Posted on 01/31/2023 4:01:43 AM PST by COBOL2Java
I was chatting with a young friend of mine the other day (he in his 30s, me upper 60s). We were talking about the TV show M*A*S*H.
We started talking about the opening theme song, and he caught me off guard - he said "It's a nice tune, I wonder if they gave it a title."
I responded "Suicide is Painless". He thought that was a weird title. "Why on earth would they call it that?" I said it's from the movie.
"Movie?" he asked, "what Movie?" I said "The TV show came from a movie of the same name, and in the movie, that song actually has lyrics."
He had no idea!
Then I gave him the pièce de résistance when I said "the movie is based on a novel of the same name - although in the book it was just 'MASH', not 'M*A*S*H' with the stars between each letter. And Radar is the only character in both the movie and the TV show."
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He had no idea! I suggested he read the novel, and then watch the movie. Notwithstanding the political tone the TV show later took (thanks to Alan Alda), I generally enjoy M*A*S*H, especially in the episodes featuring MPs - my father-in-law was an MP in the Korean conflict.
A buy named Tommy Tedesco played the guitar in the MASH theme song. He was a member of the “Wrecking Crew”, a group of LA based musicians who played on virtually EVERYTHING in the 1960s into the 1970s. From the Righteous Bros to Sonny & Cher to the Beach Boys to the Grassroots to many others to TV/radio commercials, they played on them all.
As for the TV show, it was good for the first five years or so until it became too preachy and you got St. Hawkeye and B.J. the Good.
The song lyrics surprised me and sad. Just curious, is the book any good?
Gary Burghoff plays the same character in the movie and the series. Every character in the early seasons of the series appeared in the movie. (Maj. Charles Emerson Winchester, III, Commanding Officer Col. Sherman Potter and Capt. B. J. Honeycutt were introduced after several seasons.) Capt. Duke Forrest was in the movie and not the series, and Capt. Oliver “Spearchucker” Jones appears merely in first-season cameos.
It'd be interesting to hear what freedom living South Koreans today think of Alan Alda's political statements about the Korean War being a waste of lives and time.
Same here. The episodes I prefer are in the first few seasons, with Wayne Rogers, Larry Linville and McLean Stevenson.
Love Col. Flagg the best.
When the movie came out, a friend of mine told me his father, who had been in a real MASH unit in Korea was furious about it. According to the father, the movie was completely divorced from reality, and made the serious business of treating the wounded look like a clown show.
Col. Flagg was a riot! I didn’t mention several recurring characters, like the many enlisted men (like Sgt. Rizzo), nurses (like Lt. Kelly) or visitors. But I thought Spearchucker Jones and Duke Forrest were too central to the plot of the movie not to mention.
Genuine POWs felt the same way about “Hogan’s Heroes”.
My biggest problem with M*A*S*H as I got older was that it was very elitist. I know the military enforces a sharp line between officers and enlisted that the show doesn’t even uphold so well, but the enlisted in the show were depicted as somehow less than human. Radar needed actual god-like powers to be appreciated; it’s easy to overlook but he doesn’t have everything the commanding officer needs simply be anticipating his needs well, but is actually a fairly powerful psychic. He’s called “Radar” because he knows when casualties are coming in by helicopter before anyone else, and not because of sharp hearing.
If memory serves, the book was a hoot. Especially the “miraculous apparition” by helicopter.
Johnny Mandel performing “Suicide is Painless”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whhAg6bA3_o
Lyrics
Through early morning fog I see
Visions of the things to be
The pains that are withheld for me
I realize and I can see
That suicide is painless
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave it if I please
That game of life is hard to play
I’m gonna lose it anyway
The losing card I’ll someday lay
So this is all I have to say
Suicide is painless
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave it if I please
The sword of time will pierce our skin
It doesn’t hurt when it begins
But as it works its way on in
The pain grows stronger, watch it grin
Suicide is painless
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave it if I please
A brave man once requested me
To answer questions that are key
“Is it to be or not to be?”
And I replied, “Oh, why ask me?”
Suicide is painless
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave it if I...
Suicide is painless
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave it if I please
The book was quite good, I thought. There were a couple of sequel books, not as good.
I have a now deceased aunt who was a nurse in a MASH unit in Korea. She hated the show.
The book was quite good, I thought. I read a couple of the eight or so other MASH books, not as good.
BTW, The 4077th was nowhere as big as the real 4 or 5 MASH units in Korea. According to the original book, they typically had about 200 beds for the wounded.
Oops. Didn’t realize I had posted the comment before making a few changes.
M*A*S*H was highly disrespectful of the military. Col. Potter was the first “regular military guy” who wasn’t written to be despised. In the TV show taken solely on its own merits, this is excusable because it’s written from the POV of characters who would do anything to leave the war. My father is a Korean-war veteran who sympathized with this perspective, even as an enlistee. But in the larger context of Walter Cronkite, Jane Fonda, John Kerry and the generally anti-American portrayal of the military in Hollywood, I could easily understand your father’s reaction.
The first few seasons of M*A*S*H had the Korean pop songs broadcast over the camp loudspeakers.
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