M*A*S*H (1972–1983): Season 3, Episode 19 - Aid Station - full transcript

"I" Company aid station sustained heavy shelling; 4077 are to provide trained personnel until replacements arrive. A surgeon was KIA, and they need a cutter, scrub nurse and a corpsman. Hotlips volunteers. The doctors draw sausages and Hawkeye is drafted; Fr. Mulcahy picks Klinger's card for corpsman duty. Everyone is scared to death; they cover with jokes. Grumpy calls Snow White to check in; the conditions are appalling. There is no roof and no running water; few of the walls are standing. Even Klinger gets "hands on" and Margaret is promoted to actual cutting. The trio works so hard, they each sleep happily on their mats. Back at the 4077, lonely Radar sleeps in Hawkeye's bunk; Henry drinks gin and frets. At the aid station, Margaret is jubilant: they did it! They made chaos orderly and achieved the 8th wonder. On the ride home, Hawkeye makes a sweet confession to Margaret. Klinger dons his best bonnet. Be it ever so much like an upholstered toilet, there's no place like home.

What is this?

Something and eggs.
The yellow stuff is the eggs.

This looks familiar.

I once cut that up
in med school.

I know.
They're little Italian cigars.

I'll have mine
after the theatre.

- I'll eat what you don't want.
- Your death wish is my command.

Two mounds
of mashed potatoes for breakfast?

I think I used to go steady
with that tray.

We could patent that,
you know?

Potato falsies.



Foul mouths!
There is a lady present.

Well, where is there
a lady present?

- Now there's a lady present.
- What's this morning's breakfast?

- Last night's dinner.
- Great.

That was yesterday's lunch.

Will you darn "foolskis"
kindly cut the gabble-gabble?

- "Darn foolskis"?
- [Man On P.A.] Attention.

Officers'call will be held
in Colonel Blake's office at 0700 hours.

- Is that A.D. Or B.C.?
- I don't know. I was never sure about Henry.

Waitress, they're not
paying their check!

Oh!

[Frank] It was just another
disgraceful display of the lack of discipline.

I don't think it's asking too much
for officers to be military at breakfast.

I can't throw up and salute
at the same time.



I see Private Carter has come down
with carnal flu again.

- Get out of there!
- Yes, sir.

- Can we be of some service, Colonel?
- Got an emergency at the front.

You're at the wrong place, Radar.
The emergency's at the front.

- Radar, have you got that message
from "l" Company command?
- I have that message, sir.

"'I' Company aid station
sustained heavy shelling.

MASH 4077 to provide trained personnel
until replacements arrive."

- That's it.
- That's it? Did they enclose a check?

"L" Company's a cheap outfit.

Well, they could've
sent something.

Their surgeon's been killed.

They need a new cutter,
scrub nurse and a corpsman.

- That's all, huh?
- Look, this is a very dangerous mission.

I'm not gonna blow
any sunshine up your skirts.

Any volunteers?

I'll go.

What about a surgeon?

Sure got quiet.

I don't want anything I say
to be misinterpreted.

All right, fair is fair.
We'll draw straws.

- Uh, sir, no straws.
- Well, what have you got?

Um, sausage from breakfast.

I told you they weren't
meant to be eaten.

Okay.

Whoever draws
the short sausage volunteers.

Good luck... Hawk.

I should be excused.
I'm single.

- I have the most kids.
- You're making a mockery of this!

I wouldn't make a mockery of
drawing burnt sausages out of a bed pan...

to pick a volunteer
for the Purple Heart.

[Sausages Rattling]

Frank.

[Chuckling]

- I don't suppose there are
three long sausages in there?
- No, sir.

Then I volunteer.
Hi, bunkie.

- Welcome aboard.
- [Henry] Okay, okay.

Now I gotta find someone
to do the corpsman job.

I have the personnel cards
right here, sir.

Just my luck,
I'll get a lemon.

- I'll pick one.
- I don't trust you, Henry.

You always got
something up your sleeve.

That's fine.
All right, Father, you pick one.

Uh, you do trust
Father Mulcahy?

It says I should on all my money. If you can't
believe your money, who can you believe?

Well...

here we go.

Terrific. I'm knocking my brains out
to get sent home.

- This assignment will get me there in a box.
- Oh, no.

If I don't come back...

this pink strapless number should go to
that big job... the blond from Minneapolis.

Yeah, she'll keep it up.
She's built like a brick blockhouse.

Oh, my mink.

I got this for my interview with
that shrink at H.Q. In Seoul.

- I came that close to a Section Eight discharge.
- [Chuckling]

Then I saw the shrink's coat...
white fox, full-length.

He only wore it on leaves.

It's not easy when the doctors
are nuttier than you are.

- Give it to Lieutenant Brown.
- Aw, come on.

- You're gonna come back. You'll be all right.
- Write.

Tsk. "Mink to Lieutenant Brown."

Ah, that's about it.
The rest isn't worth much.

Just to wear around the tent
when you dust.

Are you scared?

Nah. I'm from Toledo.

My mother was mugged
bringing me home from the hospital.

- So long, buddy.
- Yeah, I'll see you soon, huh?

Sure you will.

- Hey, Klinger.
- Huh?

Uh, the...

Oh! Of course.

Never in the afternoon.

You're making me nervous, Frank!
This is no time to make me nervous.

I know you're sorry
you didn't volunteer, Frank.

I know you didn't volunteer
because you're a married man.

It's practically monogrammed
on your shorts.

And I know you can't leave your wife
on account of the children.

That and the fact that
everything is in her name.

Well, I'm a married man
too, Frank...

married to the army.

I don't want
the future you offer...

meeting behind garbage cans
and behind laundry trucks.

When the war's over...
and nothing good lasts forever...

you'll go home,
home to your wife's bony arms.

I'll still be in the service.

I'm an army brat, Frank.

My father was a colonel and my mother was
a nurse, and I was conceived on maneuvers.

The army's in my blood.
I need its discipline, its traditions.

I thrill to the sight
of a precise parade.

I could faint from looking down
at my own brass.

That's why I volunteered, Frank...
to serve the army I love.

And don't you worry.
I'm coming back...

coming back to you for whatever time
we have left together.

Because I'm not just
Major Margaret Houlihan, army nurse.

I'm also Margaret Houlihan...

frail, vulnerable,
sensitive female.

And if you touch one nurse while I'm gone,
I'll cut your hands off!

- Listen, while I'm gone...
- Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

- Promise me you'll go out with other doctors.
- Yeah, right.

And when you come back, knock twice
and give me five minutes.

And I expect to find
all my after-shave.

I marked the bottle. I need that stuff.
It's my secret weapon.

- You don't drink it?
- Are you crazy? That'll kill ya.

I just gargle it.

- It must be rough up at the front, huh?
- It is in the movies.

There's a letter
in my locker.

- Okay.
- It's my will.

Right.

I leave everything to the
Benjamin Franklin Pierce Memorial Brothel.

I'll deliver it in person.

Shall we drink
to Douglas MacArthur or Ish Kabibble?

I don't know.
They both mean so much to me.

No kidding.
Let's drink to something important.

[Together]
To the Ritz Brothers.

Jeep's ready, Hawk.

Come back soon.

I hate to play
solitaire alone.

[Bang]

- Flat tire, sir.
- Good thinking, Klinger.

- Watch for snipers.
- Yes, ma'am.

Is this more clever than saying
"I ran out of gas"?

I had to arrange an entire Korean War,
but I finally got you alone, Margaret.

Yeah. I'll have the tire
changed in two shakes.

- You'll have it changed?
- Well, you're the surgeon.

We can't risk your
hurting your hands.

[Chuckles]
I'm not gonna let a woman do that.

- Don't think of me as a woman.
- Don't stand in profile.

- This is so ungallant of me.
- Consider it an order. You are under me.

Would t'were that it were.

- [Sighs]
- What?

- The least you could do is get out of the jeep.
- Oh.

Never let it be said
I didn't do the least I could do.

[Explosions Continue]

You'd never know
this is an aid station.

Our red cross got blown off
with the roof.

I finally make a house call,
and the house is gone.

Klinger, come on.

- [Coughs]
- Pierce.

Dever.

- Dever, you wanna start that man
on plasma right away.
- Dennis.

I'll do the initial triage out here,
and then, once I start operating...

you and you will have
to take care of it, all right?

- Find someplace for this man
to lie down, will you?
- Don.

[Explosions Continue]

All right, we'll make this
our sterile area. Margaret.

We'll operate right on the litter.
They're about as sterile as anything we've got.

Put 'em up
on these sawhorses here.

Klinger, prep
the casualties over there.

Get a table or a box or something
to put the instruments on.

- Yes, sir.
- All right, we're in business.

When you're all through,
we'll print the invitations.

- Yes, sir.
- Margaret...

- Yeah, get some of those and pour
a lot of alcohol into them.
- Right.

This is Grumpy calling Snow White.
Grumpy calling Snow White.

Come in, Snow White.

This is Snow White.
How you doing, Klinger?

Ah, we're setting things up.

- Is it terrible?
- [Chuckles]

- It'll take a little work before it's only terrible.
- [Explosion]

- What was that?
- I hope it was just another flat tire.

They're shelling us
with live shells.

Exploding, live shells.
This is Grumpy signing off.

Uh, Sn-Snow White,
over and out.

[Sighs]
Good luck, Grumpy.

- What's his blood pressure?
- 110 over 80.

- Beautiful. Keep him under.
I'm almost done here.
- [Explosion]

Margaret!

Tape this up. Try to keep
the dust off him. Neatness counts.

Got a table for one here.

Right down front.
He can see the whole floor show.

[Groans]

Okay, he's done.
Corpsman.

I'm afraid to move this one.

Start-Start some plasma on him.
He'll hold.

[Margaret]
Doctor, I need you!

- Klinger. Wash up.
- Sir!

Give me some more clamps,
will ya?

Come on over here.
I need some pressure on a bleeder here.

Come on.

Damn Stalin. Truman.
Whoever.

Come on, Nurse, get with it.
Don't you see we need heavier silk?

Frank, you're just sewing up an incision,
not tying up the Queen Mary.

Oh, go mind
your own beeswax.

- Go ahead, Henry. I'll finish up here.
- Any news from the aid station?

Not yet.

Frank, you got enough rope here
for the last roundup.

Well, then you do it...
sir.

It's unfair, making a surgeon work
under these conditions.

Okay, put more pressure
on it.

- All right, that ought to hold him.
- Thank you, Doctor.

You'll be okay.
He's the best.

[Explosions Continue]

How's the blood pressure now?

They keep knocking
the needle around.

You can start
without me, Margaret.

I never cut a man open before.
I'm not a surgeon.

That never stopped me.
Assist the major.

Yes, sir.

[Large Explosion]

How come they
don't get tired?

You gotta irrigate
the wound first.

- It's difficult.
- You may have to open the wound more.

You can do it.
Why should I have all the fun?

[Explosion]

Are they getting closer?

It's an optical illusion.

You can't tell me they'd kill
a medical person on a mission of mercy.

They've already killed
one surgeon here.

I told you,
you can't tell me that.

More casualties coming in!

Colonel Blake, I insist that you order
Mclntyre to stop harassing me.

It's tough enough doing surgery
under these primitive conditions.

Surgery?
You medical moron.

You couldn't cut a salami
without bungling it.

- Oh, yeah?
- That's enough from both of you.

- He started it!
- Frank, I swear I'm gonna
put it in your record...

you don't work
and play well with others.

## [Humming "God Bless America"]

That's enough, Frank.

Fourteen choruses
of"God Bless America" is enough.

- Slacker.
- What?

- I don't chew my cabbage twice.
- [Knocking]

- Who is it?
- Another one of your gang.

Uh, it's me, sir.

- Choppers, Radar?
- Uh, no, sir.

Um, sir,
I'm not feeling too hot.

Maybe it's everything you ate.

No, sir.
Um, the thing of it is...

I'm, uh... I'm lonely.

It's so quiet and everything.

It's okay, Radar.
You can sleep in Hawkeye's bunk.

- Really?
- This is an officers' tent!

- Try to snore importantly, Radar.
- Yes, sir.

And remember, Hawkeye would be very upset
if you had an accident in there.

- Oh, yes, sir.
- Is that it?

You're not going to tuck him in?
No bedtime story?

Radar, do you want me to tuck you in
and tell you a bedtime story?

- No, sir.
- That's it, Frank.

- Then I'll turn this out.
- Sir, uh, do you have a night-light?

Hi, guys.

[Trapper] Sorry, Henry. You can't
check in without baggage.

- [Frank] Anything we can do for you?
- No, no.

I just stopped in for a nightcap.
I ran out.

In a few hours,
that'll be gin.

- Who's sleeping in that bed?
- Goldilocks. Her number came up.

- It's me, sir.
- Oh. What are you doing here?

Captain Mclntyre promoted him.

Frank, it's after 6:00.
You can stop being snotty.

- Good night, Radar.
- Good night, sir.

Nobody went to the movie.

It's, uh, Sherlock Holmes.

The butler did it.

Aw, I was gonna see that
tomorrow night.

I was kidding, Frank.
The maid did it.

Good movie.

It sure is quiet.

Guess you guys wanna
go to sleep, huh?

- [Trapper] Henry?
- Yo?

They're okay.

- Yeah, sure.
- Are you worried about them?

I sent them,
remember, Frank?

Their commanding officer?

Back home, my biggest decisions are whether
or not to have my own bowling ball made...

and do I get the cat fixed.

Sending people to the front's
just not my speed.

[Crickets Chirping]

[Sighs]

Would you like another can?

No, thanks.
I ate before I left America.

Klinger's asleep.

Yeah, he collapsed
about an hour ago.

Time flies
when you're having fun.

- He did good work.
- He's a credit to his bloomers.

May I clear the table?

Some dessert?
Would you like to see the pastry tank?

We have some
military favorites:

Napoleonic War, Pie Alamo,
Caramel Custer.

No, thanks.

[Sighs Deeply]

We did it.

My lips are sealed.

Do you suppose
there are snipers out there?

If they're good union snipers,
they are.

I want you to know,
chivalry isn't dead.

It's just been replaced
by exhaustion.

Good night, Captain.

Good night, Major.

- Radar?
- Sir? Oh.

Sir, they're on
their way back.

- Really?
- Yes, sir.

Klinger just called and, uh,
the replacements have arrived...

and they're safe and they're okay
and they're safe and everything.

- I gotta have a drink.
- Yes, sir.

- You drank it all.
- Radar, do you believe me?

I never have, sir.

Uh, you better tell
Captain Mclntyre and Major Burns.

You know, some people are just born to
take charge. You know what I mean, Radar?

Yeah, I guess he knows
what I mean.

Well, there it is.

We made it back
to the fort, Emmy Lou.

I never thought I'd be happy
to see that upholstered toilet again.

- Excuse me, ma'am.
- Major, I gotta tell you something.

But if you repeat this
to anyone, I'll deny it.

You are my favorite officer
in the whole U.S. Army.

Same goes for me, Major.
You're aces.

Thank you, Corporal, Doctor.

I always go for the popcorn
when it gets to the mushy part.

Right. Okay.

Ready for the army again.

# Over hill, over dale #

#We will hit the dusty trail #

#As those caissons
go rolling along #

## [All Singing,
Voices Overlapping]

#As those caissons
go rolling along #

# For it's hi, hi, hee
in the hoo-hoo, ha-ha hee #

# Shout out your numbers
loud and strong ##

Cold and noisy.

Those shells
make a lot of noise.

I don't know how the guys
in the war movies can take it.

I know. Right.

- But how was it?
- It was rough.

Klinger worked so hard,
he got a run in his legs.

But, uh, how was the major?

Pretty damn good.

You fink.
Start from the top.

- Oh, no, nothing like that.
- But you just said...

She worked like a trooper
above and beyond the call.

Boy, your mind
is in the gutter.

I can't help it.
It's attached to my body.

Come on, will ya? A man and a woman
can have a constructive relationship...

that's based on mutual respect.

- Of course.
- You!

Oh, I just love that.

"Dr. Pierce and I performed like a well-oiled
machine under very difficult circumstances.

It was an exhilarating experience."

And I don't exhilarate you,
I suppose?

You're not the easiest woman in the world
to exhilarate, let me tell you that, Margaret.

I mean... I mean, I don't want that to sound
like it means what it sounds like.

I was just so jealous.
I missed you so.

I slept with one of your boots
under my pillow.

Honest. Really.

I wrote you the longest
love letter of my life.

It takes up almost
a whole roll of toilet paper.

Oh, Margaret.

- Margaret, you're back.
- I have a headache, Frank.

I knew it.
I knew it!

"Well-oiled machine."

Where is everything?

I said give it away
in case l... you know.

- Yeah, I know, but...
- The green neg was my favorite.

- I was gonna wear it for dinner...
my first night back.
- Well, I tried, but...

You guys at the rear have no respect
for the front-line troops...

stealing our dresses.

I just wish I could make out
what it was I was eating.

All it needs
is a little salt.

And pepper.
Mustard, catsup, sauce, flavor.

And, of course,
the coffee's cold again.

It's getting better.
It's less purple.

[Frank]
Oh, this camp is impossible.

I don't believe the conditions
we're expected to put up with.

I mean, really. I know there's a war going on,
but we can't be treated like animals.