lot of the feelings of the country
01:24:12when we had come to Vietnam,
01:24:14and I don't feel that I'm the best person to expound on this,
01:24:18but MASH in its development, of course,
01:24:21began to deal with social issues,
01:24:23and I was, you know, we all felt
01:24:26that the things that we were able to touch on were meaningful.
01:24:30The acting was superb, a lot of the writing was very good,
01:24:34well-directed, just a very carefully crafted show
01:24:38with some ideas that are timeless.
01:24:40Good is good, and it lasts forever.
01:24:43It's the legacy that was left by a bunch of people
01:24:47who actually loved what they were doing.
01:24:49Okay, and action.
01:24:52One of the questions that I've often been asked over the years
01:24:56is why did we think the show was so successful?
01:24:59And I've always said that the audience loved those characters,
01:25:04but somehow, subliminally, they also got the sense
01:25:08that the actors loved one another.
01:25:11And cut!
01:25:13Ah, we're good.
01:25:15That's a wrap!
01:25:17Yeah!
01:25:32I think I'm proud of all those people
01:25:36that made it possible.
01:25:39All the writers and the actors and the whole gang.
01:25:44I think the feeling generally is one of
01:25:48sort of an overwhelming sadness
01:25:51because it's never going to be like this again.
01:25:55It's breaking up a family.
01:25:57It is, it's sad.
01:26:00The constant camaraderie
01:26:03and the constant humor and respect and love,
01:26:06it was synchronicity.
01:26:08It doesn't happen often, or maybe even ever again.
01:26:12Father, I may never see you again, and before you go,
01:26:15there's something I've been meaning to tell you for a long time.
01:26:18Your shirt's on backwards.
01:26:20Uh...Mash changed my life.
01:26:23And I always say, well, you know, the blessings
01:26:26that Mash showered on me were so great
01:26:29that I think I'm a pretty lucky actor.
01:26:34A couple of days ago, somebody asked me
01:26:37if I thought Mash had made me a better actor,
01:26:41and I said I didn't know about that.
01:26:44But I know it's made me a better human being.
01:26:49And there aren't many shows you can say that about.
01:26:52Colonel, before you go, we've been thinking about it,
01:26:55and there's a little something we'd like to give you.
01:26:58It's not much, but it comes from the heart.
01:27:17It's hard to remember all of the wonderful things
01:27:20I went through on Mash, because it happened so long ago.
01:27:24Sometimes it seems like it happened
01:27:26to a completely different person.
01:27:28But fortunately, he lets me live in his house.
01:27:32Look, I know how tough it is for you to say goodbye, so I'll say it.
01:27:40Miss you.
01:27:42I'll miss you. A lot.
01:27:45The show resonated with people in a way that, in my experience,
01:27:49has not happened before and has not happened since.
01:27:52The clichés when we were doing the show was from people who said,
01:27:55I never watch television, and I never miss Mash.
01:27:58The one I hear today more than any other is,
01:28:01I used to watch the show with my father,
01:28:04or I used to watch the show with my grandfather.
01:28:07Now I watch the show with my children.
01:28:22And I watch the show with my grandfather.
01:28:41And a big hello, you daddy-o's, mommy-o's and nc-o's,
01:28:44from Big Daddy O'Reilly.
01:28:46Big Daddy, just play the records.
01:28:48Got you covered, big cat.
01:28:49What?
01:28:50That means yes, sir.
01:28:51Real cool.