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The cast of ‘Little House on the Prairie’ opens up about the harsh reality of filming the hit TV series.
The actors were invited to Patrick Labyorteaux’s podcast to discuss their experience on the show. He asked Alison Arngrim, who played the role of Nellie Oleson, what the first day was like for her.
“Complete chaos and confusion,” Arngrim admitted.
‘LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE’ STAR SAYS CHILD ACTORS ARE ‘ABANDONED’ AFTER HOLLYWOOD FAMOUS FAN
Alison Arngrim, along with other members of the “Little House on the Prairie” cast, opened up about their experiences filming the series. (NBCU/NBCUniversal Photo Bank via Getty Images)
She explained that she didn’t know she was supposed to show up with her character’s signature curls: “So there was a lot of panic and phone calls and then a massive curl of my hair. So yeah, bananas. And then the first day on location, of course, I passed out.”
“So I got off to an exciting start at that point,” she added.
The conversation also included fellow actors Dean Butler, Pamela Roylance and Jennifer Donati, as well as Tracy and Victor French, the children of the late actor Victor French.
Labyorteaux also starred in “Little House on the Prairie” as Andy Garvey.
During a later conversation about how hot it was in Simi Valley, where the series was filmed, Arngrim joked that the cast and crew were able to tell when summer was coming because “the first day of summer is when Alison hits the ground, because I was outside like that. It was so hot.”
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Michael Landon directs Melissa Gilbert and Melissa Sue Anderson in an episode of “Little House on the Prairie.” (NBCU Photo Bank)
Speaking again about her first day on set, she explained that she was “very disciplined”, walked up to the director and said: “Excuse me, I think I’m going to pass out” before “completely losing consciousness and falling”.
“It’s like the challenge is not to pass out,” she continued. “It was crazy, though – the great thing was other people started passing out, so people realized it wasn’t me, the first being Sean Penn.”
Penn, who was a child at the time, “didn’t wake up and come back to work. That was it, he was done for the day.”
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Arngrim said: “That’s when they decided maybe it wasn’t just me, that it was actually that hot.”
Later in the podcast, the topic of their least favorite episodes came up, and Arngrim shared that she didn’t like episodes involving sporting events because it meant sitting in the stands “where it was 100 million degrees” for hours while crew members filmed reaction shots.
Several cast members from the show agreed that filming in Simi Valley was extremely hot. (NBCU Photo Bank)
She remembers one such shoot where Charlotte Stewart, who played schoolteacher Eva Beadle Simms, “was just sitting there, and she actually passed out and fainted and passed out, but she just didn’t fall, and they didn’t know she was out.”
Of the stifling setting, Butler admitted: “You just had to do whatever strategy you could. I always felt sorry for the women on set…(the men) were basically dressed in “shirt, pants and horny boots” while the female cast members wore dresses, petticoats, stockings and sometimes wigs.
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Roylance shared that Michael Landon, who acted as executive producer, writer and director on “Little House” in addition to his starring role, let her film a scene with her blouse unbuttoned and sleeves rolled up because “it was just miserable heat” that day on set.
Roylance said Stan Ivar, who played her character’s husband, gave her a fan that she could wear under her costume when she wasn’t filming. (NBCUniversal via Getty Images)
“It just didn’t get done,” she admitted of how she wore the blouse, “but it’s in the plan, you can see it in the episode, and I was very grateful for that.”
She also said that Stan Ivar, who played her husband, gave her “a little fan that I wrapped around my leg and made my skirt fluff up.”
Donati, who along with her twin sister were babies when she played Baby Rose Wilder, joked: “I don’t want to brag, but I think I was the most pampered actor there. They didn’t let me get hot.”
The cast of “Little House on the Prairie” included Matthew Laborteaux as Albert Quinn Ingalls, Melissa Gilbert as Laura Elizabeth Ingalls Wilder, Michael Landon as Charles Philip Ingalls, Dean Butler as Almanzo James Wilder, Melissa Sue Anderson as Mary Ingalls Kendall, Linwood Boomer as Adam Kendall, Karen Grassle as Caroline Quiner Holbrook Ingalls and one of the Greenbush sisters as Carrie Ingalls. (NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal/Getty Images)
“Little House on the Prairie” was a Western family drama loosely based on the semi-autobiographical books of Laura Ingalls Wilder. It follows the Ingalls family as they build a life in Walnut Grove, Minnesota, in the late 19th century.
Landon played the role of Ingalls family patriarch Charles, Karen Grassle played his wife, Caroline, and Gilbert played their daughter, Laura. The series premiered on NBC in 1974 and ran for nine seasons, until 1983, followed by three television films.
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