‘M*A*S*H’ Star Mike Farrell Reveals What Shocked Him on First Day on Set

M*A*S*H star Mike Farrell recently revealed what shocked him the most during his first day on the set of the show.

In the April 20 episode of the Still Here Hollywood podcast, Farrell, 87, opened up about joining the series as Captain B. J. Hunnicutt in Season 4. He signed on after Wayne Rogers — who played Trapper John McIntyre — left M*A*S*H at the end of Season 3.

“The first day… We sat down around the table to read the script,” Farrell recalled, noting that right off the bat, it “wasn’t something I hadn’t had a lot of experience with.” He explained, “Most of the time, you walk in, they say, ‘OK, you’re standing there, and here’s when you’re saying, and you’re pointing to him,’ and read the script.”

For M*A*S*H, however, executive producer and frequent director Gene Reynolds, had the cast read completely through the script before seemingly asking them to start over from the beginning. This baffled Farrell even more.

“Gene said, ‘OK, page one.’ And I thought, ‘Was I asleep? Didn’t we just do that?’” he admitted. “‘Oh, Mike,’ he said, ‘Here’s where we go through the script page by page to see if you, the actors, have any thoughts, any ideas, any suggestions.’ And I thought I’d died and gone to heaven… Really? You want to hear from us?”

As it turned out, the writers and directors truly did want to hear from the actors.

“People suggested, ‘Well, you know, this scene might work better if,’ and, ‘How about if Bill did this line instead?'” Farrell recounted. “It was remarkable. And it never stopped being that. It became, for me, a creative community.”

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He added, “If we thought a scene wouldn’t work for this reason or for that reason. If we were doing something that the character — that happened a couple of times — would have a problem with, we want to hear about it.”

To conclude his thoughts on this unique way of filming for M*A*S*H, Farrell shared, “I can’t think of a better experience for working as an actor. And ultimately, I was a writer and a director some of the times. Again, because they encouraged it.”

M*A*S*H aired for 11 seasons from 1972 to 1983. In addition to Farrell, it starred Alan Alda, Loretta Swit, Jamie Farr, William Christopher, Harry Morgan, Gary Burghoff, and Larry Linville, among others.

M*A*S*H, streaming on Hulu, Disney+, and FRNDLY TV