M*A*S*H Page #10

TIME LAPSE:

EXT. MASH COMPOUND – DAY

Trapper, Hawkeye and Duke emerge from the hospital in

fatigues. Some enlisted men are tossing a football around.

One of them makes a wild throw and the ball rolls to a stop

at Trapper's feet. He stops to look at it and the other two

halt with him. Then very slowly, Trapper leans over and picks

up the ball, waving Hawkeye downfield.

Hawkeye complies unquestioningly and when he is about thirty

yards away, Trapper whips a perfect pass into his arms.

Hawkeye just stands where he is, holding the ball, oblivious

of the enlisted men who want it back, as Trapper and Duke

continue toward him.

Revelation jolts him with apocalyptic force.

HAWKEYE:

Jesus to Jesus and eight hands around!

Duke, did I ever tell you how I beat

Dartmouth by intercepting a pass?

DUKE:

Sixteen times.

HAWKEYE:

We didn't have a chance, little

Androscoggin College against the Big

Green, but there was this blizzard

and we held then nothing nothing

till the last twenty seconds. Then

this great passer of theirs let one

go, snow and all...

TRAPPER:

Lucky you didn't have your mouth

open or it would have gone down your

throat.

HAWKEYE:

He's Trapper John! Only man in history

who ever found fulfillment in the

ladies' can of a Boston and Maine

Railroad car! When the Conductor

caught him in there with his Winter

Carnival date, she screamed: 'He

trapped me!' What have you been doing

since those days, Trapper?

DUKE:

What does he have to do? A score

like that, a man could just live on

his reputation.

The enlisted men, increasingly concerned about their football,

are muttering mutinously to each other. Hawkeye is too carried

away about Trapper's identity to notice this till Trapper

calls it to his attention.

TRAPPER:

(to Hawkeye)

Ball.

Hawkeye looks at the football and at the enlisted men, and,

finally getting the point, throws it back to them.

TRAPPER:

(relieved to find

another subject)

What gives over there?

They look across the compound to the Shower Tent, behind

which an Army truck full of GIs has just pulled up. While

Hawkeye and Duke explain what's going on to Trapper, and the

three of them move in for a closer look, we see the visiting

GIs drop one by one from the rear of the truck, pay their

admission fees and take their places in the line leading up

to the strategically placed peep hole in the rear corner of

the tent.

DUKE:

Must be Painlees Pole Day in the

Shower Tent.

HAWKEYE:

(to Trapper)

You met him. Walt Waldowski, the

Dental Officer.

DUKE:

Nice guy, for an enamel surgeon.

TRAPPER:

What are they peeking at? Captain

Waldowski in the shower?

HAWKEYE:

Part of him. Painless is the owner

and operator of the Pride of Hamtrack.

That's where he comes from...

Hamtrack, Michigan.

DUKE:

Best equipped dentist in the whole

goddam Army. Care to have a look, a

man with your background?

HAWKEYE:

Way we hear it, the Pride is supposed

to have run up the highest lifetime

batting average ever recorded in

Wayne County.

EXT. SHOWER TENT – DAY

Corporal Judson from Mississippi takes his turn at the

peephole. His speech is that of the rural southern black.

JUDSON:

Ah'd purely love to see it angry.

TIME LAPSE:

INT. OPERATING ROOM – NIGHT

Hawkeye and Duke are working on a patient about whose chances

their faces reveal extreme pessimism. The nurse in attendance

is Leslie.

Hawkeye takes the patient's blood pressure and frowns at the

reading.

HAWKEYE:

This kid looks like a loser. Maybe

we better get the bead-jiggler to

put in a fix.

DUKE:

(to Leslie)

Call Dago Red.

TIME LAPSE:

INT. OPERATING ROOM – NIGHT

Without interfering with the administration of blood and

other medical measures, Dago Red is just finishing giving

last rites to the patient.

DAGO RED:

...May God remit unto thee the pains

of the present and future life, open

to thee the gates of heaven, and

bring thee to everlasting life.

(makes the sign of

the Cross)

May Almighty God bless thee, Father,

Son and Holy Ghost.

Rate this script:4.0 / 1 vote