I was sitting in a soundproof studio recently, recording an episode for a podcast, when the host threw an entirely unexpected question my way.

He leaned into his microphone, looked at his notes, and asked, “Alan, you spent eleven incredible years on the set of MAS*H. What was the most physically exhausting prank the cast ever pulled on each other?”

I had to pause for a second.

My mind instantly raced back to the dusty, chaotic soundstages at 20th Century Fox.

I smiled, leaning closer to the microphone, because one specific, ridiculous memory immediately bubbled up to the surface.

It involved Gary Burghoff.

Gary, as everyone knows, played the iconic character of Radar O’Reilly.

Radar was the absolute heartbeat of the 4077th, always one step ahead of everyone, always running frantically around the compound.

And he never went anywhere without his trademark wooden clipboard.

That clipboard was practically an extension of Gary’s own arm.

We were deep into filming a particularly exhausting season of the show.

We had been shooting a highly complex, chaotic pre-op scene all day long.

The script called for Radar to burst through the double doors of the hospital ward in an absolute, breathless panic.

He was supposed to run up to me and Wayne Rogers, hand over his clipboard with the latest casualty reports, deliver a rapid-fire line of dialogue, and then sprint right back out the door.

Simple enough.

But Wayne and I were feeling incredibly punchy.

The filming hours were incredibly long, the studio lights overhead were brutally hot, and we desperately needed a laugh just to keep our sanity intact.

While Gary was briefly off set grabbing a quick cup of coffee, Wayne spotted a pile of solid lead stage weights sitting near a heavy lighting stand.

Wayne looked closely at the heavy weights.

Then he looked over at me.

Then we both looked at Gary’s unattended clipboard resting peacefully on the nearby props table.

We didn’t even need to speak a single word to each other.

We walked over, grabbed a roll of heavy-duty gaffer tape, and secretly strapped about twenty-five pounds of solid lead securely to the back of that wooden clipboard.

We quietly placed it right back exactly where Gary had left it, making absolutely sure it looked perfectly normal from the front.

The assistant director loudly yelled for everyone to take their places for the next take.

Wayne and I stepped inside the hospital ward, pulling our green surgical masks up over our faces.

Gary quickly returned to his designated mark just outside the double doors.

The director yelled action.

The heavy film cameras finally started rolling.

Wayne and I stood there in complete silence, our eyes wide with intense anticipation over the tops of our surgical masks.

We could hear Gary shuffling his boots on the other side of the set, getting completely ready for his big, frantic entrance.

The tension in the room was almost unbearable.

And that’s when it happened.

Gary aggressively grabbed the clipboard from the props table and immediately hit the double swinging doors.

But the precise moment he lifted it, you could visibly see the absolute shock register in his eyes.

He was completely expecting a few ounces of thin wood and paper.

Instead, he was suddenly holding the physical equivalent of a heavy bowling ball.

Now, Gary was always a consummate professional, incredibly dedicated to his craft and the specific physical comedy of Radar.

He decided in a split second that he was going to bravely push through the scene no matter what happened.

He burst through those double doors exactly on cue, but his entire center of gravity was violently thrown off.

He was leaning completely to his right side, dragging this tremendously heavy piece of wood like it was a rusted boat anchor.

His usual bouncy, nervous sprint quickly turned into a bizarre, strained, agonizing shuffle across the set.

Wayne and I were standing at the operating table, and we could immediately see him struggling mightily.

Underneath our surgical masks, we were biting the insides of our cheeks so hard they were almost bleeding.

Gary finally made it to the operating table, completely out of breath.

He lifted the twenty-five-pound clipboard with both hands, his arms visibly trembling from the sheer exertion of the movement.

He delivered his rapid-fire dialogue perfectly, without missing a single syllable or dropping a word.

Then came the critical moment of truth.

He had to physically hand the massive clipboard over to me.

Gary extended his trembling arms across the operating table, offering me the heavy burden so he could make his exit.

I reached out, pinched the very upper corner of the clipboard with just my thumb and index finger, and gently pulled.

I pretended it was as light as a feather.

I completely refused to take the actual, physical weight of the thing from his tired hands.

Gary’s eyes went incredibly wide.

He was completely trapped in the middle of our joke.

He couldn’t let go, or the twenty-five pounds of solid lead would crash right through the flimsy prop operating table and destroy the scene.

So he just stood there, sweating profusely under the brutal studio lights, holding all the weight while I casually flipped through the blank paper.

I purposely took my sweet time, slowly reading the fake casualty report as if it were a fascinating novel.

Wayne was standing right next to me, vibrating with silent, intense laughter.

I could hear him making muffled, high-pitched squeaking noises because he was trying so hard not to ruin the take.

The director, sitting quietly behind the camera, had absolutely no idea what was going on between us.

He was completely confused as to why Gary Burghoff looked like he was participating in an Olympic powerlifting competition just to deliver a piece of paper.

“Cut!” the director finally yelled out, totally bewildered by the performance.

He stepped out from behind the heavy camera equipment, aggressively scratching his head.

“Gary,” the director asked, “why in the world are you standing like that during this scene?”

Gary simply couldn’t hold it together for another second.

He opened his hands and completely dropped the clipboard.

It hit the studio floor with a massive, deafening thud that sharply echoed across the entire soundstage.

The sound was so incredibly loud it actually startled the sound mixer working up above, who jumped and almost dropped his heavy audio equipment directly onto the set.

Wayne and I instantly ripped our surgical masks off and collapsed against the nearby prop tables, roaring with unrelenting laughter.

The camera operator was laughing so hard he actually had to step away and sit down on a wooden apple box just to catch his breath.

The director walked over, knelt down, inspected the massive lump of stage weights safely taped to the back of the wood, and just shook his head in absolute disbelief.

Multiple retakes failed miserably that afternoon because every single time Gary walked through those doors with the normal clipboard, Wayne and I would instantly burst into hysterics all over again.

Gary eventually got his revenge on us, of course.

But that specific afternoon remains one of my absolute favorite memories from the show.

It was chaotic, spontaneous, and wonderfully harmless.

When you are filming a television show dealing with incredibly heavy themes every single week, those brief moments of levity are a true emotional lifeline.

You absolutely have to find creative ways to break the tension on set.

And sometimes, you find that necessary humor by strapping a pile of heavy lead to your co-star’s everyday props.

Looking back on it now, I wouldn’t trade those absurd, laugh-filled afternoons for anything in the world.

Have you ever played a harmless prank on a coworker that escalated into absolute chaos?