Alan Alda is revered not only for his role as Hawkeye Pierce on the iconic TV series “MAS*H,” but also for his ability to triumph against adversity throughout his life.
With his role as the witty Dr. Benjamin Franklin “Hawkeye” Pierce on the long-running TV show, the now-86-year-old actor, director, and writer became a household name throughout the world.
Unfortunately, he now has to deal with Parkinson’s disease, and he has lately spoken out about some of the main difficulties associated with it.
The final episode of the military comedy and drama MAS*H, which aired from 1972 to 1983, is still one of the most-watched finales in television history.
The role of Alan Alda on the hit show earned him six Golden Globe Awards as Best Actor in a Television Series.
Even though he came from a famous family in the entertainment industry, the famous actor had a difficult and traumatic childhood.
Alan Alda
Alan, who was born in the Bronx in 1936, spent his early years on the road with his family as his father pursued a career as a burlesque performer. His mother, Joan Browne, was a beauty pageant winner and homemaker; his father, Robert Alda (born Alfonso Giuseppe Giovanni Roberto D’Abruzzo), was an actor and singer.
It was stated in Alan’s autobiography, “Never Have Your Dog Stuffed — and Other Things I’ve Learned,” that his father spent many nights away from home working and that his mother had mental health issues.
Many families were left to cope alone with mental illness since it was a taboo subject and there were few resources available in the 1940s and 1950s.
“How much easier it could have been for my father and me to face her illness together; to compare notes, to figure out strategies. Instead, each of us was on [our] own,” he wrote in his 2005 memoir.
As his father worked late, he and his mother would remain up together, and he remembered a terrifying event from when he was six years old.
Robert’s wife had already made up her mind that he had been cheating on her when he returned home. When Alan’s parents got into a disagreement, Alan’s mother became angry and tried to stab his dad in the back with a paring knife. Alan took the knife from his parents and slammed it into the table, bending the point before anyone was hurt.
When he brought it up to his parents a few weeks later, he admits they had no idea what he was talking about and his mother told him he was imagining things.
Polio is a crippling and perhaps fatal condition that was identified with Alan the next year.
“I got it when I was 7,” he said to AARP magazine. “I had a stuffy nose at Warner’s movie theater—honking the whole evening. I couldn’t clear my nose. When I got home, I threw up, and my legs were unsteady. The next day, I had a stiff neck. I couldn’t sit up in bed.”
