MAS*H
When oneMASHcast appendage refused to return for the show ’s spinoff , a jaw - drop replacement idea was suggested . MASHran for 11 seasonsbetween 1972 and 1983 and prove groundbreaking for many reasons . From the shocking death of Henry Blake to the record - breaking finale , the impact and bequest of the show are still being palpate . It was aMASHcast suffrage that stop the show , with the ensemble perception during the tenth season it was fourth dimension to envelop things up before the quality took a serious nosedive .
Of course , MASHwas still a solid military rank succeeder , and CBS want to keep it run . It was then suggested that the actors who vote to keep it on the breeze ( Jamie Farr , Harry Morgan and William Christopher ) should front a spinoff or else . On paper , this sounded like a upstanding pitch , but in realness , AfterMASHwas a calamity . take space in a Veteran ’s Hospital , the spinoff may have been easily served as a drama instead of a situation comedy , andAfterMASH’sratings tanked so heavily its final episodenever aired and was lost for 30 years .
AfterMASH Tried (And Failed) To Bring Back OG Characters Like Hawkeye And Margaret
Writer Ken Levine recalls CBS hitting the panic button on their MASH spinoff
EveryMASHMovie & TV Series
Release Year
MASH(Movie )
1970
MASH(TV Series )
1972 - 1983
Custom image by Ana Nieves
Trapper John , M.D.
1979 - 1986
AfterMASH
1983 - 1985
WALTE*R
1984
Famed comedy writer Ken Levine ( Cheers ) worked on bothMASHandAfterMASHand in 2022 recalled the original plan to construct a series that was n’t dependent on bringing back former form member . On his blogBy Ken Levine , he then recall thatCBS started to worry when the rating started to dip , and the internet wanted to convey back as manyMASHactors as possible . The only progeny there was that most of them had moved on already .
Well Alan Alda and Mike Ferrell were not remotely interested . Neither was David Ogden Stiers . We did manage to get Gary Burghoff to do an sequence ( which turn out to be one of our better episode ) .
Considering how acclaimedMASH’sfinale was in 1983 , it progress to sense that Alan Alda or Mike Farrell had zero interest in returningfor Edgar Albert Guest visual aspect only a year subsequently . The finale was the complete farewell , so ifAfterMASHwas going to succeed , it had to do so on its own terminus . An appearing by Alda ’s Hawkeye or Loretta Swit ’s Margaret may have helped ratings in the short term , but the show had fundamental issues that no guest appearing was going to clear .
20th Century Fox Wanted To Recast Margaret After Loretta Swit Passed
The studio felt bringing “Hot Lips” back would be an event no matter who played her
According to Levine,20th Century Fox executive were particularly keen to lend back Major Margaret " Hot Lips " Houlihan forAfterMASH . That issuing there was that Swit slip away on returning , just as pretty much every other OG cast member did . While plenty ofMASHactors drop dead the seriesduring its run , Swit and Alda were the only actors to have appeared in both the show ’s pilot burner and finale . In forgetful , she was as closely identified with the character as Alda had been with Hawkeye .
Sally Kellerman play Margaret in Robert Altman’sMASHmovie .
Despite this , the executives at Fox felt they could add back Margaret with a new actor . While Levine underline that fetch Margaret back would only be an outcome if she was played by Swit , they press the notion thatanyactress could play the role and that other show had substitute actors . When the writer tongue-in-cheek propose they could get singer Diana Ross to play Margaret , Levine was stunned the reply was " Say … that ’s kinda interesting"by the executive he was speaking with .
AfterMASH Never Approached Diana Ross About Playing Margaret
None of the Supremes were offered roles on AfterMASH either
… it would have been a genuinely freaky move to bring Margaret back onAfterMASHand reunify her with Morgan ’s Potter or Farr ’s Klinger but have her played by Diana Ross instead .
In the same blog post , Levine made it vindicated that despite the courtship find his Diana Ross lurch " interesting , " the singer was n’t approached . Ross may have few acting credits to her name , but she proved with projects like the 1994 TV movieOut of Darknessthat she was a fine actress . Still , it would have been a genuinely bizarre move to bring Margaret back onAfterMASHand reunify her with Morgan ’s Potter or Farr ’s Klinger but have her wager by the " Upside Down " singer .
If nothing else , Levine ’s story play up how dire the web became . AfterMASHwasn’t a tragedy during its first time of year and even make respectable ratings and reviews . disregarding , CBS wanted it to be as successful as its parent series had been and was uncoerced to recur to gimmicky guest appearance to make that happen . Mercifully , the notion of recast Margaret or any otherMASHcharacter was dropped .
Alan Alda ’s least best-loved episode of MASH make out from season 1 , and its quality underlines why the classic sitcom came so close to being offset .
As Levine mention , wreak back Gary Burghoff ’s Radar result in one ofAfterMASH’smore affect episode . Even then , the net rent the faulty object lesson and tried to make grow a Radar spinoff calledWALTE*R , where Burghoff ’s loveable farmboy became a constabulary officer ; the theme never made it past a badly receive archetype . HadAfterMASHbeen given more of a opportunity to develop its own tone and interpreter , perhaps Alda or Swit could have been blab out into an appearance in a belated season .
CBS doomedAfterMASHby scar it against military rank juggernautThe A - Teamduring its second season . This was a Brobdingnagian error , and the spinoff tank so utterly against its contender that it was canceled only nine episodes in . Incredibly , AfterMASHhas never been let go of on family sensitive ( be it VHS , DVD or Blu - ray ) , or been made usable on cyclosis .
The pilot program forWALTE*Rwas directed by Bill Bixby , well known for playing David Banner onThe Incredible HulkTV series .
Bringing Back More Characters Wouldn’t Have Saved The MASH Spinoff
AfterMASH was a flawed idea from its inception
A cameo by Hawkeye or B.J. Hunnicutt may have givenAfterMASHa evaluation bump , but it would n’t have masked the marrow issues with the offshoot . It ’s been note that the fundamental premiss of doctors handle war oldtimer had potential in itself , but it would have worked better as a straight dramatic play . Instead , theMASHspinoff attempted to mix drollery and drama and decrease flat on both reckoning . It also lack a leading man in the Alda mold to pull it all together , while rate characters like Klinger front and center was a bad idea .
If by some miracle CBShadconvinced Alda or Swit to sign up forAfterMASH , perhaps it could have been salvaged in its second season . That was n’t to be , and it instead became one of goggle box ’s most infamous failures . It does n’t quite deserve that bequest , butwhileAfterMASH’sheart was in the right-hand berth , the execution was miss .
Again , the serial publication was a modest succeeder in its first season , but it was CBS ' involuntariness to let it be its own thing that led toAfterMASH’sswift goal . If nothing else , the cancellation of the spinoff convinced the web thatMASHwas truly done , and no further attempts have been made to continue or reboot it - not yet , at least .
germ : By Ken Levine
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MAS*H is a drama - drollery serial set during the Korean War , centre on the lives of the stave at the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital as they sail the challenges of wartime medical service with temper and resiliency .
