Jeff & Ryan open Radar’s mailbag and answer (to the best of their abilities) listeners’ intriguing questions. Did the food served in the mess tent really taste disgusting? Was the laugh track written in to the script? What the heck is Ryan’s dog barking at? Listen to find out the answers to these and many more burning questions.
M*A*S*H Notes:
RIP M*A*S*H casting director Eddie Foy III.
Rotten Tomatoes’ conducted a survey of readers’ favorite all-time TV comedies … and M*A*S*H made the list (obviously).
Our thoughts and prayers go out to those affected by the California wildfires.
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TRANSCRIPT: MASH Matters #005 – You Asked For It!
Attention all personnel, incoming podcast. This is MASH Matters.
RYAN: Hey, we’re back. Episode five.
JEFF: Episode five, can you believe it? How long ago did we start this? What was it – 15 minutes ago?
RYAN: Yeah, at least five episodes ago.
JEFF: Hey, we got to episode five and we didn’t know when we started this how many episodes we would do and now we’re up to episode five. That’s amazing. I mean, that’s really fun.
RYAN: I mean, some Hollywood relationships barely get out of episode one, let alone getting to episode five, you know?
[phone ringing]
JEFF: That’s true. And some of my Hollywood relationships are calling me right now. Wait a minute…
BOTH: [laugh]
JEFF: There they are. Okay. We’re back.
RYAN: So, uh..
JEFF: This is a high class, expensive show, folks.
RYAN: Hey, we are going to run through a bunch of questions that have come in over the last several weeks from people who apparently are listening to this podcast, believe it or not. We’ve had a lot of people that have sent us emails, who have gone onto our Facebook page and sent us private messages or put questions right there on the page. And we even have a couple of voicemails that we’re going to be playing and those questions we’ll be answering as well. So… We have a lot to do here. In the words of Jerry Reed, we have a long way to go and a short time to get there. So, uh, Jeff, are you ready to dive into these?
JEFF: I am ready, Ryan Patrick. Let’s go.
RYAN: All right, Jeff Maxwell. Uh, this is an email that came in from Steve Bennett and there’s not really a question here, but it’s a really cool story. He said, “thanks for creating this podcast and giving fans an opportunity to contribute. My mom loved MASH from day one. We had a TV in the house, so as kids, we either watched what she wanted or didn’t watch TV at all. MASH was always –”
JEFF: Well, he should have called, I’m sorry. He should have called Child Protective Services and worked that out.
RYAN: [laughs] “MASH was always interesting to me since I had aspirations to be a doctor when I was young. I would watch from time to time, but not until the party episode did I become an avid fan until 1979. I delivered the Southbridge News in my hometown neighborhood. And one of my customers was Doctor and Mrs. Monroe. I rarely saw Doctor Monroe, but Mrs. Monroe was a very nice lady.”
JEFF: Oh really? How nice was Mrs. Monroe? Steve? Let’s get to the truth, Steve.
RYAN: [laughs] “Before the party episode aired on March 2, 1979, there was an article in the Southbridge News about Dr. Monroe. He had been a MASH surgeon in Korea and submitted his own story to the writers about his unit setting up a reunion of families. The writers loved the story and created this episode and even gave Dr. Monroe a shout out.”
JEFF: No cheque [laughs]
RYAN: [laughs] Not a cheque. A shout out. Yes.
JEFF: No cheque, Dr. Monroe. Sit down, doctor. You’re not getting a cheque. Say your name, maybe.
RYAN: Radar comes into post-op when they all returned from their bug out location to tell BJ has spinal injury patient that was going to be fine.
[Audio from the show]
RADAR: Sir, the 121st EVAC just called and Dr. Monroe up there just operated on your spinal patient.
BJ: Is he all right?
RADAR: He’s better than all right. He’s terrific. Dr. Monroe says in a couple of months, he ought to be able to feel the fuzz on a picture of a peach.
BJ: Yeah!
JEFF: Whoa.
RYAN: I only had one opportunity to speak to Dr. Monroe after that, and the conversation was very brief. I can’t even recall him even telling me anymore than I had already read in the paper.
JEFF: It was probably in court, really, with his wife. Maybe not.
RYAN: [laughs] “Since that episode, I have been an avid fan and continue to watch at least one or two episodes per day before bed. Thanks again for the opportunity to share my story and my love for MASH. I wish you great success with the podcast and looking forward to following along.” Thank you, Steve Bennett, for that lovely, lovely story.
JEFF: Really nice, Steve. Thank you very much. And please write the truth the next time, all about you and Mrs. Monroe. And if you have any pictures, send those as well.
RYAN: That’s so cool to have – you know, imagine when you’re a kid and you’re delivering the paper and somebody on your route was mentioned in an episode of MASH. I mean, that’s gotta be really, really cool. And I’m just curious if anybody else out there has any kind of personal connection to somebody on the show or maybe somebody that inspired one of the storylines from the show. We’d love to hear that story as well from you.
JEFF: Really cool, yeah, that would be a really cool thing to have a relationship like that with a real person that had a touch of the show. That’d be really cool. And that’s, it’s a great story, Steve. I had some fun with it, but it really is a cool story. Let’s see, who else do we have? Well here’s one from Mr. Joe Swank. Well I assume it’s Mister. It could not be. It might not be a Mister. It could be Mrs. Joe Swank.
RYAN: It is Mr. Joe. I know Joe. Joe is a good guy. It is Mr. Joe Swank, yes.
JEFF: Well he says, “Hi Ryan, just listened to the first episode and I’m already intrigued and interested. I have subscribed. I don’t normally do that.” Wow, well that’s cool. “I’ll throw a question in that I have always wondered about. Hawkeye had a penchant for Groucho lines and Groucho-esque delivery. Was that the product of a writer who was a Groucho fan or was that actually Alan Alda who was the Groucho fan and stuck those in of his own volition? Looking forward to the next episode. Great job both of you.” Hey, Joe, thank you very much. Okay, do you know the answer to this?
RYAN: No, I have no clue. I can only assume that Alan Alda was a big Groucho fan, but I actually did a little bit of research. I jumped online and see if I could find any interview from Alan Alda where he talked maybe about being a fan of Groucho, but I couldn’t find anything. So I don’t have an answer for this question. Do you have an answer?
JEFF: No. As we discussed earlier, I have a guess. I don’t have – I really can’t say I absolutely know why this happened. Certainly this was many years ago and I wasn’t there when it was all happening at that point. But my guess is that Larry Gelbart was a huge fan of Groucho and the entire Groucho era and I suspect that Alan Alda was as well. So my guess is when they got together and they were talking about the scripts, it was probably a sort of a natural evolution of conversation and of comedic timing. Alan Alda is a master at comedic timing and Larry Gelbart is the guru of comedic timing. So between the two of them and their appreciation of Groucho Marx and that whole rhythm and what they did, I suspect that that’s why it crept into the delivery. I know it kind of subsided as years went on, but because it was a young show and they were kind of finding their way, it was probably a safe way to get into the dialogue and to move it along and to find the rhythm of the characters as well. So that would be my guess, but I don’t know. So when we have Alan Alda on, whenever we do
RYAN: Episode 84 I think is when we’re scheduling to having him on.
JEFF: Yeah, we’ll ask him that. So, you know, and see whether or not I’m, I’m even close because I don’t know, but it, but it would be interesting to find out. But I think there’s, there’s probably some truth to something I said in there somewhere in terms of why that happened so… but it was a good question. Cause I thought that too. I wondered why too.
RYAN: So this next question comes from Tina Marie Krasner. She’s sent us a couple of questions via Facebook. And this is a question I’m gonna guess, Jeff, has to be at least in the top three questions that you get a lot from MASH fans. And that question is, all that food you served, was it really that horrible?
JEFF: Well, who said it was horrible, for gosh sakes? Gee whiz, me? I served horrible food? Uh, the truth is, and I have been asked this question a lot, the reality is that all of the food that was on the show the entire run of my nine years with the show always came from the 20th Century Fox commissary which happened to be a really, really good restaurant. So all of the mashed potatoes and the bacon and whatever it was came from the Fox commissary. Now once it got to the set, the prop guys occasionally would take things and add water and some oatmeal and kind of mush things around a little bit so it looked a little squishy and it gave you something to go, ugh, that doesn’t look very good. So there was some work done to the food to kind of make it look funky. But the reality is once they said cut and the scene was cut and we were going to do another setup or whatever, we would nibble on that food. [laughs] So it wasn’t bad. We liked the bacon a lot and we used to throw bacon across the set just for fun at each other. But so the answer, no, the food wasn’t really bad. It was supposed to look bad and the truth of the army food is the truth of the army food. They did use powdered milk and it wasn’t so delicious. So that was the joke that had to be focused on. But the food that we actually served on the show was really good.
RYAN: Okay, well there you have it.
JEFF: There you have it. Who asked that question? Oh, Tina Marie.
RYAN: Tina Marie asked that one. Our next question comes from Grace Ann McLeod. Actually, this question was also asked by another person. John Hunt also asked this question. Grace Ann, she sent us an email and said, “Dear Jeff and Ryan, I’m so glad this podcast was recommended to me. I’m loving it and learning a lot. I too grew up watching MASH with my mom, but for a long time now, it’s been my pastime. The world gets unpredictable and frightening, but I can tune it out for 23 minutes at a time by welcoming dear characters into my living room.”
JEFF: Aww
RYAN: “I may know all the lines by heart, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to hear them again and again and again”. That’s really sweet. That’s nice. So here’s the question she has, and again, John Hunt also asked this question. “In the season six opener, Fade Out, Fade In, you have a scene with David Ogden Stiers, but Johnny Haymer is dubbing your voice. Every time I see the episode, I wonder why that is. Did you have laryngitis? Thanks for all you do. Grace Ann McLeod.” And by the way, Grace Ann used to live in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Now lives in London, England. So our first international listener that we know of.
JEFF: Wow
RYAN: Thank you, Grace Ann for contacting us. And also thanks to John Hunt for sending in that same question. So what do you have to say about this question?
JEFF: [in low voice] Well, I don’t know. Let me think about it. I’m not sure what actually happened to my voice at that point. I don’t know. [clears throat, continues in regular voice] Well, here’s the truth. It’s an interesting answer, but I’m not prepared to answer it quite yet.
RYAN: Okay.
JEFF: I would like to answer it and I can’t tell you exactly the number of the podcast I’ll answer it in because I kind of have to think about it. I’m not trying to be cagey or mysterious. It was an important moment for me and why that happened was a significant moment in my life and it has certain relevance to various people who were on the set. And so I’d really like to answer the question because there are two people who have asked it and I want to be honest about it and I will. I just – you just have to give me a couple of weeks and I will answer the question. So you have to listen to the podcast every single episode and I will answer it. Is that fair? Is that fair, Ryan? I don’t know. Is that good?
RYAN: Jeff, have you ever considered a career in politics? Cause you’re really good at answering questions without answers. That was amazing.
JEFF: [laughs] Thank you.
RYAN: I am really impressed by that.
JEFF: I appreciate that very much. I thank you very much.
RYAN: No, I completely understand. This is a big tease now because, you know, everybody’s going to be hotly anticipating the answer to this question. Maybe I’ll just check in with you every now and then on future episodes and say, are you ready to answer it yet?
JEFF: Yeah
RYAN: And you say yes or no, and then we move on.
JEFF: And the reason is there are other people involved that kind of led to that moment. And so I have to kind of figure out how to navigate and what I will feel about those other people when I discuss this. And you know, our podcast is growing in popularity and we want that to continue. And so I want to be very fair to everybody before I say anything that somebody might not like.
RYAN: Sure
JEFF: And I want to be fair to anyone, everyone listening to the podcast because there is some truth to it and it is an interesting story. And I want to tell it, I really do want to tell it’s important to me to eventually tell that story. So stay tuned and I will. So thank you very much for your tolerance and your patience Of course, and I’m going to throw my hat into the presidency of the United States of America. Why not?
RYAN: Hey, everybody else is doing it.
JEFF: Oh, well, we’re not political. We’re not getting political on this show.
RYAN: No we’re not, we’re not
JEFF: I’m not gonna say anything bad about anybody.
RYAN: Our next question is one of several questions that have come in from Lisa Fetsco. Lisa’s one of our faithful listeners. Thank you, Lisa. Then this is really kind of an interesting question. I had never really thought about this, she watches the DVDs and one of the great things about the DVDs of the series MASH is that you can turn off the laugh track
JEFF: Mmm hmm
RYAN: And it’s – it’s fascinating to watch the show without a laugh track. It’s a completely different show without the laugh track. But her question is, with the laugh track off, the pacing of the dialogue seems slower. She says, “like I could tell where the laugh track would eventually be, were these pauses written into the script? The lines weren’t getting stepped on by the laugh track, I don’t think. Just wondering how that was all timed so perfectly.”
JEFF: Good question.
RYAN: Yeah.
JEFF: Lisa, no. None of the scripts nor any of the performances were ever motivated by the laugh track concept. In fact, the producers tried forever to get the laugh track taken out of MASH. There’s only one place in it that the – everybody agreed that the laugh track could go and that was when they were in the OR. But every other scene or every other location, the laugh track was there. But nobody ever said, oh gosh, we got to hold this line or, you know, take a pause here because of a laugh track that would have really ruined the rhythm of the script and the actor’s timing. So not, I think it’s just kind of a thing that you hear, you know, we’re all very, very –, I think we’re all very tuned to the idea that there is a laugh track. So when you don’t hear it, maybe it sounds like there’s a blank space. But in reality, there isn’t a blank space. It’s just that I think we’re all so primed to hear it that if we don’t hear it, it sounds like it’s wrong. But no, nobody ever did anything to try and time the dialogue to a laugh track.
RYAN: So I have a question for you, Jeff. What is your take on the laugh track? I mean, it’s one thing when a show is filmed in front of a live studio audience, obviously the laughs are gonna be very natural and come at the appropriate times, hopefully. But on shows that were not filmed in front of an audience and they would put the canned laughter in, what was your take on that practice?
JEFF: That’s a great question. I don’t think I’ve ever been asked that. So I’m gonna have to really flip around and see if there’s an answer in my head about it.
RYAN: [laughs]
JEFF: I guess I’ve grown up with it. So I’m not as big a purist as I think everybody else might have been connected certainly with MASH who objected to it. I think because it’s a way to force people to think that this is something funny with – instead of actually doing something that’s funny so people will laugh. The psychology behind the laugh track issue is very deep and I think riveted in network beliefs about how to hold on to an audience and the reason they want to hold on to an audience is so that you’ll sit there and wait for the commercial because that’s what pays the bills. So I think that their concept is really steeped in a very serious culture of belief that the laugh track will do that. And by hanging on to the audience, they’re going to be able to sell you more dog food and I think they think that laugh track is part of that experience. I don’t know that. I’ve never been head of a network so I could be full of baloney. But just from my experience in being here in Los Angeles for a number of years, I think that’s probably part of it. But I personally kinda don’t care if there’s a laugh track there or not. I didn’t write MASH and if I had written MASH and if I had been a genius like Larry Gelbart I would have probably been offended that somebody would make the laugh track [fake laugh]. But I’m not a genius like Larry Gelbart so I’m not quite as offended by it. I don’t pay any attention to it, frankly. If I like a show I watch it and if it amuses me I hang in there with it whether there’s a funny stupid canned laugh track or not. Quite frankly, I sometimes object to the audience laughs. I have been to tapings of – I’ve been part of shows, I’ve acted in shows that have a live audience. And I think that they push the audiences to laugh kind of even harder than the laugh or the joke deserves. So some of that is all kind of, you know, manipulated and we’re all audiences and we’re all in a certain way manipulated by that process. I’ve sat in and –
[George squawking]
JEFF: Oh, that’s my bird. I’ve sat in – Either that or they’re slaughtering the hogs out there. I don’t know. Are you slaughtering the hogs, Ben? No, I’m not. Okay, never mind that. So, what was I saying? Who am I? Oh, wait. I’ve sat in reading, so when you get to, you’re going to do a taped show and you’re going to rehearse it and there’s going to be an audience later on, but they go through the table reading and the writers will go [laughs] they’ll laugh like crazy and it’s not that funny, but the writers are going to laugh because they want everybody else to think it’s funny, so they laugh and scream and slap their knees. So I don’t know. You know, I think when it gets down to it and it’s on television and you’re sitting there with your spaghetti and meatballs and you want to watch something, if there’s a laugh track and somebody’s laughing, it may or may not affect you. But you may think whatever you see is funny. So you should have the right to laugh at it and feel good about it. Or if there’s a live audience and they laugh and you should have the right to laugh along with them. I think it’s a real personal thing. [sighs] I gotta nap now. I’m really tired.
JEFF: So do you think we should then add a laugh track to this podcast?
RYAN: We definitely need a laugh track. Please let’s get one. Yeah. Oh yeah, definitely. Oh, wait a minute, in lieu of a laugh track.
[bicycle horn]
RYAN: Hey, it’s back, all right.
JEFF: We can’t afford the laugh track, but
[bicycle horn]
RYAN: I think now would be a good time.
JEFF: To nap.
RYAN: To play a voicemail. I think it would be a good time to play one of our voicemails. We’ve had a couple of them come in.
JEFF: I like that idea, yes.
RYAN: This is one that came in. We asked people to kind of share their stories, their connections with MASH, and here is Grant’s story.
Voicemail from GRANT: Hi, my name is Grant. I live in Maryland and I’ve been a MASH fan – I am 47 years old and I grew up watching MASH with my father who loved the show. My father passed away in 2010 but I still watch it. I got my wife into it. I’ve been with my wife for 24 years and I got her into the show and we followed it on Facebook and we just love the show so much. If I had to pick a favorite episode, I just listened to your podcast three. My favorite episode would probably be when the corporal thought he was, I’m sorry, I think he was Captain, he was Captain Christ, and he thought he was Jesus Christ. And I think the best part is when Major Sidney Freedman asked him, does God answer all prayers? And he says yes, and he said sometimes the answer is no. And that really hit me too because I am a Catholic and I really, it really kinda like, you know what? That’s probably why some of my prayers are not answered. The answer is no. So I guess that was one of my favorite episodes. I think my wife’s episode, Deal Me Out, we’ve watched a million times. Just the fact that they play poker all night and all the things that go on in a matter of the night but we really enjoy this podcast, we love you guys. Igor we love you as always. You were a special server in that mess tent, we love the show, we will continue to watch for many years to come. Thank you guys for starting this podcast and on behalf of everybody that watches MASH, we love you guys and we will continue to watch. Thank you
JEFF: Well, that was about as nice as it could get. How sweet.
RYAN: Yeah.
JEFF: That’s very, very sweet.
RYAN: So thank you, Grant, for calling in. That was a really nice story. And hey, that’s what we want to hear. We want to hear you tell your stories about your connections with MASH and your favorite episodes and why they’re your favorite episodes. So that episode, Quo Vadis, Captain Chandler from season four, written by Burt Perletsky and directed by Larry Gelbart. Yeah, it’s a fantastic story. And that moment that really resonated with him, is a moment that resonates with a lot of people.
SIDNEY: Tell me, is it true that God answers all prayers?
CAPT CHANDLER: Yes. Sometimes the answer is no.
RYAN: We have another voicemail we’ll get to here in just a minute, but so many questions coming in. If somebody is saying, hey, how can I get my question in? Well, there are several different ways. You can email us through our website, which is MashMattersPodcast.com. You can hit us up at Twitter, @MashMatters. Facebook has really been popular with people sending in messages and posting questions. Or you can leave the voicemail 513-436-4077.
JEFF: Cool.
RYAN: So tell you what, Jeff, we’re kind of running out of time here, but there’s one more question here that we can talk about, I think, which is a message that came in from Chris Armstrong. You want to read that one?
JEFF: Chris Armstrong. Let me see if I can find Chris Armstrong.
[dog barking]
RYAN: And that’s my dog in the background.
JEFF: Oh, that’s your doggy in the back. Doggy, doggy, doggy. What kind of doggy is it?
RYAN: He’s a mutt and his name is Walter, as in Walter Eugene O’Reilly. His full name is Walter Eugene Patrick.
JEFF: Aww. I found Chris Armstrong. “Good morning Mr. Maxwell.” Aww, that’s very nice of you to call me Mr. but please call me Mr. “I am a fan of MASH and probably have seen most, if not all of the episodes several hundred times”. You know Chris, you ought to get a job or something. “I joke with my wife and asked her if she’d ever seen this episode presently watching, although I think that joke is getting old. [fake laugh] Ok. “I got hold of the cookbook you wrote, Secrets of the MASH Mess, and thought it was very ingenious”. Thank you! I thought it was pretty good, too. “The cook from MASH writing a cookbook must have been a huge undertaking”. Thank you. “There are a couple of recipes I could not find in there. For instance, Igor’s Has Beans, where you tell Hawkeye these beans are so old, they are has beans, and Hawkeye’s French Toast when he was a cook for the day. Anyway, love the book. Looking forward to trying some of the recipes. Best regards, Chris”. Chris Armstrong, thank you very much for saying all that stuff. You know a couple of recipes I couldn’t find in there. Igor’s has beans. If I left that out, I was an idiot because that’s a great – that was a great recipe I should have put in there. So thank you for pointing out my failings. Do it any time. But I will try and write a sequel and the first recipe in that book is going to be Igor’s Has Beans and the second one’s going to be Hawkeye’s french toast. And that’s because of you, Chris Armstrong.
RYAN: We haven’t really talked about the book that much. The cookbook that you wrote, Secrets of the MASH Mess, now it’s no longer in print. Is that correct?
JEFF: That’s correct.
[Walter barking]
RYAN: But I mean, it still is available out there. You can find it on eBay and you can find, I think there’s even some resellers on Amazon. So you can find the book.
[Walter barking]
RYAN: It is out there and I’m very sorry about my dog in the background.
JEFF: Aww, no.
RYAN: It must be an intruder trying to break into my home right now. That’s all I can guess. Or a leaf just blew across the yard. It’s one of those two.
JEFF: [laughs] I think Walter heard my bird and wants to eat my bird. That’s what’s happening. They may be talking to each other.
RYAN: So the cookbook is still out there, but we haven’t really talked too much about it. But that, I think we can talk more about that in a future episode. It’s just why you wanted to do the book and kind of the story behind the book. One of my favorite stories that you’ve told me was a great story about how Larry Gelbart helped you get the book published. I would love to hear you tell that story someday. Another thing we can do maybe sometime is put some of the recipes from the book maybe on the website so people can try them out.
JEFF: Sure. The book – there’s over about 250 recipes in the book. It really is a viable cookbook. It’s not just a joke. There are great recipes. I spent a lot of time. My wife and I actually spent a lot of time creating those recipes and going to different people, real top chefs to create them, but they just have funny names, but they’re really, really delicious and I make ‘em, we still make ‘em and eat ‘em. So I recommend it. If you can find one, I recommend getting it and trying some of the recipes. They’re really fun and they’re really good.
[Walter barking]
JEFF: So if you’re a MASH fan and you like to eat creamed weenies, you can find the recipe for creamed weenies in there and it’s pretty good.
RYAN: Hold on a second. [walks away] Walter! Walter! Knucklehead! [returns] I love my dog.
JEFF: [laughs]
RYAN: I love my dog
JEFF: I don’t think you cut this out.
BOTH: [laughs]
JEFF: I think you’ll leave you in there. Walter! Walter! Anyway. There you knucklehead.
RYAN: So, okay, we have one more voicemail to play here. Here’s the one from Corey.
Voicemail from COREY: Hi, my name is Corey. I live in Issaquah, Washington. And my question for Private Igor, Jeff, do you have any plans in the future to do anything along the lines of – I don’t know, MASH history, MASH this, that, or the other thing, anything that brings it forward. Are there any plans? Do you have any plans to do something like that or are the other people that are involved? Thanks, loved your show, loved you. You are a fantastic person, man, thanks.
JEFF: Aww, is he talking about me?
RYAN: I think so!
JEFF: Oh, well, Corey, thank you very much for that. I appreciate that, thank you very much. Gee, any plans to take this forward? Well, you know I haven’t announced this thing – I know you and I, Ryan, we wrote a spec script where we – we reset MASH in Alaska and we’ve renamed it MUSH so that may be something that everybody will get excited about it may not be but i’m sorry should I not have said that
RYAN: Now we’re gonna have so many people clamoring to purchase that script I don’t know what we’re gonna do you know. I’m not but the bidding war No, MASH history…
JEFF: Well, you know, I think we’re doing that.
RYAN: Exactly [laughs]
JEFF: I think we’re doing that actually. So Cory, yes, we do have plans to do it. Our plans are to keep doing this and keep listening because you’ll hear more and more stuff about MASH, its history and its future.
RYAN: And you know, a couple of people have asked us because we had the interview with Marc Freeman in the previous episode, and some people have asked, are you going to have other people from the show on? And the answer is we hope so. That’s kind of the plan is – you know, maybe down the road, having more people from either behind the scenes or in front of the camera come on the podcast and be our guest and talk more about the history of MASH. That’s what this podcast is all about is over time, episode after episode to be an oral history of the show. Not only for the people who love the show, but also to reintroduce or to introduce the show to people who have never watched it before.
JEFF: And you know, let’s say down the road that we have an opportunity to talk to one or more of the writers. So if we have a writer or several writers as guests on the show, I’m very curious as to what our listeners would like to ask them. What do you want to ask the writer of the show? I mean, we want to ask Igor if the food was really good, but you know, these guys wrote all these episodes over 11 years. So what’s your burning question to ask a writer. And when we have a writer on the show, we’ll ask the writer. Hey, that sounds like a new podcast: “Ask The Writer”
RYAN: And you can email us those questions at a mashmatterspodcast@gmail.com. You can find that through the website or call and leave your voicemail 513-436-4077. Jeff, I think we’re –
JEFF: Is that it?
RYAN: We’ve pretty much reached our time limit for this episode. We have more questions to get to and we haven’t even gotten to the reviews, but you know what? We’ll save those for another time.
JEFF: Yeah
RYAN: And I would just say if you have not left a review yet on Apple Podcasts or there’s another way to leave a review, which is on our Facebook page. And we’ve had several people go onto our Facebook page and leave ratings for the podcast. So if you’re not on Apple Podcasts and you still want to leave a rating, you can do that at our Facebook page. Just search for MASH Matters podcast on Facebook and you’ll find us. But we appreciate everybody who has left a review online for us and we will read some of those in upcoming episodes.
JEFF: Hey Ryan, we’ve had fun. I’ve had fun and I’ve enjoyed Walter very much. So please pet Walter for me [laughs]. And I look forward to our episode number six.
RYAN: Yes, me too. And hey, um, in the last episode I said, Hey, we need a name for MASH fans. And my friend Joe Swank, who sent us the question about Alan Alda and the Groucho reference, he came up with a pretty good name and I’m just going to throw it out there and see if the people like it. How would you feel about MASH-kateers?
JEFF: [laughs] MASH-kateers [laughs]
RYAN: Just let that one simmer and we’ll still take submissions. What should MASH fans be called? But there’s the first entry, MASH-kateers
JEFF: Okay, I want to make it clear for the Disney Corporation, when they sue us, please call Ryan Patrick. We’ll post his telephone number and his address.
RYAN: That’s true. Yeah, we may not be back for episode six at this point. We’ll find out. Stay tuned and see but yes, that’s our first entry. So until next time, MASH-kateers
JEFF: Miska, muska, MASH-kateer! Yeah, I like it. I don’t like it. Please give me a big glass of beer. I like it.
RYAN: All right. All right. We’ll see you next time.
JEFF: Okay. Bye-bye.