Speaker 1: The fiftieth was coming. Ah, that's gonna be gay on. Hi, Glennis.
Speaker 2: We are back after a year of Wilder finishing releasing
Speaker 2: all of its episodes.
Speaker 3: Emily, we're back. It's been a year since Wilder was
Speaker 3: released into the wild, and it's been two years since
Speaker 3: we were on the road, and three weeks from now
Speaker 3: is the fiftieth anniversary of the television show premiering on NBC.
Speaker 3: So we thought it would be a really fun time
Speaker 3: to reconnect and sort of look back on our whole
Speaker 3: podcast making experience and reflect on it and also give
Speaker 3: you guys some of the outtakes that didn't make it
Speaker 3: into the final podcast. Okay, So Emily, Hi, Hi.
Speaker 2: This year because the original premiere of Little House came
Speaker 2: out in March. As you heard Alison say at the
Speaker 2: top of this show, they're having past reunions, you know,
Speaker 2: at all the different locations of the houses.
Speaker 1: We felt left out.
Speaker 2: We wanted to have our own little reunion, and we're
Speaker 2: missing our fearless executive producer, Joe Piazza because she is
Speaker 2: off on her own other adventure or road trip or something,
Speaker 2: who knows what, somewhere, but she does have a little
Speaker 2: message for you, so we just wanted to play.
Speaker 4: That, Hey'll, I miss you. I miss being on the
Speaker 4: road with you. I actually can't believe that it's been
Speaker 4: a year since we made this podcast. And it's funny
Speaker 4: because I've been on the road again, traveling on book
Speaker 4: tour for the Sicilian Inheritance, and every single place that
Speaker 4: I go all over the country, people ask me about
Speaker 4: the Wilder podcast, and people have their own stories of
Speaker 4: Laura Ingalls Wilder and how much she touched them and
Speaker 4: how much she inspired them. It just reminds me how
Speaker 4: big Laura looms in our collective American imaginations and our mythologies.
Speaker 4: She's a force. Look, no one has forgotten Laura, but
Speaker 4: I do feel that we got to kind of bring
Speaker 4: her back into the zeitgeist and get people talking about
Speaker 4: her about the good, the bad, the ugly, the inspirational
Speaker 4: in a way that I really think she would have appreciated.
Speaker 4: I miss it. I miss you, guys. I'm going to
Speaker 4: go watch some Michael Landon taking off his shirt and crying.
Speaker 5: Now it's funny.
Speaker 3: On my phone in the last few weeks comes up
Speaker 3: the photo memories and can you believe it was more
Speaker 3: than two years ago? We were on the road for
Speaker 3: this podcast. It keeps sending me photos of us and
Speaker 3: just met South Dakota with you, like with the mics
Speaker 3: and us standing in front of the cottonwood trees and
Speaker 3: at the pageant.
Speaker 6: And I'm like, wow, it's already been a year.
Speaker 3: And then I realized, no, it's already been two years. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and then realizing like, the podcast has been out for
Speaker 3: over a year, which is amazing because it feels like
Speaker 3: another lifetime that it came out. I don't know if
Speaker 3: that's just the news cycle we've been living in America
Speaker 3: this year, but it feels like wildly distant and it
Speaker 3: was even though it was such a huge undertaking and
Speaker 3: such like a joyful undertaking. I don't know. Does it
Speaker 3: feel like that to you?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it feels like there's two separate timelines, and there
Speaker 2: was the making of the podcast and then the releasing
Speaker 2: the podcast. Everything we talked about has been so relevant
Speaker 2: in the past year with the crazy news cycle. It's like,
Speaker 2: there's not it really a day that goes by that
Speaker 2: I don't think about all of the things that we
Speaker 2: saw and discussed in the entire show.
Speaker 3: I feel like the more distance we get from this
Speaker 3: podcast the prouder I am of it. It's such a
Speaker 3: monumental undertaking and how fortunate we were to drive around
Speaker 3: the country and be in all those different places. So anyways,
Speaker 3: this is basically we're doing a fiftieth annivers three Little
Speaker 3: House in the Prairie TV Show special episode, and also
Speaker 3: just congratulating ourselves on a podcast that we really read of.
Speaker 2: And on that note, just speaking of the road and
Speaker 2: speaking of everything that initially surprised us. As you can
Speaker 2: imagine listeners, there is so so many more hours of
Speaker 2: tape than what you actually heard go into the show.
Speaker 5: And I think.
Speaker 2: It's one of the sad parts when you're making this
Speaker 2: as some of your favorite characters and your favorite places
Speaker 2: we went to or things that we learned just couldn't
Speaker 2: make it into the show.
Speaker 3: I was always the one being like, can we slide
Speaker 3: this in? Can we slide that in? And you're like,
Speaker 3: this is one episode. It cannot be four hours long
Speaker 3: because a you recorded everything on the road, Like it's
Speaker 3: not an easy thing to always have everything miked for
Speaker 3: hours every day, but like, we got so much good stuff.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I think first I really wanted to do
Speaker 2: justice to all of the people in the towns who
Speaker 2: are benefiting off of Laura tourism, whether that's being dedicated
Speaker 2: to managing the houses, or running the pageants, or even
Speaker 2: just like the people who run the restaurants and the
Speaker 2: cafes in this town that yeah, they owe a lot
Speaker 2: of the most of their revenue in the summer probably
Speaker 2: to Laura tourism. And talking to them, it always kind
Speaker 2: of astounded me that they weren't sick of it, and
Speaker 2: they weren't that you know, you saw like these usually
Speaker 2: generations of like mothers and children and you know, family
Speaker 2: businesses of people that were just really dedicated to the cause.
Speaker 2: I think there was one good example of that in
Speaker 2: Pepen Lake Pepin and Wisconsin, the town which was a
Speaker 2: cute little vacation town and was.
Speaker 3: The first place where we really began to understand that
Speaker 3: people who lived in these places but weren't necessarily working
Speaker 3: directly with the houses all had positive feelings about little
Speaker 3: House and Laura and what and what her legacy had
Speaker 3: brought to the town, which I thought was interesting because
Speaker 3: I could see a possibility of or the potential to
Speaker 3: be sort of resentful or tired of her. And meanwhile,
Speaker 3: I think everybody loved it.
Speaker 2: Our very first stop was this amazing cafe, and that
Speaker 2: was where we learned to just start asking everyone what
Speaker 2: they thought of Laura. This is one of our initial
Speaker 2: conversations with people to just get a sense of how
Speaker 2: the books and living in a place that where Laura
Speaker 2: lived has impacted their lives and their business. And the
Speaker 2: name of this cafe is the Homemade Cafe. Just to
Speaker 2: give them a.
Speaker 1: Shot if you are ever they are.
Speaker 2: They had they had great pie, amazing pie.
Speaker 3: Oh they had the best pie.
Speaker 7: Well, good, good, awesome, she's awesome show.
Speaker 6: I'm just curious that how much how many people through
Speaker 6: here for the house, for the for the to get
Speaker 6: it a lot?
Speaker 7: How do you even estimate?
Speaker 5: Yeah, a lot, it's a lot.
Speaker 7: Then I have a sticker on the green sticker it
Speaker 7: says I was hit Laura's or something like that.
Speaker 6: And then they got that museum down here, so I said,
Speaker 6: you know, usually they'll go water the other and then have.
Speaker 7: You been at the museum.
Speaker 3: We're cutted there.
Speaker 5: We came here first.
Speaker 7: That's awesome. And I told them to go down by
Speaker 7: the lake. Yeah, it's beautiful here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So did you grow up like surrounded by Laura
Speaker 3: that you were aware of her for ever forever.
Speaker 7: I read those books I read when I read them
Speaker 7: when I was Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, did you ever read them?
Speaker 1: That you ever read those books?
Speaker 3: And did you watch the TV show?
Speaker 7: Oh yes, I've never missed it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, did you too?
Speaker 7: Yeah, my mom always watched it, so and my granddaughter.
Speaker 1: It's all about Morgan's Yeah, it was wed.
Speaker 6: And the people you get here would like is it
Speaker 6: sort of an international crowd and definitely yes?
Speaker 5: Oh yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 3: All over, I said, a lot of them.
Speaker 6: You we have the wedding wedding venues here too. We
Speaker 6: have two big wedding venues, so I said, we get
Speaker 6: it from all over?
Speaker 3: Really, Oh yeah, is this like a vacation, not a
Speaker 3: like a it's more of a tourist It kind.
Speaker 4: Of shuts down in the winter.
Speaker 7: Now it's a tourist destination. It never used to be,
Speaker 7: never used to be. It is now we have a
Speaker 7: tourism board.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, is that because of Laura or Hartley?
Speaker 7: I'm sure in the wedding venues, did you guys like,
Speaker 7: what did you love about Laura?
Speaker 1: Would you ever feel like suffocated by her?
Speaker 3: It's just sort of a reality.
Speaker 5: No, no, I.
Speaker 8: Loved it, but all of it. I love the books.
Speaker 1: Well, I just like the whole thing.
Speaker 4: How they made.
Speaker 7: It through all those tough times, and you know, and
Speaker 7: they were very close family. Yeah, you know that's hard anymore.
Speaker 5: You don't have that a lot anymore.
Speaker 6: Does the Mississippi Freeze is pet Lake Pepin Freeze?
Speaker 3: It does because that's the end of the opening of
Speaker 3: the house and the pairs they're going across.
Speaker 5: The frozen water. It exactly does.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And when we were driving down but we were
Speaker 1: all remarking.
Speaker 3: On how much bigger Mississippi appears when you're driving beside it.
Speaker 3: Then maybe it's huge, Yeah, and pretty fast flowing, I think, right.
Speaker 7: Yeah, to drive across there with just pantrified.
Speaker 3: Used to drive across the across here to say thank
Speaker 3: you so much for speaking with us.
Speaker 1: I have a terrible voice.
Speaker 3: You know, you have an amazing voice.
Speaker 2: Not when it recorded.
Speaker 7: That's what I think.
Speaker 4: And I've made a career of making pods.
Speaker 2: Appreciated, you know, going to these pageants, we talked about
Speaker 2: them putting on these big shows and like the kids
Speaker 2: from the town playing out scenes from the book, and
Speaker 2: sometimes a mix between the book and the TV show
Speaker 2: but there was also uh like fun little communities that
Speaker 2: we encountered, Like, I mean, we are just coming out
Speaker 2: of the Olympics, and my favorite thing in the world
Speaker 2: is like the more niche sports like archery, artistic swimming,
Speaker 2: these things. I would say, like the Mansfield Fiddle Off
Speaker 2: was my delightful, little like niche performance competition of the
Speaker 2: road trip.
Speaker 3: Good morning to y'all, and welcome up to the fiddle
Speaker 3: off contest here.
Speaker 6: It's gonna be here out most of the day.
Speaker 2: Remember in the fiddle competition, there was like the there
Speaker 2: was the tiny category, and then like the junior category,
Speaker 2: and then the adults. And I just remember must have
Speaker 2: been like a eight or nine year old girl going
Speaker 2: up there and just slighing, just killing.
Speaker 3: All, just owned the whole competition. And also people had
Speaker 3: driven I mean, Mansfield's not that close to anything except Springfield,
Speaker 3: but like people had driven distances to come there and compete.
Speaker 3: These people were serious about their fiddle talents, which they
Speaker 3: should be. They were incredible. Mansfield was delightful. When I
Speaker 3: chase that guy across the back to across the field
Speaker 3: who was carrying pause fiddle, I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 3: what is it like? To hold pause, fiddle. You're just
Speaker 3: wandering around like the most valuable and a lot of
Speaker 3: people's lives, a lot a lot of you think it's
Speaker 3: worth emotionally priceless. I don't think you could put a
Speaker 3: price on Yeah, that's a terrible like I can't even
Speaker 3: grasp painting.
Speaker 6: It was also.
Speaker 3: Thinking of remember when we were in Burr Oak and
Speaker 3: they had the competition of the A. Laura and Almonso competition,
Speaker 3: uh costume competition, but that people who won it was
Speaker 3: almost like a Miss America set up, like people who
Speaker 3: won had responsibilities of visiting schools like it was and
Speaker 3: bur Oak isn't even it is so tiny, it's not
Speaker 3: even incorporated, Like it's literally like a postage stamp of
Speaker 3: a handful of buildings, and they held this competition and
Speaker 3: had really serious responsibilities to it. I just, yeah, that
Speaker 3: should be in the Olympics. Maybe we should, like, if
Speaker 3: they're gonna put break Dance in the Olympics, we should just,
Speaker 3: you know, petition the Olympics to consider our little house contests.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. The other thing that I still can't get
Speaker 2: over about the road trip is we covered so much
Speaker 2: ground just going from Wisconsin to Minnesota to South Dakota,
Speaker 2: and then we ended up going over to Wyoming just
Speaker 2: to take in that stretch of the Americana of it all.
Speaker 2: And that was the first time I had seen that
Speaker 2: part of the country. And besides just being wowed by
Speaker 2: the bad lands, like I think, I just said wow
Speaker 2: the entire time we were driving through it.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 2: It was the first time that it really hit me
Speaker 2: that I had only seen mythology of America, like almost
Speaker 2: have only seen like the bastardization of it in old
Speaker 2: Westerns and all of that, and I had never seen
Speaker 2: the actual thing. And you realized, why, oh, yeah, that
Speaker 2: that is so amazing. I get why rich, greedy white
Speaker 2: men just like wanted to destroy this place and make
Speaker 2: money off of it. But it is and which it's tragic,
Speaker 2: because it is some of the most beautiful places I've
Speaker 2: ever seen.
Speaker 3: America is incredible. And I mean, again, going back to
Speaker 3: driving across it, I think we so many Americans and
Speaker 3: so many people around the world are sort of fed
Speaker 3: the postcard version of it that becomes so familiar in
Speaker 3: two dimensional and sometimes a caricature, that when you actually
Speaker 3: go there, to any of these places, it is gobsmackingly
Speaker 3: beautiful and powerful, and you're like, oh, it is an
Speaker 3: incredible country and it is gobsmacking and breathtaking and seeing
Speaker 3: it firsthand feels so necessary to me actually.
Speaker 2: And smack dab in the middle of that. After you
Speaker 2: get out of the bad Lands, you get like a
Speaker 2: little bit cartoonish Disneyland Old West location. Do you want
Speaker 2: to tell everyone about Waldrug? Which is maybe the thing
Speaker 2: that I'm most disappointed couldn't make it into the show,
Speaker 2: because there wasn't really right.
Speaker 3: I forget that Waldrug didn't make it. So the first
Speaker 3: time I went to Waldrug was the first time I
Speaker 3: went to Waldrug was in two thousand and two, before
Speaker 3: the Internet, and the way I came to it was
Speaker 3: west to east. And for Waldrug, there's all these hand
Speaker 3: painted billboards for miles and miles and miles saying like
Speaker 3: come to Waldrug, five cent coffee, come to Waldrug, all
Speaker 3: these things, and so the build up is so extraordinary
Speaker 3: and you pull in and it's just this like wild
Speaker 3: caricature of a wild West town with all these buildings
Speaker 3: and like kitchy stuff and that crazy dining room and
Speaker 3: it's sort of the entryway to rapid city, which has
Speaker 3: a bit of that same vibe to it, that very
Speaker 3: like Mount Rushmore kitchiness that is very, very very American.
Speaker 3: And also in all it's the Las Vegas of you know,
Speaker 3: the wild West and with all the problems that come
Speaker 3: with that.
Speaker 5: You're right.
Speaker 2: I mean, you go from Wall Drug which it does
Speaker 2: feel like the Disneyland of rest stops, like it literally
Speaker 2: has animatronics and if you go into the gift shop
Speaker 2: there's there's a glass wall and behind it is animatronics
Speaker 2: of just old like Western Western men, just like play
Speaker 2: in banjo and singing a song.
Speaker 3: When I say it's so American, it's like it's both
Speaker 3: the what we talked about, like the extreme breathtaking beauty
Speaker 3: and openness and possibility and history and also the worst
Speaker 3: of America in terms of the extermination, the attempted extermination
Speaker 3: of Native Americans, of the Buffalo, of the natural wonders,
Speaker 3: and also the overlayer of you know that that kitch,
Speaker 3: that sort of Las Vegas, but the West kitch and
Speaker 3: so's it holds both of these things which are both
Speaker 3: or all of these things which are all so American
Speaker 3: in the same place. And I think that is the
Speaker 3: real intensity and magic of it. And I don't mean
Speaker 3: magic in sort of like a frivolous way. I mean
Speaker 3: like deep magic of being out there and to some extent,
Speaker 3: you know, I think speaks to the enduring a peal
Speaker 3: of Little House because she's holding all of those things
Speaker 3: in the book at the same time too.
Speaker 2: What are your feelings coming up on the fiftieth anniversary
Speaker 2: and your fiftieth birthday.
Speaker 3: I feel great about turning fifty. There's something very charming
Speaker 3: for me and having the fiftieth anniverse, Like the show
Speaker 3: premiered one week after I was born, and so there's
Speaker 3: something delightful to me about having it. It's always existed,
Speaker 3: but like it's always been around, and I just think, oh,
Speaker 3: it's both a short period of time and such a
Speaker 3: long period of time. I just had this memory of
Speaker 3: remember when we got to Desmet and we were in
Speaker 3: the B and B, and I hadn't watched the show,
Speaker 3: Like we've been so heavy in prep that I hadn't
Speaker 3: seen the show in a while. Remember when we turned
Speaker 3: it on the TV when we were in the B
Speaker 3: and B, and like we're immediately engaged with it, Like
Speaker 3: immediately our heads whipped around and we were pulled in
Speaker 3: and it's just a reminder, like it was such a
Speaker 3: good show. We talked about all the problems with it
Speaker 3: as problems with everything but ban the music.
Speaker 4: Pah.
Speaker 3: One of the surprise takeaways for us, anyway, when we
Speaker 3: started doing our interviews for this podcast, which we did
Speaker 3: so many interviews before we went out on the road,
Speaker 3: was how many of the people who loved the book
Speaker 3: and had written about the book and were scholars of
Speaker 3: the book disliked the TV show and primarily disliked Michael Landon,
Speaker 3: which I thought was fascinating because obviously we talked about this.
Speaker 3: I loved both, but Michael Landon in particular seemed to
Speaker 3: be po His version of paw Ingles seemed to be
Speaker 3: a flashpoint for a number of people.
Speaker 9: I never liked the series ever, because it didn't look right.
Speaker 1: You know, Michael Landon obviously looks nothing like Pa.
Speaker 7: It was so clearly an ego project for him that
Speaker 7: I just never liked it.
Speaker 10: I actually didn't like it because it was so different
Speaker 10: paw In Like, I was like, who is this clean shaven?
Speaker 5: I just phoned Michael Landon. I just could not relate
Speaker 5: to him. And plus they never moved out of walnut growth.
Speaker 5: They completely eliminated South Dakota.
Speaker 10: You know, he's such a kind of preening presence in
Speaker 10: a way that I think would have been horri fine
Speaker 10: to Laura Ingles Wild. I think she would have been
Speaker 10: dumbstruck at that portrayal of her beloved father.
Speaker 2: Lover hate. What Landon did with Charles Ingalls, like Michael
Speaker 2: Landon is one of the main reasons that everything still persists.
Speaker 3: Oh, for sure.
Speaker 2: The TV show gave the books a whole new life
Speaker 2: and continues to do so because it's on TV all
Speaker 2: the freaking time.
Speaker 3: And to my atten delight, Yeah, yeah, why it's been
Speaker 3: on my mind is Tim Watz, the VP candidate with
Speaker 3: Kamala Is. He's not from man He's not from Mancato,
Speaker 3: but he spent He's from Nebraska, but he spent most
Speaker 3: of his adult life in Mankato before becoming governor. Which,
Speaker 3: as people who listen to the podcast know, there's an
Speaker 3: entire episode where we're primarily in man Cato, and people
Speaker 3: who watch the television show know that they're always going
Speaker 3: to man Cato to buy something or sell something or whatever.
Speaker 3: And then the wagon falls off the side of the road.
Speaker 3: And someone almost dies and like Mary's glasses set the
Speaker 3: whole place on fire, like Mankato figures into this as
Speaker 3: a destination. But as I was thinking about, you know,
Speaker 3: Rebecca Tracer, who was on the podcast, wrote a piece
Speaker 3: for New York Magazine recently about the different versions of
Speaker 3: masculinity the Republicans are providing and the Democrats are providing
Speaker 3: and talking about sort of the Tim Waltz masculinity, and
Speaker 3: in some ways it really reminded me of the Michael
Speaker 3: Landon version of masculinity. Not that Tim Waaltz is taking
Speaker 3: off his shirt and like glossing up his pecks or whatever,
Speaker 3: but like the masculinity the ability to be to provide
Speaker 3: an idea of masculinity that also allows for emotion and sensitivity.
Speaker 3: And Michael Landon's paw ingles was like, as we know
Speaker 3: and have discussed, was crying in nearly every episode as
Speaker 3: like a show of strength.
Speaker 5: And it really.
Speaker 3: It's interesting because the show itself, I think appealed in
Speaker 3: its day to conservative groups, and we know Ronald Reagan
Speaker 3: it was his favorite show, but we're obviously in a
Speaker 3: much different time of what who and what gets to
Speaker 3: find as conservative And I was just like there's something
Speaker 3: a little tim Waltzy about Michael Landon's Paw Ingles and
Speaker 3: maybe vice versa, and it seems like it just struck
Speaker 3: me as so interesting, especially with the like man Cato connection,
Speaker 3: So MU should write that the Mancato connection of Charles
Speaker 3: of Paw, of Michael Landon's Charles Ingles and Governor Tim
Speaker 3: Waltz running for VP.
Speaker 2: I think we've got our finger on the pulse with
Speaker 2: this one. And I think with the anniversary of the
Speaker 2: TV show and Tim Waltz, maybe there's maybe there's a
Speaker 2: whole other season here, six Degrees of Separation, just man
Speaker 2: Cato edition. Well, in honor of the Vivia the anniversary,
Speaker 2: we did just want to bring you some more snippets
Speaker 2: of conversations we had with the cast that all of
Speaker 2: them were completely amazing, like exceeded all expectations. Also will
Speaker 2: shout out all of their books if you have. If
Speaker 2: you're a fan of the TV show even a little bit,
Speaker 2: I recommend especially Alison Aringram's book. But with Alison Aringram,
Speaker 2: I mean we talked to her for well over an hour.
Speaker 2: And if you're thinking of iconic Nelly Olsen episode, a
Speaker 2: big fan favorite, that we didn't really talk at all
Speaker 2: about in our TV episode is Bunny Oh.
Speaker 3: That I love that episode, Oh Bunny.
Speaker 2: We did talk to Melissa and Alison about the making
Speaker 2: of that episode and people's reactions to it, and we're
Speaker 2: going to play some of those clips side by side,
Speaker 2: and I love hearing them talking about it because that's
Speaker 2: where you can also hear their deep friendship come through.
Speaker 2: Melissa Gilbert and Alison Aringram, despite being very believable enemies
Speaker 2: on screen, are the best of friends, and it delights
Speaker 2: me every time they talk about it.
Speaker 3: So do you hear about the most And what was
Speaker 3: your favorite episode of the show.
Speaker 1: Bunny where I go down the hill in the wheelchair?
Speaker 9: I hear about Bunny and the race. People really dig
Speaker 9: the wheelchair push down the hill.
Speaker 3: That's the only time my mother walked into the family
Speaker 3: room and said Laura seems mean and I was like,
Speaker 3: Laura's amazing, and my mother said, I don't think that
Speaker 3: was a nice thing to do and then exited the room.
Speaker 9: Well, Laura was pushed to the brink, but I did
Speaker 9: pretend to be paralyzed and ruin everyone's life.
Speaker 1: In most episodes, Nellie does things to ruin Laura's life
Speaker 1: and make her miserable. But in Bunny's the only episode
Speaker 1: Nelly's insane behavior actually impact everyone. So, yeah, she has
Speaker 1: it common. She has it common.
Speaker 9: And I'll tell you Alison got her revenge many years ago.
Speaker 9: I had to go in for a colonoscope and she
Speaker 9: took me, and when it was over, they wouldn't let
Speaker 9: me walk out of the surgery center. I had to
Speaker 9: go out in a wheelchair and she pushed it, and
Speaker 9: she kept threatening to shove me down a number of
Speaker 9: different hills that day, even though I didn't. I said, I,
Speaker 9: you know something I fault.
Speaker 1: I didn't write it. Tell them people let me do that.
Speaker 9: The other thing I hear about a lot too, is
Speaker 9: the mud fight. People like a lot when Alison and
Speaker 9: I got physical.
Speaker 3: We hear that from a lot of fans, and I
Speaker 3: think it was having girls express sort of like complicated
Speaker 3: emotions to each other and that jealousy and competition, which
Speaker 3: felt very recognizable at that age.
Speaker 9: I think the other thing that that informed those those performances,
Speaker 9: and maybe the audience was getting it subliminal, subliminally, was
Speaker 9: that we really loved each other dearly. And I've always said,
Speaker 9: you know, you don't really have to necessarily get along
Speaker 9: all that well with someone you're doing a love scene with,
Speaker 9: but boy, you have to love and trust the person
Speaker 9: you're doing a fight scene with.
Speaker 1: We thought it was so funny because we bonded right away,
Speaker 1: and then the idea that regularly every few episodes we'd
Speaker 1: hate each other in the face was like, it's awesome, Like, oh.
Speaker 5: Yeah, fight scene coming up.
Speaker 1: And it was funny because like the very first fight scene,
Speaker 1: they were very careful and there was a stunt girl
Speaker 1: to do one of the falls so I wouldn't hit
Speaker 1: my head. And then but like after that they went
Speaker 1: and we pretty much were choreographic our own fights and
Speaker 1: they just didn't need stunts for that. The mud fights
Speaker 1: all us, they're stunk with that, the famous mud fight.
Speaker 1: They're like, yeah, you guys got this whatever, and they're
Speaker 1: just like, do do whatever the hell you want to do.
Speaker 1: And we did, and we had so much fun, and
Speaker 1: we thought it was so funny to play these mortal
Speaker 1: enemies and do all this terrible stuff. And then but
Speaker 1: it was weird because these scenes right me saying things
Speaker 1: and she's crying. It's like and we're going out for
Speaker 1: slurpees later.
Speaker 2: Other favorite actor to just learn more about her story
Speaker 2: was Karen Grassley and how her she as a person
Speaker 2: was so polar opposite of Caroline Ingles, and she was
Speaker 2: part part of the free sex movement. She was in Berkeley,
Speaker 2: she was an actor, she was like on these things.
Speaker 2: And also I think if you read her book, which
Speaker 2: which I highly recommend, she talks about her entire life
Speaker 2: and if you have any interest in you know, sixties
Speaker 2: arts and counterculture, definitely read it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was not progressive where Caroline Ingles was. And
Speaker 3: I think it's interesting though, because I don't know. I mean,
Speaker 3: she played the character that was written for her on
Speaker 3: a show that was huge, but ilo The Waltons were
Speaker 3: on at the same time, and the mother in The Waltons,
Speaker 3: that character was much more feminist, you know she And
Speaker 3: so that is one of the major issues with Michael
Speaker 3: Landon was he was open minded in so many ways,
Speaker 3: but not about grown women. It's just worth pointing that
Speaker 3: out because I think she was in a tough position
Speaker 3: of making those decisions as a working actor to get
Speaker 3: that show that sets you up for life and allows
Speaker 3: a lot of choices.
Speaker 8: The little Woman had never been my goal, and so
Speaker 8: there were times when the choices offered to Carolyn in
Speaker 8: the script wrinkled. Let me give you an example, and
Speaker 8: this is not at all a criticism. This is just
Speaker 8: an example of how Michael knew his vision and he
Speaker 8: knew what he wanted and in fact was well connected
Speaker 8: to his audience. Early on. This is Carolyn has the
Speaker 8: scene in the morning of finishing those braids and getting
Speaker 8: those scrambled eggs on, and packing those lunches and rescuing
Speaker 8: the three year old who's climbing up the stairs and
Speaker 8: keeping her from putting her hands by the fire, and
Speaker 8: finally the girls have their coats on and their little
Speaker 8: lunches and they're going out the door. And my reaction was, oh,
Speaker 8: thank goodness we did. And Michael said, no, you look
Speaker 8: out the door, you watch them going, and you smile
Speaker 8: because they're so lovely. And that's what we did. So
Speaker 8: there were times when I couldn't influence what I believed
Speaker 8: about the hard work that a mother does, that a
Speaker 8: woman cooking on a fire does, But as much as
Speaker 8: I could, I tried to influence the way the writers
Speaker 8: would see her, and I was happy that in the
Speaker 8: end many of them got it. They got it?
Speaker 3: What are your favorite episodes with respect to them getting
Speaker 3: it well?
Speaker 8: Olsen versus Olsen where the women all go on strike.
Speaker 8: That was our idea a friend of mine and I,
Speaker 8: and she consequently became a staff writer on Little House. Yeah,
Speaker 8: I was very proud that Chris Abbott came on, and
Speaker 8: then I think it was our very close to our
Speaker 8: final show, if not our final show, where Laura and
Speaker 8: I have a nice scene where we acknowledge our contribution
Speaker 8: and she says something like they couldn't have done it
Speaker 8: without us. But you know, I respect also this traditional
Speaker 8: role that women have played, and I mean, for God's sake,
Speaker 8: these women who helped settle the country. They were so strong.
Speaker 8: When I read this book called Pioneer Women, it said
Speaker 8: that if a woman at that time lost her husband,
Speaker 8: she just went on. But if a man lost his wife,
Speaker 8: he wrote immediately for a Maile lord a bride because
Speaker 8: he simply could not handle it alone.
Speaker 2: Someone that you might not expect was as bad as
Speaker 2: in her day as she was because she's so perfect
Speaker 2: and loving and warm on the show is Charlotte Stewart,
Speaker 2: who was Miss Beetle, and we got to meet her
Speaker 2: in Mansfield pretty much by accident. We were in Mansfield
Speaker 2: during Wilder days. She was kind of the big guest
Speaker 2: that they had, and she was there to do signings
Speaker 2: and everything, and we got invited to a little reception
Speaker 2: where we got to sit down and speak to her.
Speaker 2: So we're gonna that is why this tape might be
Speaker 2: a little noisy, the tape that we're about to play you.
Speaker 3: She was delightful.
Speaker 2: Alison Arngrim, You know, she is at all of the
Speaker 2: conventions and everything. And when she first described to us
Speaker 2: people's reaction to Charlotte, she said, it's in line. It's
Speaker 2: men in eraser Head t shirts crying to her and
Speaker 2: telling them how much they loved her as this beetle
Speaker 2: while they're in their full like David Lynch, get up.
Speaker 2: Because she worked with David Lynch.
Speaker 3: She was a favorite of David Lynch. Yeah.
Speaker 6: Was it strange in the seventies to be cast.
Speaker 5: As sort of a very tradition and a very traditional
Speaker 5: female role.
Speaker 6: I meanwhile, I was smoking dope at home, yes, and
Speaker 6: then an eraser the movie rape in m I right
Speaker 6: about the eraser Head eraser Head, Yeah.
Speaker 5: Well I was doing it at the same time as
Speaker 5: I did the episode of The Waltons because David Lynch,
Speaker 5: as a student filmmaker, had no bounds on how late
Speaker 5: you worked. You know, we used to shoot all night long.
Speaker 5: That's when he preferred to shoot. We'd show up at
Speaker 5: eleven o'clock at night and shoot all night. So I
Speaker 5: would finish at six in the morning, and if I
Speaker 5: had a job, I would have to run home or
Speaker 5: change or something and get to the studio. So it
Speaker 5: happened to be I was doing The Waltons at the time.
Speaker 5: So I came staggering into Warner Brothers where they were shooting,
Speaker 5: and I watched it the other night it was on,
Speaker 5: and I watched it and I thought, oh no, that
Speaker 5: scene is coming on because I could not remember my lines.
Speaker 5: I was so tired and.
Speaker 6: Like playing if you were saying, like playing like a
Speaker 6: traditional misfeto was fairly traditional and then and then, but
Speaker 6: you were like a brown up woman in the seventies,
Speaker 6: an actress in Hollywood. I mean, that just feels like
Speaker 6: I'm sort of night and day.
Speaker 5: I'll tell you I was more connected with rock and
Speaker 5: roll than I was Hollywood. I was never very popular
Speaker 5: in Hollywood at the time that I got the part
Speaker 5: I had a clothing store called the Liquid Butterfly. It
Speaker 5: was on Santa Monica Boulevard, and it was rock and
Speaker 5: roll the across across the hall. I was in a
Speaker 5: building on Los Angele called the Pure Thoughts Building, and
Speaker 5: it was the office of Elliott Roberts, who managed Joni Mitchell,
Speaker 5: Neil Young, Crosby Stills, Nashing Young, you know, Jackson Brown.
Speaker 5: So I was in the middle of rock and roll
Speaker 5: for a lot of that time because I was dating
Speaker 5: the agent that managed them all. So I was backstage
Speaker 5: at rock and roll more than I was in Hollywood.
Speaker 5: I never was in Hollywood. I never got invited to
Speaker 5: any Hollywood parties.
Speaker 8: You know.
Speaker 5: And then when I got Little House on the Prairie,
Speaker 5: it was like people in Hollywood went, what little House
Speaker 5: on the what? Oh how boring? Well guess what, we're
Speaker 5: still on the air. Yeah. Yeah, we got put down
Speaker 5: a lot. Really oh yeah, and we got put down
Speaker 5: a lot.
Speaker 1: But also because I.
Speaker 2: Mean people still today are like, oh that was so
Speaker 2: wholesome and a little too mushy, but like it tackled.
Speaker 5: Some big issues. And I meet people all the time
Speaker 5: who I remind them of when they used to watch
Speaker 5: the show with their grandparents, you know, and they get
Speaker 5: very emotional. Good.
Speaker 6: We drive to Memphis tomorrow evening and then we're going
Speaker 6: to Graceland Sunday.
Speaker 1: To four hour drive.
Speaker 5: But we flight.
Speaker 6: It's hard getting flights back and forth to New.
Speaker 2: York to this area.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 5: I worked with no I did what was that?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 5: I did a movie called Speedway, and I have been
Speaker 5: a guest at Graceland. It's pretty amazing. It was in
Speaker 5: the sixties. I was expecting something totally different. I thought
Speaker 5: he was going to be this, you know, look me
Speaker 5: up and down and be with his guys. You know,
Speaker 5: it's on trush. Nobody was there. He was by himself.
Speaker 5: Colon Parker wasn't even there. So it was a director
Speaker 5: and me and a girl that was playing his girlfriend
Speaker 5: in the scene. They were in a convertible. They come
Speaker 5: to a drive in and I wait. I'm a waitress
Speaker 5: and I wait on them at the drive in and
Speaker 5: he's ordering all this special stuff and I burst into
Speaker 5: tears and tell my boyfriend. You know, my boyfriend, he
Speaker 5: can't afford anythinking of you, you know. Anyway, he ends
Speaker 5: up paying for my wedding, and it gives me a
Speaker 5: big wedding and all of that stuff. So it was fun.
Speaker 5: We were there always worked with him for two days.
Speaker 5: And what he did was when we broke from shooting
Speaker 5: the drive in, he went over and sat down, and
Speaker 5: I don't know what happened to the girl. She took
Speaker 5: off somewhere and he asked the assistant director to bring
Speaker 5: over another chair and he sat sat it down beside
Speaker 5: him and he said, come here, and I sat down
Speaker 5: and he took my hand and he started telling me
Speaker 5: about his mother. WHOA And I'm sitting there. I'm twenty
Speaker 5: five years old. I'm, you know, young enough to remember
Speaker 5: him as a big, big, big deal. And do you
Speaker 5: tell me about Gladys and when he went in the
Speaker 5: army and they wouldn't let him come home to see
Speaker 5: her when she was sick. And I was like, holy shit,
Speaker 5: Elvis is holding my hand.
Speaker 2: Yeah, needed someone to talk to.
Speaker 5: Honestly, that was because we were there.
Speaker 10: I was there.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: It was funny that we found out we had absolutely
Speaker 2: no clue she had ever worked with Elvis, and we
Speaker 2: were actually going to be on our way to Graceland,
Speaker 2: like in the next day or so.
Speaker 3: What do you think was your favorite part of doing
Speaker 3: this whole podcast. That's a big question, because this is.
Speaker 2: A yeah, I'm I mean the road trip, my favorite
Speaker 2: part was going to a random place, even the places
Speaker 2: that were a little more out of the way, like
Speaker 2: pass South Dakota or going from Missouri over to Tennessee.
Speaker 2: When we would just start having conversations with someone, make
Speaker 2: sure in every conversation to bring up lor Engles Wilder,
Speaker 2: and usually someone did have a connection with her. It
Speaker 2: was the serendipitous thing of yeah, she is everywhere.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm trying to think what my favorite part was.
Speaker 3: I think my favorite part was I think Pepin surprised
Speaker 3: me the most. And then our drive from Heuron to Buffalo,
Speaker 3: Wyoming because it's the emptiest part of the country, and
Speaker 3: when Ranger Tanya actually was one of my most favorite
Speaker 3: parts of our road trip because I think she was
Speaker 3: such a surprise and such a delight. And so that's
Speaker 3: the word I'm looking for, reaffirming or.
Speaker 8: I'd like to begin.
Speaker 4: Where I'd love to begin is in fourteen ninety two,
Speaker 4: Pelma says the ocean blue, a four hundred year resistance up.
Speaker 3: Until this is like a bravery to the way she was,
Speaker 3: you know, talking about the history at the Battle of
Speaker 3: Little Big Horn site, and she's just she was so
Speaker 3: delightful when she got on the podcast with us, So
Speaker 3: she was one of my favorite parts. And then I
Speaker 3: think in the recording when we moved to CDM Studios
Speaker 3: in terms of like actual work experience and having such
Speaker 3: a high end facility and working with such kind people, like,
Speaker 3: I think it comes through on the podcast that we're
Speaker 3: actually in the recording of it, we're having a lot
Speaker 3: of fun too, and working with so many people who
Speaker 3: took such great care to make sure that the product
Speaker 3: was high quality.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I do want to give a big shout out
Speaker 2: to all of our amazing producers and editors and mixers
Speaker 2: that worked on this, because I'll say it a million times,
Speaker 2: podcasts are not easy to make, especially this kind of podcast,
Speaker 2: and it takes it really does take a village. And Yeah,
Speaker 2: coming into CDM and immediately getting more ears on things
Speaker 2: and more opinions is always a good thing. It shows
Speaker 2: you where you're where you're coming through, not coming through.
Speaker 2: It gives you validation that like, yeah, this is interesting.
Speaker 3: It was such a team effort and everyone on the
Speaker 3: team took such great care with the whole podcast. There's
Speaker 3: so much depth to all of the intelligence and attention
Speaker 3: to detail and determination to make this really good that
Speaker 3: came through in the final product that I just want
Speaker 3: to make sure that people are aware like this this
Speaker 3: was a huge undertaking and everybody involved in it was
Speaker 3: willing to go the distance with it, which is amazing because,
Speaker 3: as Joe and I talked about endlessly, that degree of support,
Speaker 3: you know, is rare, not just in podcast world, but
Speaker 3: in like media, creative or otherwise in general, and so
Speaker 3: we were so fortunate to be able to have that
Speaker 3: backing for this project which needed it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I'm so grateful that we got to make
Speaker 2: this and then it gives us a chance to sit
Speaker 2: here and chat. So thank you for chatting, Glennis.
Speaker 3: This was so and thank you to everyone who listened
Speaker 3: to this podcast and provided feedback positive or otherwise. It's
Speaker 3: so gratifying to have something you worked this hard on
Speaker 3: be engaged with, and.
Speaker 5: We're so.
Speaker 3: Thankful that people have taken the time to listen to it.
Speaker 3: This is not this isn't this podcast isn't undertaking as
Speaker 3: a listener too, So thank you everyone. We're just we
Speaker 3: wanted to come back and follow up basically to say
Speaker 3: that like, here's extra stuff, and also we're so grateful
Speaker 3: that it resonated.
Speaker 5: Thanks everyone for listening.
Speaker 2: This episode was hosted by Glennis McNicol and me Emily Maronoff.
Speaker 2: It was produced by me mixing and mastering Gune.
Speaker 4: I'm a Heath Frasier.
Speaker 3: Now and now. It can never be a long time ago.
Speaker 3: It's just two years ago.