Completely OT, but for the "old-timers"

[Florida Art]

Actually, Elliot Gould played "Trapper John". B.J. Honeycutt was an invention of the (vastly inferior) tv series.

Sally Kellerman was way better as "Hotlips" too.

[JohnBKistler]

Actually, Elliot Gould played "Trapper John". B.J. Honeycutt was an invention of the (vastly inferior) tv series.

Sally Kellerman was way better as "Hotlips" too.

A TV show...especially one made for the broadcast networks in the 70s...is always going to be inferior to a movie.

As it was, MASH was cutting edge for it's time. Killing off Colonel Blake took some guts. The shows ratings reflected its popularity.

EDIT: Wikipedia has some interesting info on that final scene with Colonel Blake:

When McLean Stevenson decided to leave the show at the end of the third season, his character was scripted to be discharged and sent home. However, in one of television's most shocking surprises, in the final scene of his last episode it is reported that Blake’s plane has been shot down over the Sea of Japan and that he has been killed.

The script pages with the scene were handed over by the producers, Larry Gelbart and Gene Reynolds, only minutes before filming, so none of the cast except for Alan Alda knew about that development until shortly before Gary Burghoff was told to go in and report Blake's death. Until then, as far as anyone knew, they were going to get a message that Blake had arrived safely home. This was deliberately planned so that the emotions shown by the actors during that scene would be as real as possible, and it worked well, so much so that during the second take of the scene one of the extras accidentally dropped a surgical instrument on the floor, which made a loud clank and was left in the final edit.

[alien bird]

Nice thread. I toast you with my Grape Nehi raised high.

[Section 502 Raven]

I thought one of the funniest lines in television was from Charles Winchester the third when he responded to Hawkeye about not sweating in the heat of summer. "One, i do not sweat i perspire and two i do not perspire".

[AirFlacco]

lob-
Saw it "at the movies" as well, back in the early 70's in Blacksburg!
spidey-
No offense meant, mon ami. I just figured there're a bunch of "mature":) vets on here who would immediately remember Hunnicutt, who as moose noted, wasn't in the original movie but was introduced in the series (when Trapper was discharged back to the States, IIRC).

AF-
Not the most politically correct name, but wasn't Brown's character named 'Spearchucker Jones', or something like that? As funny as much of the movie was, the football game was hilarious! You had to watch everything going on in the periphery of the camera shots, there was a lot of funny stuff.

moose-
I ain't no more-on! I remember when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor! ;)


Mrs. H said her husband was a technical consultant of sorts, and the show would have him recount incidents that were used to build certain episodes. Wish I could have spent time with 'B.J.' to hear first-hand stuff. In real life, SWMBO said he was a great guy.

Yea, you're right about Spearchucker JOnes.

I didn't use Gould's name in the movie, just that he had BJs part in the movie and Wayne
Rogers had BJs original part on TV and MacLain Stevenson had Col Potter''s original part
on TV.

Rogers and Stevenson were much funnier and left for other roles and Rogers didn't
like taking a back seat to Allan Alda.

I thought Radar and the father were the same in the movie and TV show.

No, Pear Harbor was before my time.

[mmi16]

Remember MASH??!?!?! Sacre dieux! I saw the original movie in a thee-ay-ter, first run!

Ditto!

[Teavo]

Best scene in the football game is in the pileup of players when an hand pops out holding a syringe to inject into an opposing player with something to make him woozy and unable to play, and the hand first takes care to swab the area with alcohol to get it clean and then injects him. Doctors playing football, I tell ya! :D

[MarkS]

Actually, Elliot Gould played "Trapper John". B.J. Honeycutt was an invention of the (vastly inferior) tv series.

Yea, the OP meant Trapper John, not BJ Honeycutt.

In WWII, John Lyday was a WWII B-24 gunner and radioman. After the war he got his medical degree, then later served as a combat surgeon in Korea. He was stationed with the 8055th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital along with a fellow surgeon H. Richard Hornberger, the author of the book M.A.S.H.

He passed away in Greensboro, NC in 1999. His wife just passed a few months ago. RIP to them both.

As a side note, H. Richard Hornberger (AKA Richard Hooker) absolutely detested the M.A.S.H, the TV show. He claimed it was because his book (and the original movie, which he liked a great deal) were intended to be a work of humor, not an anti-war screed, and specifically that Alan Alda's portrayal of Hawkeye (a character he largely based on himself) was unacceptably unfaithful to the original character.

Of course, the fact that he sold the TV rights to arguably television's most successful TV show ever for a few hundred dollars might have been a factor too.

[edtude]

A TV show...especially one made for the broadcast networks in the 70s...is always going to be inferior to a movie.

As it was, MASH was cutting edge for it's time. Killing off Colonel Blake took some guts. The shows ratings reflected its popularity.

EDIT: Wikipedia has some interesting info on that final scene with Colonel Blake:

Oh my god that show was such a ball buster. I can remember my jaw hitting the floor when Radar came in the OR. Still can bring a tear to my eye to watch that episode.

[JohnBKistler]

Of course, the fact that he sold the TV rights to arguably television's most successful TV show ever for a few hundred dollars might have been a factor too.

Yeah...that's gonna leave a mark.

[AirFlacco]

Here's the trailer for the movie. It shows the weed and parts of the football game. I didn't
like the religious sarcasm but that's just me.

I stole a line from the movie when I worked at APG and was walking down the hallway and my buddy, the Safety Manager, was talking to the Commanding General and said how did this agency get such an irresponsible employee like Trap.

I said, I WAS DRAFTED just like in Vietnam.

The General laughed his ass off and said you were drafted during Vietnam? I said yea
but I didn't go over and he said at least you showed up unlike my Safety Manager. We laughed ourselves silly. General Ball was on the last chopper out of Saigon and was hit but made it to the ship.

He said the last thing he did in Nam was burn $50,000 cash so to VC wouldn't get it. He
couldn't carry it with him.

I was on a first name basis with the CG. He called me Trap and I called him General-lol.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gNvuJ7IbTw

[Beau Petard]

alien-
Sante, monsieur!

Sec. 502--
Yeah, lots of funny stuff like that. I always like the time when Winchester gave Radar some advice on how to charm the ladies with an "intellectual" approach - just assume a pensive look on your face and announce, "Aahhh...Bach!" I use it all the time with SWMBO....

She hates Bach! :D

Mark--
Dr. Lyday is, indeed, the person I had in mind for B.J., and his wife Irma, was the lady I mentioned. SWMBO and her sisters grew up in Greensboro across the street from the Lydays, and apparently the kids spent a lot of quality time at the pool ;) and getting into other mischief.