AND SOMETIMES HILARIOUS
Farrell (BJ Hunnicutt) was a Marine.
M*A*S*H had to be careful not to look like it was too anti US military. One episode showing soldiers standing outside in the cold in a bid to get sick and be sent home was pulled — even though this was a real practice in the Korean War.
A pre-fame Patrick Swayze played a soldier in an episode. Happy Days’ Ron Howard, The Matrix star Lawrence Fishburne and The Naked Gun’s Leslie Nielsen also appeared.
The writers got creative when the cast criticised scripts. They set one episode during a freezing Korean winter – and the actors had to wrap up and stand by a fire despite the scorching 38C heat in Malibu where the show was filmed.
Sewer
The final episode in 1983 sparked an urban legend that the New York City sewer system crashed because so many people waited to go to the toilet after it finished. It didn’t actually fail but the water flow did massively surge.
Alda (86), Swit (84), Farrell (83), and Farr (88), are still alive, as is Gary Burghoff (79), who played “Radar” O’Reilly.
Rogers, McLean Stevenson (Henry Blake), Larry Linville (Frank Burns) and Harry Morgan (Sherman T Potter) are also no longer with us.
SOME CAST OF CHARACTERS: Swit and Klinger now (above) and (left) the TV cast (back row l-r) William Christopher (Father Mulcahy) Gary Burghoff (Radar O’Reilly), David Stiers (Maj Charles Winchester), Jamie Farr (Corporal Klinger); (front row l-r) Loretta Swit (Hot Lips Houlihan), Harry Morgan (Col Sherman Potter), Alan Alda (Hawkeye Pierce), Mike Farrell (BJ Hunnicutt) in the hilarious sitcom