Gary Burghoff makes Radar O'Reilly's innocence funny without treating it as stupidity. We prefer his gentler television performance to the darker film version: the timing is precise, and the character's vulnerability matters as much as the joke.
Fi1m perspective
Radar O'Reilly caring for animals is a small but telling part of Gary Burghoff's work in MASH* (1972). The company clerk's concern is straightforward, and Burghoff does not need to make him wise before asking us to take him seriously. We were moved by his tenderness towards them, because he makes Radar's vulnerability as evident as his affection. His innocent Radar gives this humane comedy someone who need not be witty to matter.
Burghoff had already played the title role in the stage musical You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown (1967) before making his film debut in Robert Altman's MASH* (1970). His original Radar was darker and more sardonic, a closer fit with the film's abrasive company. We find the film funny, but its indulgence of the surgeons' bullying limits the pleasure. Burghoff's move to television gave him the chance to change the character substantially.
He was the only actor from the film to become a series regular, and Larry Gelbart helped him make the clerk more innocent. Alongside Alan Alda's Hawkeye Pierce, that change gives the comedy a different kind of timing: Radar need not match the doctor's sophistication to be funny. Burghoff makes the contrast work through precise reactions and a willingness to seem unprotected. It is funny, attentive supporting work.
There are limits to this approach. Such an innocent character can become a convenient way for a comedy to remind us of its decency, and the series does sometimes lecture when a scene would do. Its dated jokes remain a caveat, too; Burghoff's warmth does not excuse them. But his emotional openness is a substantial reason to stay with the ensemble.
We have a much clearer sense of Radar than of Burghoff beyond him. Later opportunities were restricted by typecasting, and these two versions of one role cannot tell us everything he might have done. They do show an actor capable of reconsidering a successful performance rather than simply repeating it. Start with the television series, provided the occasional sermon does not send you reaching for the remote.
Biography
Gary Burghoff is an American actor. He was born on 24 May 1943 in Bristol, Connecticut. He first gained notice playing Charlie Brown in the original 1967 Off-Broadway production of the musical You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown.
Burghoff made his feature film debut as Cpl. Walter 'Radar' O'Reilly in Robert Altman's MASH (1970). He was the only actor from the film to reprise the role as a regular in the long-running television series MASH (1972–1979). He received six Emmy Award nominations for the series and won in 1977 for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series. Burghoff left after the seventh season but returned for a two-part farewell episode in the eighth season.
