(*PERSONNEL FILE*) Sgt. Zelmo Zale
Lord love a bit player. All the glory goes to the main characters in MASH’s character-driven dramatic tapestry, but where would they be without the smaller ones to make them look good? Praise is overdue for a guy like Zale, who, for a quick bit of conflict or tension, is always there when you need him.
Like his recurring adversary, Klinger, Zale has a salt-of-the-earth quality about him. He’s a regular guy who drinks, plays poker, and fights. Unlike Klinger, he has questionable morals (as seen in “Of Moose and Men,” when he goes into a rage over his wife’s cheating while he is also cheating) and isn’t that terrific at his job (in “Patent 4077,” he boasts that he can design a new clamp, but his prototype succeeds only in pinching Hawkeye’s hand). Johnny Haymer, born Haymer Flieg, delivers time and time again with his brash, straightforward demeanor and impish face—Zale is a fractious little toad, none too likeable, not completely unlovable.
Why shouldn’t Zelmo be kind of a jerk, forever carrying a chip on his shoulder? He would probably argue that there’s no one else to defend him—in the world of the MASH, he is the proverbial little guy. He doesn’t have the flair of a Klinger or the sweetness of a Radar to attract friends to himself; nor can he throw weight around, lacking the elevated status of, say, Major Frank Burns. Zale is the supply sergeant and also the camp electrician. That is to say, he holds a not-unimportant place in the company for the seven seasons in which he appears. But when he is arrogant—as when he makes sure to carve “Z.Z.” into the clamp handle—or aggressive, or stubborn, these are the only times he’s really noticed.
We can infer that this man doesn’t have much love for the surgeons, seeing them as stuck-up, their personal concerns silly. So who needs him? We do, not just for conflict, but for verisimilitude. Everyone has those people they come up against once a week or so, perhaps mildly annoying, but in no way central to their lives. (Consider that an alternate-universe show from Sgt. Zale’s point of view would encounter Hawkeye and the rest but seldom, focusing more on the problems of the enlisted men.) Zale, then, doesn’t deserve any more time than he gets. That’s the beauty of him.
