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Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about movies and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the Movie urban legends featured so far.

MOVIE URBAN LEGEND: Robert Altman’s son made over a million dollars writing the lyrics to “Suicide is Painless.”

“Happy accidents” are common in the world of entertainment. as there often needs to be a rare confluence of events for anything to become a hit, but a particularly odd branch of hit songs are the ones where the artists behind the song truly did not believe in the material. In the past, I’ve spotlighted the story of how the hit Strawberry Alarm Clock song “Incense and Peppermints” was recorded by a teenager hanging out in the studio because no one in the band wanted to sing such a dumb song and how the classic hit song “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye” was recorded by a made-up band name because the songwriters didn’t want to be associated with such a dumb song. In the “proud” tradition of those artists, then, we have for you the story of how a teenager was enlisted to help write the “stupidest song ever written” and how said song then made millions.

1970’s hit film M*A*S*H* was a big break for director Robert Altman, who, at that point, was mostly known for directing television shows like Bonanza (although he had directed two motion pictures in the two years preceding M*A*S*H*). After the success of the film, he went on to become one of the most acclaimed directors of his generation, garnering five Academy Award nominations for Best Director over a career that lasted into the 21st Century. However much Altman owed the film for his future success as a director, in strictly financial terms the film was not a major windfall for him. In fact, that was almost certainly a major factor in him getting the job – that he was cheaper than a “name” director. So for the film he made $70,000, which was good money, of course, but noticeably less than what a major director would net for a film at the time. Now the Altman family, however, made out a good deal better, as Altman’s teenage son made millions off of the film.

There is a notable scene in the film where one of the characters, Walter “Painless Pole” Waldowski (played by John Schuck), decides that he wants to kill himself. So the other characters in the film then have a “Last Supper” for him and then give him a sort of “honorary” suicide. During the silly ceremony, another character, Private Seidman (played by Ken Prymus) sings a song for him while playing an acoustic guitar.

The acclaimed film composer Johnny Mandel was brought in by Altman to write the melody for the song. Mandel recalled the situation to Marc Myers a few years ago:

Mandel: I was brought in before the movie was even shot, which was highly unusual. In most cases, you’re the Mash last one in the line to see the film when scoring it. So Bob and I were sitting around getting rather ripped one night. Bob said to me, “You know, I need a song for the film. It’s that Last Supper scene, after the guy says he’d going to do himself with a pill because his life is over, because couldn’t get it up with the WAC the night before.” I said, “A song for that?” He said, “Yeah, that Last Supper scene where the guy climbs into the casket and everybody walks around the box dropping in things like scotch, Playboy and other stuff to see him into the next world. There’s just dead air there.”

Myers: But if I recall, the scene features just a guy singing with an acoustic guitar.

Mandel: Right. Bob said, “We’ve got one guy in the shot Mash1 who can sing and there’s another guy who knows three chords on the guitar so we can’t use an orchestra.” Bob also said the song had to be called Suicide Is Painless. “Since [Capt.] Painless commits suicide with a pill, that would be a good title,” he said. Then he said, “It’s got to be the stupidest song ever written.”

Myers: What went through your mind?
Mandel: I said to myself, “Well I can do stupid.” Bob was going to take a shot at the lyrics. But he came back two days later and said, “I’m sorry but there’s just too much stuff in this 45-year-old brain. I can’t write anything nearly as stupid as what we need.”

Myers: So who wrote the lyrics?
Mandel: Bob said, “All is not lost. I’ve got a 15-year-old kid who’s a total idiot.” So Michael Altman, at age 15 [Mandel is slightly off on the age here. Altman was born in 1955 and the film was released in January of 1970, so he was definitely 14 at the time, not 15 – BC], wrote the lyrics, and then I wrote the music to them. It was the first scene in the movie that they were going to shoot. They had to have the song for it as a pre-record, so the actor could mouth the words, allowing for a dub later.

Since the song was prepared before the movie was even finished, Altman got to hear it a lot and as it turned out, he really liked it. He decided to try it out as the song that is played over the opening credits (in a new version sung by session singers John Bahler, Tom Bahler, Ron Hicklin and Ian Freebairn-Smith, none of whom were credited on the film). Mandel thought it was a terrible idea but gave up on arguing the point when he realized that Altman had made his mind up on the matter.

The movie became a big hit and an instrumental version of the song became the theme song to the M*A*S*H* TV series that followed the film.

In an 1985 interview on The Tonight Show, Altman remarked that his son had made over a million dollars from the song at that point from royalties (the song’s co-writer of course gets paid even if only the melody is used and the songwriters get paid every time the song is played, including every syndicated rerun of M*A*S*H*). Years of syndication later, the royalties are certainly well into the multiple millions.

And all for “the stupidest song ever written.” Not bad for a fourteen-year-old!

The legend is…

STATUS: True

Feel free (heck, I implore you!) to write in with your suggestions for future installments! My e-mail address is bcronin@legendsrevealed.com.