Saturday, March 28, 2020

Weekend Post

MASH episodes tend to be complicated and I’m often asked how we plotted out stories. So here’s how we did it.

First off, we chose the best stories we could find – the most emotional, the most interesting the best possibilities for comedy. Plotting is worthless if you have a bad story. Chekhov would pull out his hair trying to make “B.J.’s Depression” work. (Side note: stories where your lead character is depressed generally don’t work in comedy. Moping around is not conducive to laughs. Better to make them angry, frustrated, lovesick, impatient, hurt – anything but depressed… or worse, happy. Happy is comedy death.)

We got a lot of our stories from research – transcribed interviews of doctors, nurses, patients, and others who lived through the experience. But again, the key was to find some hook that would connect one of our characters to these real life incidents.

Some of these anecdotes were so outrageous we either couldn’t use them or had to tone them down because no one would believe them.

For each episode we had two and sometimes three stories. If we had a very dramatic story we would pair it with something lighter. The very first MASH we wrote, Hawkeye was temporally blind and Hawk & Beej pulled a sting on Frank.

We would try to mix and match these story fragments so that they could dovetail or hopefully come together at the end.

All that stuff you probably knew. What you didn’t know is this:

We broke the show down into two acts and a tag. Each act would have five scenes. Brief transition scenes didn’t count. But go back through some episodes. Five main scenes in the first act and five in the second. As best we could we would try to advance both of our stories in the same scenes. But each story is different and we tried to avoid being predictable.

Usually, we wrapped up the heavy story last. That’s the one you cared most about.

The tag would callback something from the body of the show, generally drawing from the funny story.

And then we had a rather major restriction: We could only shoot outside at the Malibu ranch for one day each episode. So no more than 8 pages (approximately a third of the show). And that was in the summer when there was the most light. By September and October we could devote 6 pages to exteriors. And once Daylight Savings was over that was it for the ranch for the season. All exteriors were shot on the stage. So if we wanted to do a show where the camp is overrun by oxen we better schedule it for very early in the summer. Those 20th guards never let oxen onto the lot without proper ID.

If possible we tried to do at least one O.R. scene a show. We wanted to constantly remind the audience that above all else this was a show about war.

We always feared that a sameness would creep into the storytelling so every season we would veer completely away from our game plan for several episodes just to shake things up and keep you off the scent. That’s how all format-breaking shows like POINT OF VIEW, THE INTERVIEW, and DREAMS came about. And during our years we extended that to a few mainstream episodes. We did NIGHT AT ROSIE’S that was more like a one-act play. Everything was set in Rosie’s Bar. (I wonder if a series like that but set in Boston would work?) We moved them all to a cave. We did an episode set exclusively in Post-Op and assigned each of our characters to a specific patient. Letters-to-home was another nice device.

I should point out here that I didn’t come up with the MASH guidelines for storytelling. That was all Larry Gelbart and Gene Reynolds (pictured). We just followed the template. And for the record, in all my years in the business, no one was better at story than Gene Reynolds. He passed away recently and you can read my tribute here.   It was amazing how he could zero in on problems and more impressively, find solutions. The story had to constantly move forward, it had to have flow, logic, surprises, the comedy had to real as well as funny, and most of all – the dramatic moments (especially during the conclusion) had to be earned.

So that’s how we did it, based on how they did it. And when I occasionally watch episodes of MASH from our years there are always lines I want to change or turns that could be made more artfully or humorously, but those stories hold up beautifully. Thank you, Gene Reynolds.

33 comments :

  1. Rick Wiedmayer3/28/2020 6:23 AM

    What was the feeling like when Alan Alda first came up to the Show runner and said that he would like to write an episode and when he wanted to direct an episode?

    Rick Wiedmayer

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  2. Ken, a friend of mine on Facebook has created a March Madness-style bracket to find the Greatest American Sitcom. Every day he posts a new bracket and everyone votes.

    So far, MASH has beaten the Doris Day Show.
    And Cheers has beaten It's a Living.

    Though Becker was eliminated by How I Met Your Mother. (Booooo)

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    1. Kevin FitzMaurice3/28/2020 5:03 PM

      "M*A*S*H" and "The Doris Day Show" had McLean Stevenson in common.

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  3. Could you do the same for that new series "The Pandemic"?

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  4. Most people act like it was SEINFELD that set the standard for sitcoms (or TV shows, in general) having multiple storylines intertwined in each episode, because they had four main characters, and each of the four characters had to have their own plot thread in each episode, that all tied into each other (like George saving the beached whale because it was Kramer's golf ball that got stuck in its blow hole). It seems like people forget that it was M*A*S*H that practically pioneered this format of including multiple storylines per episode, so if anything, it was M*A*S*H that set that standard, not SEINFELD.

    You've talked about wanting to avoid that "sameness" before, Ken, including how and why you started doing the more visually interesting shows in Season 7 because we had been seeing the same sets for six years . . . given that, "The big 'M' stands for mobile," was there ever any consideration that the 4077th have a permanent bug-out to a new location? Granted, while I'm sure it would have been realistic from a war standpoint, I'm sure from a logistical standpoint as far as television production is concerned, it would have been an impossible nightmare to tear down the entire Ranch set, move it to a different spot, rebuild the entire set, and probably have to rearrange the layout of the Compound on Stage 9 as well.

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  5. This is hilarious

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LcFOyIe_jc

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  6. Someone once said of Chaplin that he was an artist and always made sure you could tell he was an artist, while people like Keaton and Laurel were artists but did not show it off. MASH did so much, so well, and did not show off about it.

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  7. Talked to my son yesterday and he said he and his wife started binge-watching CHEERS, which they'd never seen. He said although it's a little dated they were surprised by how funny it is. This warmed my heart, and I told him to stay with it, as it only gets better.

    He also said that knowing Ted Danson only from THE GOOD PLACE and CURB, it was jarring to see him so young. So there was that gut-punch too.

    Stay healthy, everyone!

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  8. I have learned so much about the industry from reading this blog.

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  9. Ken,
    I've seen a few times where you said that the anecdotes were too outrageous to include in the show. Are you able to edit out the identifying details and share some with us here?

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  10. That's was fascinating, thank you. I recently watched the entire run on Hulu, so I love to read stories like this. And let's thank you for the podcast, I love the stories....

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  11. Just in case you didn't catch this:

    https://www.mlb.com/news/vin-scully-sends-words-of-encouragement

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  12. Troy McClure3/28/2020 12:24 PM

    I recently binge watched season 2 of Scream Queens, the horror comedy series. In one episode, a character mentions MASH to one of the young girls. She asks what that is and the guy says "You've never heard of MASH? It's only the biggest TV show in history."

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  13. "And once Daylight Savings was over that was it for the ranch for the season. All exteriors were shot on the stage."

    Is this why so many episodes were set at night?

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  14. That is honestly fascinating, Ken. It's why I love your blog. It's so enjoyable to gain insight into why a show works effectively.

    I recently saw an episode of MASH when I couldn't sleep. And so I thought about what my favorite episodes are. There are too many to choose from, but the silver medal went to one of yours, "Goodbye Radar" (which I realize was actually 2 episodes). The gold medal went to the one with Charles and the pianist, that ended with the Ravel concerto. Just thinking about it now brings me to tears (maybe because of everything going on - we really are in another war).

    I've had a question for you, and any of your fellow writers, cast and crew on MASH. I know that Trump is a 4 letter word to you, and I understand why. But what do you think about recent developments in Korea? It seems like North and South have made at least a little progress to peace. Do you have any insights to offer, since the police action never really ended (at least not for our soldiers at the border)? You can consider that a Friday question, I guess, although it's not your typical fare.

    Speaking of politics, if you'd like to see what a "good" Republican looks like, pay attention to Gov. Mike DeWine here in Ohio. Watching his press conferences is a lesson in how to do it properly. His expert doctor, and Director of Health, Amy Acton, is remarkable. He never undermines her or contradicts her. He says what he needs to, and gets out of her way. If you want to see a politician and a doctor explain to their citizens how serious this situation is, with authority and empathy, watch this 3 minute video from the Columbus Dispatch. It's refreshing. If only the whole country had this at the top.

    https://youtu.be/GXjLgBM7Uto

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  15. One of the things I liked about the 'middle seasons' of MASH -- basically Seasons 3-7 -- was the ability to balance the comedy and drama, to where neither seemed forced. Lots of people like Seasons 1-2 specifically because many of the episodes lacked any real drama, because CBS feared that would drive people away from the shows, while once you get past the transitional Season 8, there just seemed to be too many episodes in Seasons 9-11 where you could tell there was concern for the dramatic story line, while the comedy one comes across as the red-haired stepchild that not enough time was spent refining (i.e. -- Potter's homilies becoming more and more forced, and the cast for some odd reason talking louder and louder, as if a higher decibel level could mask a weak bit of comedy). The final season with Henry and Trapper up through Radar's goodbye was really the Golden Age of the series.

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  16. Personally, I feel like Season 7 was the "transitional season." That's just me, but I find it really has a feel all its own - it's not quite as funny/humorous as Seasons 1-6, but it's nowhere near as dramatic as 8-11.

    To me, Season 3 is when the show really found its footing: by then, everything about the show solidified in terms of writing, direction, acting, storytelling, etc. And, of course, M*A*S*H got better with age - each season had more to offer than the season before, and agreed, there was definitely a very well balance between comedy and drama.

    I'll even argue that the same can be said for HOGAN'S HEROES. Granted, it was always a silly, wacky, broad, slapstick show, and can't quite hold a candle to M*A*S*H, but likewise, each season of HOGAN seemed to get better to the point that I would say the last two seasons (especially the last) were on-par with the earlier seasons of M*A*S*H. Interestingly, both shows had some of the same writers (namely Laurence Marks), directors (namely Gene Reynolds), and even the same cinematographers (William "B.J." Jergenson).

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    1. Excellent observations and analysis. I know some bemoan the latter seasons of the show (admittedly, there was more “funny” earlier on), but I’d remind them to watch an episode like “The Joker is Wild” from S11. It still makes me laugh out loud to this day. I appreciated the evolution of the series, breaking away from the established formula of the earlier seasons to allow each of the main characters to grow/develop (especially Margaret). I also liked the addition of Charles after the departure of Frank, whose character didn’t have much more to offer after Margaret’s wedding. There were moments in the latter seasons that were a little heavy handed on the drama, but the producers were blazing a trail: They were trying to perfect the “dramedy” format.

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  17. I've owned the sheet music for the Ravel left-hand concerto - that is, the full piano part plus a reduction of the orchestra playable on a second piano - since before the James Stephens episode aired in early 1980. It's an amazing piece of writing; the last few minutes are a solo cadenza that sounds like three hands instead of one.

    YouTube has the recording that's been my favorite since I was 16: Samson Francois and the Paris Conservatory Orchestra, circa 1960. Go listen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjiSSWubIuU

    However, it always seemed implausible to me that the Ravel sheet music could be found in a military library in Seoul, where Charles sent Klinger to retrieve it for his patient. Or anywhere else in Korea, for that matter.

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    1. @gottacook,
      Thanks for sharing the video. I've never heard that version before. Beautiful. That cadenza is easily one of the greatest ever.

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  18. Blogger Joseph Scarbrough said...

    ...

    I'll even argue that the same can be said for HOGAN'S HEROES. Granted, it was always a silly, wacky, broad, slapstick show, and can't quite hold a candle to M*A*S*H, but likewise, each season of HOGAN seemed to get better to the point that I would say the last two seasons (especially the last) were on-par with the earlier seasons of M*A*S*H. Interestingly, both shows had some of the same writers (namely Laurence Marks), directors (namely Gene Reynolds), and even the same cinematographers (William "B.J." Jergenson).


    To me, the interesting comparison is between the first two seasons of MASH, and the first season of McHale's Navy, since the two shows started off very similar but went in 180-degree opposite directions -- doubly ironic, since Ernest Borgnine's character and the framework of the plot was created as a drama, "Seven Against the Sea" -- Gene L. Coon, who would later go on to produce "Star Trek", was brought in an did a rewrite to turn the show from a drama to a comedy, and Season 1 had other A-list writers like Danny Arnold, Danny Simon, Jerry Davis and even Joseph Heller. The two shows even shared plot lines, between MASH's "Five O'clock Charlie" and McHale's "Washing Machine Charlie" (which featured Mike Ferrell).

    But MASH's tone would get more serious as the years went on, while McHale had become a slapstick farce by the middle of Season 2. That might just be the difference between what was expected of TV sitcoms in the 1960s versus the 1970s, when many sitcoms tried to be more grounded in character development over premise, along with what viewers would be willing to accept in their war-themed sitcoms, before and after seeing all the war footage from Vietnam in the late 1960s and early 70s on the evening news.

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  19. I have always wondered if there was a thought in Quo Vadis Captain Chandler to have Radar's bear healed? As "Jesus" blesses the bear, it's missing eye miraculously appears. Maybe that was too much comedy for the moment.

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  20. I always wondered if anyone considered the healing of Radar's bear during the end scene of Quo Vadas, Captain Chandler?
    As the good captain leaves, Radar asks him to bless his bear. Captain Chandler blesses the bear and covers his face with his hand. Did anyone think of replacing the bear's eye after the blessing? This may have been too much comedy at this moment, but it sure would have been a fun ending.

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  21. Trumptards being Trumpian3/29/2020 7:09 AM

    Here's a shocking video of a woman who bought out the entire stock of toilet paper and napkins from a store. Absolutely disgusting behavior. And guess what....she loves Trump and is proud of it.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HM5eO84Q9-A

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    Replies
    1. No fan of Trump or hoarders, but what on earth does your post have to do with MASH???

      Delete
  22. I have always loved MASH ever since I was a kid watching it with my father. I still continue to watch it today. It makes you laugh and at the same time some scenes made you cry. No matter what it was a clean show. I wish i could find more channels to watch the show. I wish would put it back on netflix. Is it true that scenes were filmed in Branson,Missouri also?

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  23. Just noticed that the Mash episode Red/White Blues has a story line about Chloroquine. The drug that's being made famous at the moment. Here's a snapshot. https://mash.fandom.com/wiki/The_Red/White_Blues_(TV_series_episode)

    Hawkeye finds a letter enclosed that HQ was out of Chloroquine, so they sent the other, less effective drug, instead. Primaquine is just a suppressant, not the cure ...plus, it also has negative side effects for "Negroes." (and Klinger)

    Fred C

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  24. I'm still curious (call it an FQ if you will) about just what Alan Alda did in his credited position of
    "creative consultant."

    I mean, his roles as a star, episode writer and director are all self explanatory.

    Even if he had gotten a producer or executive producer credit it might be more well understood.

    So what did that mean?

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  25. ScarletNumber3/29/2020 7:19 PM

    RIP David Schramm at 73

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  26. here is a compilation of scenes from MASH applied to our current situation.
    https://www.facebook.com/frankvacc/videos/10219653484705743/?t=301

    Alan Alda was in the army and served in Korea, probably helped with his creative consulting. (at least that is what I read on the internet. Which is never wrong)

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  27. @J Lee That's another interesting comparison, and I know Gene Reynolds has said that when production began on M*A*S*H, "We didn't want to do another McHALE'S NAVY." Granted, that's one classic sitcom I've yet to actually see (and I'm really big into the classics), but I'll take your word for it. I do know that veteran writer/producer Si Rose had a hand in making that show possible.

    @Janet From what I understand, since Gene Reynolds had left the show the year before, Alan Alda would continue to meet with him once a week to discuss the direction the show was going in, and ask for his input and the like. And, as I've read from different sources, Gene was not too happy about some of the changes made after he left, namely Margaret getting divorced (since her marrying Penobscott was Gene's idea, and was cruicial to the growth and development of her character), or the fact that Frank was replaced with Charles.

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  28. What I understand about McHale's Navy:

    Remember that when McHale's started in '62, Tim Conway was still basically unknown.
    Once they had Tim on film, the producers realized that he was comedy gold - more so when set up with his fellow Ohioan Joe Flynn.
    This cast the die toward hard comedy, with Ernie Borgnine as straight man - and Ernie liked that just fine (he must have seen how well this was working for Andy Griffith).
    Put a youngish nerd type in the Parker role, and McHale's could just as easily gone in a slightly more serious direction (slightly … ).

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  29. While M*A*S*H did have A and B stories (not sure if they were the first with this), Seinfeld generally had A, B, and C stories, and they all would intertwine at the end. That’s what they were acclaimed for, and that’s something that M*A*S*H didn’t do.

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