.Related showsExternal linksM.A.S.H (an acronym for Mobile Army Surgical Hospital) is an American that aired on from 1972 to 1983. It was developed by as the first original spin-off series adapted from the 1970 feature film, which, in turn, was based on 's 1968 novel. The series, which was produced with (currently part of ) for CBS, follows a team of doctors and support staff stationed at the '4077th ' in, during the (1950–53). The show's features an instrumental-only version of ',' the original film's theme song. The show was created after an attempt to film the original book's sequel, failed. The television series is the best-known of the works, and one of the highest-rated shows in. Contents.Plot M.A.S.H aired weekly on CBS, with most episodes being a half-hour in length.

The series is usually categorized as a, though it has also been described as a ' or a ' because of the often dramatic subject matter.The show is an ensemble piece revolving around key personnel in a (MASH) in the Korean War (1950–53). (The in the name are not part of military nomenclature and were creatively introduced in the novel and used in only the posters for the movie version, not the actual movie.) The '4077th MASH' was one of several surgical units in Korea.While the show is traditionally viewed as a comedy, many episodes had a more serious tone.

May 26, 2018  SMASH is one of the best TV series I've ever seen, and many fans were sad when NBC pulled the program after only two seasons. For me having the opportunity to see such Broadway titans as Christian Borle, Brian d'Arcy James, Will Chase, Megan Hilty, and others was special because usually you have to visit New York for this pleasure.

Early seasons aired on network prime time while the was still going on; the show was forced to walk the fine line of commenting on that war while at the same time not seeming to protest against it. For this reason, the show's discourse, under the cover of comedy, often questioned, mocked, and grappled with America's role in the Cold War.Episodes were both plot- and character-driven, with several narrated by one of the show's characters as the contents of a letter home. The show's tone could move from silly to sobering from one episode to the next, with dramatic tension often occurring between the civilian draftees of 4077th – Hawkeye, Trapper John, and B.J. Hunnicutt, for example – who are forced to leave their homes to tend the wounded and dying of the war, and the 'regular Army' characters, such as Margaret Houlihan and Colonel Potter, who tend to represent patriotism and duty (though Houlihan and Potter could also represent the other perspective at times). Other characters, such as Col. Winchester, and Cpl. Klinger, help demonstrate various American civilian attitudes toward Army life, while guest characters played by such actors as, and also help further the show's discussion of America's place as Cold War war maker and peace maker.Characters Main cast.

See also:Through changes of personnel M.A.S.H maintained a relatively constant, with four characters –, and – on the show for all 11 seasons. Several other main characters departed or joined the program during its run, and numerous guest actors and recurring characters were used.

The writers found creating so many names difficult, and used names from elsewhere; for example, characters on were named after the. Note: Character appearances include double-length episodes as two appearances, making 260 in total.CharacterActor/actressRankRoleAppearancesBenjamin Franklin 'Hawkeye' Pierce251Margaret 'Hot Lips' Houlihan PenobscottHead,temporary243Maxwell Q. Klinger(Recurring seasons 1–3, regular 4–11),later,later Company Clerk219Father John Patrick Francis Mulcahy(recurring seasons 1–4, regular 5–11)George Morgan (pilot episode),replaced by,later218Trapper John McIntyre(seasons 1–3)CaptainSurgeon72Henry Blake(seasons 1–3),Surgeon70Frank Burns(seasons 1–5)Major,later Lieutenant Colonel (off-screen)Surgeon, temporary Commanding Officer(following the discharge of Henry Blake)118Walter Eugene 'Radar' O'Reilly(seasons 1–8)Corporal(one episode as due to falsified promotion)Company clerk,156B. Hunnicutt(replaced Trapper; seasons 4–11)CaptainSurgeon187Sherman T. Potter(replaced Henry Blake; seasons 4–11)Commanding Officer (after Lt. Blake),Surgeon188Charles Emerson Winchester III(replaced Frank Burns; seasons 6–11)MajorSurgeon, Executive Officer (after Major Burns)137.

The cast of M.A.S.H from season 8 onward (clockwise from left):, andProduction Writing As the series progressed, it made a significant shift from being primarily a comedy with dramatic undertones to a drama with comedic undertones. This was a result of changes in writing and production staff, rather than the cast defections of McLean Stevenson, Larry Linville, Wayne Rogers and Gary Burghoff. Series co-creator and joke writer departed after Season 4, the first featuring Mike Farrell and Harry Morgan. This resulted in Farrell and Morgan having only a single season reading scripts featuring Gelbart's comic timing, which defined the feel and rhythm of Seasons 1–4 featuring predecessors Rogers and Stevenson, respectively.

(the show's ) and Executive Producer both departed at the conclusion of Season 5 in 1977, resulting in M.A.S.H being fully stripped of its original comedic foundation by the beginning of Season 6 — the debut of the Charles Winchester era.Whereas Gelbart and Reynolds were the comedic voice of M.A.S.H for the show's first five seasons (1972–1977), and newly promoted Executive Producer became the new dramatic voice of M.A.S.H for Seasons 6–11. By the start of Season 8 (1979–1980), the writing staff had been completely overhauled, and with the departure of Gary Burghoff, M.A.S.H displayed a distinctively different feel, consciously moving between comedy and drama.The end of the Vietnam War in 1975 was a significant factor as to why storylines become less political in nature and more character driven. M.A.S.H site in Malibu Creek State Park.

Hulk of a Dodge WC54 ambulance. Copy of the original M.A.S.H signpost was installed on the site in 2008.The 4077th consisted of two separate sets.

An outdoor set in the mountains near Malibu (, Los Angeles County, California) was used for most exterior and tent scenes for every season. This was the same set used to shoot the movie, although there were changes made to the positions of several tents for the TV show. The indoor set, on a sound stage at Fox Studios in, was used for the indoor scenes for the run of the series.

Later, after the indoor set was renovated to permit many of the 'outdoor' scenes to be filmed there, both sets were used for exterior shooting as script requirements dictated (e.g., night scenes were far easier to film on the sound stage, but scenes at the helicopter pad required using the ranch).Just as the series was wrapping production, a brush fire destroyed most of the outdoor set on October 9, 1982. The fire was written into the final episode as a forest fire caused by enemy that forced the 4077th to move out.The Malibu location is today known as. Formerly called the Century Ranch and owned by 20th Century Fox Studios until the 1980s, the site today is returning to a natural state, and is marked by a rusted and a ambulance used in the show. Through the 1990s, the area was occasionally used for television commercial production.On February 23, 2008, series stars Mike Farrell, Loretta Swit and William Christopher (along with producers Gene Reynolds and Burt Metcalfe and M.A.S.H director Charles S. Dubin) reunited at the set to celebrate its partial restoration. The rebuilt signpost is now displayed on weekends, along with tent markers and maps and photos of the set.

The state park is open to the public. It was also the location where the film (1941) and the television series (1974) were filmed, among many other productions. Much of this location, including the signpost and markers, was thought to have been destroyed in the 2018 but subsequently was determined to have survived the fire.

Smithsonian exhibit. The operating room set on display in the as part of the 'MASH: Binding Up the Wounds' exhibit in 1983.The exhibit M.A.S.H: Binding Up the Wounds was at the from July 30, 1983 through February 3, 1985. The exhibit was extremely popular, drawing more than 17,000 in a single week, a record for any Smithsonian display.On exhibit were The Swamp and Operating Room sets, one of the show's 14 Emmy Awards, early drafts of the pilot script, costumes from the show and other memorabilia. Sets were decorated with props from the show including the iconic signpost, Hawkeye's still and Major Winchester's tape recorder and phonograph. The exhibit also encouraged visitors to compare the show to real Mobile Army Surgical Hospitals of the Korean and the Vietnam Wars.Radar's teddy bear, originally found at the ranch set, was never on display at the Smithsonian. Following completion of production, the prop was kept by the show's set designer. It was sold several times including to Burghoff himself.

It was sold at auction on July 29, 2005 for $11,800, it sold again on March 27, 2015 for $14,307.50 after 19 bids. Content M.A.S.H was one of the first network series to feature brief partial nudity (notably Gary Burghoff's buttocks in 'The Sniper' and Hawkeye in one of the 'Dear Dad' episodes). A different innovation was based on the show's producers' desire not to have a, contrary to the network's desire to have one. They compromised by omitting laughter in the scenes set in the operating room.

The DVD releases of the series allow viewers to select an audio version with no laugh track.In his blog, writer Ken Levine revealed that on one occasion, when the cast offered too many nitpicking 'notes' on a script, his writing partner and he changed the script to a 'cold show' – one set during the frigid Korean winter. The cast then had to stand around barrel fires in parkas at the Malibu ranch when the temperatures neared 100 °F (38 °C). Levine says, 'This happened maybe twice, and we never got a ticky-tack note again.' Wrote that Alan Alda, whom Cooper directed in several episodes during the first two seasons, concealed a lot of hostility beneath the surface, and the two of them barely spoke to each other by the time Cooper's tenure on the show ended. Vehicles The helicopters used on the series were model (military designation and nickname of the civilian model). As in the film, some care seems to have been taken to use the correct model of the long-lived 47 series. In the opening credits and many of the episodes, Korean War-vintage H-13Ds and Es (Bell 47D-1s) were used complete with period-correct external.

A later (1954–73) 47G occasionally made an appearance. The helicopters are similar in appearance (with the later 'G' models having larger two-piece fuel tanks, a slightly revised cabin, and other changes) with differences noticeable only to a serious helicopter fan. In the pilot episode, a later Bell 47J (production began in 1957) was shown flying Henry Blake to Seoul, en route to a meeting with General Hammond in Tokyo. A helicopter was also shown transporting Henry Blake to the 4077th in the episode 'Henry, Please Come Home'.The used were 1953 military M38 or civil CJ2A Jeeps and also World War II Ford GPWs and Willys MB's. Two episodes featured the M38A1 Jeep, one of which was stolen from a General by Radar and Hawkeye after their Jeep was stolen. Two of the ambulances were Dodges and one was a.

A WC-54 ambulance remains at the site and was burned in the Malibu fires on October 9, 1982, while a second WC-27 survives at a South El Monte museum without any markings. The bus used to transport the wounded was a 1954 model. In the last season, an M43 ambulance from the Korean War era also was used in conjunction with the WC-54s and WC-27. Burned Jeep (most likely a CJ-2A) at Malibu Creek State ParkLaugh track Series creators Larry Gelbart and Gene Reynolds wanted M.A.S.H broadcast without a.

Though CBS initially rejected the idea, a compromise was reached that allowed for omitting the laughter during operating room scenes if desired. 'We told the network that under no circumstances would we ever can laughter during an OR scene when the doctors were working,' said Gelbart in 1998. 'It's hard to imagine that 300 people were in there laughing at somebody's guts being sewn up.' Seasons 1–5 utilized a more invasive laugh track; a more subdued audience was employed for Seasons 6–11 when the series shifted from sitcom to comedy-drama with the departure of Gelbart and Reynolds.

Several episodes ('O.R.' ,d 'The Bus', ', ', 'Point of View', and ' among them) omitted the laugh track altogether; as did almost all of Season 11, including the 135-minute series finale, '. The laugh track is also omitted from some international and syndicated airings of the show; on one occasion during an airing on, the laugh track was accidentally left on, and viewers expressed their displeasure, an apology from the network for the 'technical difficulty' was later released, as during its original run on BBC2 in the UK, it was shown without the laugh track.

UK DVD critics speak poorly of the laugh track, stating 'canned laughter is intrusive at the best of times, but with a programme like M.A.S.H, it's downright unbearable.' On all released DVDs, both in Region 1 (including the US and Canada) and Region 2 (Europe, including the UK), an option is given to watch the show with or without the laugh track.'

They're a lie,' said Gelbart in a 1992 interview. 'You're telling an engineer when to push a button to produce a laugh from people who don't exist. It's just so dishonest. The biggest shows when we were on the air were and both of which were taped before a live studio audience where laughter made sense,' continued Gelbart.

'But our show was a film show – supposedly shot in the middle of. So the question I always asked the network was, 'Who are these laughing people?

Where did they come from?' ' Gelbart persuaded CBS to test the show in private screenings with and without the laugh track. The results showed no measurable difference in the audience's enjoyment. 'So you know what they said?' Gelbart said. 'Since there's no difference, let's leave it alone!' The people who defend laugh tracks have no sense of humor.'

Gelbart summed up the situation by saying, 'I always thought it cheapened the show. The network got their way. They were paying for dinner.'

Episodes Episode list. Main article:'Goodbye, Farewell and Amen' was the final episode of M.A.S.H.

Special television sets were placed in parking lots, auditoriums and day rooms of the U.S. Army in Korea so that military personnel could watch that episode, in spite of 14 hours' time-zone difference with the East Coast of the US. The episode aired on February 28, 1983, and was 2​ 1⁄ 2 hours long. The episode got a Nielsen rating of 60.2 and 77 share and according to a New York Times article from 1983, the final episode of M.A.S.H had 125 million viewers.When the M.A.S.H finale aired in 1983, more than 83.3 million homes in the United States had televisions, compared to almost 115 million in February 2010.'

Automated geysers. Multiple types of rockets.

Goodbye, Farewell and Amen' broke the record for the highest percentage of homes with television sets to watch a television series. Stories persist that the episode was seen by so many people that the New York City Sanitation/Public Works Department reported the plumbing systems broke down in some parts of the city from so many New Yorkers waiting until the end to use the toilet. Articles copied into Alan Alda's book The Last Days of M.A.S.H include interviews with New York City Sanitation workers citing the spike in water use on that night. According to the interviews at 11:03 pm, EST New York City public works noted the highest water usage at one given time in the City's history.

They attributed this to the fact that in the three minutes after the finale ended, around 77 percent of the people of New York City flushed their toilets. These stories have all since been identified as part of an dating back to the days of the radio program in the 1930s.The finale was referenced in a passage from 's coming-of-age novel, in which the main character and his family watch the finale together. International broadcast. (1973–1998), (1999–2011), (2011–2017), (2018), (2018–).(- ). – – (1985–1996).(1972-1983)And many more international broadcasts.Reception Ratings and recognition The series premiered in the US on September 17, 1972, and ended on February 28, 1983, with the finale, showcased as a, titled ', becoming the in US television history at the time, with a record-breaking 125 million viewers (60.2 rating and 77 share), according to the. It had struggled in its first season and was at risk of being cancelled.

In season two, M.A.S.H was placed in a better time slot by CBS (airing after the popular ); the show then became one of the top 10 programs of the year and stayed in the top 20 programs for the rest of its run. It is still broadcast in on various television stations.

The series, which depicted events occurring during a three-year war, spanned 256 episodes and lasted 11 seasons. The Korean War lasted 1,128 days, meaning each episode of the series would have averaged almost four and a half days of real time. Many of the stories in the early seasons are based on tales told by real MASH surgeons who were interviewed by the production team. Like the movie, the series was as much an about the (still in progress when the show began) as it was about the.The episodes ' and ' were ranked number 20 and number 80, respectively, on in 1997. In 2002, M.A.S.H was ranked number 25 on. In 2013, the ranked it as the fifth-best written TV series ever and ranked it as the eighth-greatest show of all time. In 2016, ranked it as the 16th-greatest TV show.

Main article:M.A.S.H was nominated for over 100 during its 11-year run, winning 14:. 1974 – Outstanding Comedy Series – M.A.S.H;, (Producers). 1974 – Best Lead Actor in a Comedy Series – Alan Alda. 1974 – Best Directing in Comedy –: '.

1974 – Actor of the Year, Series – Alan Alda. 1975 – Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series – Gene Reynolds: 'O.R.' . 1976 – Outstanding Film Editing for Entertainment Programming – Fred W. Levine, Ken (2011-01-30). Retrieved 2011-01-30.

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Rolling Stone. Retrieved 2018-01-21. 'M.A.S.H: Television's Serious Sitcom'. July 10, 2003. Although the cast was beginning to think that M.A.S.H was about to hit its stride, the series was still attracting a very small audience and it ranked 46 in the ratings. ^.

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Laughing Matters: On Writing M.A.S.H, Tootsie, Oh, God! And a Few Other Funny Things.

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New York: MacMillan. Solomonson, Ed, and Mark O'Neill. TV's M.A.S.H: The Ultimate Guide Book. Albany, GA: BearManor Media. Wittebols, James. Watching M.A.S.H, Watching America: A Social History of the 1972–1983 Television Series. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co.External links Wikimedia Commons has media related to.Wikiquote has quotations related to:.

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Tonight’s Smash season finale will also be the musical drama’s swan song. NBC has cancelled the show soon after poor ratings relegated it to the dreaded Saturday night slot.

The hour-long network drama about the behind-the-scenes of Broadway had a promising start with a stellar pilot and during its first season.