We were sitting on a stage in Beverly Hills for one of those big anniversary retrospectives, and the moderator asked that one question I have heard probably ten thousand times since 1972.

They always want to know if I kept the dresses, or which one was my favorite, or if I ever got used to the high heels.

I looked over at Alan Alda, who was sitting two chairs down from me, and he already had that mischievous glint in his eye because he knew exactly which memory was bubbling up to the surface.

You have to understand the reality of filming MAS*H.

On your television screen, it looked like a cold, damp camp in the middle of a Korean winter, but in reality, we were usually out at the Fox Ranch in Malibu Creek.

It would be a hundred and five degrees in the shade, and the dust was so thick you could chew it.

The rest of the guys were in these thin olive-drab fatigues, which were miserable enough, but I was usually strapped into a corset, three layers of petticoats, and a wig that felt like a wool heater stapled to my scalp.

On this particular afternoon, we were losing the light, which is a polite way of saying the director was starting to sweat through his shirt and the Director of Photography was screaming about the sun disappearing behind the mountains.

I was dressed in this incredibly elaborate, floor-length, Scarlett O’Hara-style velvet gown, complete with a massive hoop skirt and a feathered hat that caught every breeze like a sail.

The scene was supposed to be a serious briefing in front of Colonel Potter’s tent.

Harry Morgan was standing there, looking as professional and stern as a statue, waiting for me to make my grand, sweeping entrance from behind a jeep to hand him a set of reports.

I felt the weight of the velvet pulling at my shoulders, and the heels of my pumps were disappearing two inches into the soft, sun-baked dirt with every step I took.

I heard the assistant director yell for quiet, and the camera started rolling.

I took a deep breath, adjusted my bodice, and prepared to give the performance of a lifetime.

And that’s when it happened.

The plan was simple enough: I was supposed to glide into the frame, stop perfectly at attention, and deliver a crisp salute while looking like a Southern belle who had lost her way to the plantation.

But as I rounded the corner of the jeep, the massive hoop skirt decided it had a mind of its own.

The wire frame caught on the rear bumper of the vehicle, but because I was moving with such momentum, the dress didn’t just stop.

It acted like a giant spring.

The bumper held the back of the skirt, the front of the skirt kept moving, and suddenly, the entire apparatus began to tip me forward like a very expensive, very hairy catapult.

I didn’t just trip; I performed a slow-motion, graceful dive directly into the California dust.

Because the dress was so structured and the petticoats were so thick, I didn’t even hit the ground like a normal person.

I landed face-first, but the hoop skirt stayed pinned to the jeep, which meant my legs were kicked up in the air behind me, encased in layers of lace, while my face was buried in the dirt.

I looked like a giant, inverted flower that had been planted by a madman.

For a second, there was absolute silence on the set.

You could hear a hawk circling overhead.

Then, I heard a sound that I will never forget as long as I live.

It started as a tiny, high-pitched wheeze, like a teakettle beginning to boil.

I turned my head slightly in the dirt and looked up.

Harry Morgan, the man who had spent decades playing the toughest, most professional characters in Hollywood history, was vibrating.

His face had turned a shade of purple I didn’t know was biologically possible.

He was trying so hard to stay in character as Colonel Potter that he was literally shaking.

Finally, he just let out this guttural, explosive honk of a laugh and doubled over, pointing at my legs waving in the air.

That was the signal.

The entire crew, who had been terrified to ruin the take because of the fading light, just absolutely lost it.

The cameraman actually had to step away from the tripod because he was laughing so hard he was worried he would knock the equipment over.

Alan and Mike Farrell, who were standing nearby, ran over, but they weren’t running to help me up.

They were running to get a better look at the spectacle.

I was trapped.

The hoop was still hooked on the bumper, and the velvet was so heavy I couldn’t get enough leverage to push myself up.

Every time I tried to move, the skirt would just bounce me back down into the dust.

I was like a turtle flipped on its back, only I was a turtle in a size twelve gown with a feathered hat.

I finally just gave up and stayed there, face-down in the dirt, yelling, “A little help for the lady of the house?”

That sent everyone into a second wave of hysterics.

It took three grips and a wardrobe assistant to unhook me from the jeep.

By the time they got me standing, the sun was completely gone.

We had lost the day’s filming entirely because of my skirt’s argument with a Willys Jeep.

Usually, the producers would be furious about losing time like that, but nobody could even look at me without starting to giggle again.

Burt Metcalfe, our director, just wiped tears from his eyes and told everyone to go home because there was no way we were getting another serious take out of Harry that night.

For years afterward, whenever I’d walk onto the set in a particularly large outfit, the crew would start making “beep-beep” backing-up noises, warning the vehicles to stay out of my way.

It became one of those legendary stories that bonded us.

It reminded us that even when we were trying to make a show about the horrors of war, we were still just a bunch of people in the middle of a field, wearing ridiculous costumes and trying to make each other laugh.

That was the magic of that cast.

We worked hard, but we never let the seriousness of the job get in the way of a good, honest disaster.

I still have a photo somewhere of me lying in that dirt, legs in the air, with Harry Morgan looming over me, laughing his head off.

It’s probably my favorite memory of the whole decade we spent together.

What’s the most embarrassing thing your wardrobe has ever done to you in public?