Speaker 1: Welcome to Go, Ask Ali, a production of Shonda Land
Speaker 1: Audio and partnership with I Heart Radio. I think, like
Speaker 1: a vaginas have a lot to say. I think we
Speaker 1: should let them stay out of it and they'll just talk. Yes,
Speaker 1: one of the hardest things to absorb for those who
Speaker 1: are new to these kinds of fights. Again, if we
Speaker 1: want all of them, we wouldn't be here. If you
Speaker 1: see a monster, don't try to run away, step right
Speaker 1: up to it and say, what do you have to
Speaker 1: teach me? Why are you? In my mind, I want
Speaker 1: to be the person who has cancer and doesn't run
Speaker 1: a marathon, Like do I have to work that hard? No,
Speaker 1: it's the best excuse not to run a marathon. Welcome
Speaker 1: to go, Ask Allie. I'm Alli Wentworth. I don't know
Speaker 1: about you, but I don't know if it's post COVID
Speaker 1: or just getting older perhaps wiser. But I've really been
Speaker 1: meditating on the idea of a simpler life, and by
Speaker 1: simpler I mean cozier, smaller, warmer. I think there's a
Speaker 1: few things that we learned going through the pandemic about
Speaker 1: how our food can be simpler, our socializing can be simpler,
Speaker 1: and what's really important what's sort of at the heart
Speaker 1: of everything is our family and our friends. And I
Speaker 1: look at my life and the years I lived in Hollywood,
Speaker 1: and how now I'm a mom and a wife, and
Speaker 1: I really love being home. In fact, I hate going out.
Speaker 1: I know that I've scaled back in so many ways.
Speaker 1: And I know people that are now, you know, knitting
Speaker 1: their own socks or growing their own vegetables. So are
Speaker 1: we all becoming more and more fascinated with the idea
Speaker 1: of a simpler life. A long time ago, millions of
Speaker 1: years ago, when I was a little girl, there is
Speaker 1: a show on called Little House in the Prairie, and
Speaker 1: it honored and folks on these simple things. And it
Speaker 1: was about this little girl, Laura Ingles, who I wanted
Speaker 1: to be, and just the fantasy of living on a
Speaker 1: prairie and life was about a kettle on the wood fire,
Speaker 1: and quilts and one plaid dress and running down the
Speaker 1: hill with your dog. It just everything seemed easy and
Speaker 1: less stressful and less anxious. And here to talk about
Speaker 1: her own journey towards simplicity is Laura Ingles Wilder herself
Speaker 1: Melissa Gilbert. Melissa Gilbert may always be best known as
Speaker 1: a child star of the hit television show Little House
Speaker 1: in the Prairie. Melissa was just nine years old when
Speaker 1: the iconic series began in nineteen seventy four, and by
Speaker 1: the time it ended in the world had watched half
Speaker 1: pint grow up. Since her days as Laura Ingles Wilder,
Speaker 1: Melissa has continued her acting career, served two terms as
Speaker 1: the President of the Screen Actors Guild, and four books,
Speaker 1: including her latest one and memoir in the New York
Speaker 1: Times bestseller, Back to the Prairie Home Remade a Life Rediscovered.
Speaker 1: In it, she shares her journey from glitzy Hollywood life
Speaker 1: to a fix her up or deep in the Catskills
Speaker 1: were the only sparkle to be found is the stars
Speaker 1: in the sky. So basically, Melissa has become Laura Ingles Wilder. Okay,
Speaker 1: Melissa Gilbert, So I met you for twenty seconds. And
Speaker 1: here's the thing about getting older, is you into it
Speaker 1: more about things? Uh? You and I were both on
Speaker 1: Good Morning America. Yes, we were pitching our bibles, pitching
Speaker 1: our books, and I walked away. After all we had
Speaker 1: to do was do a tease to a commercial, and
Speaker 1: I went, I like her. She's she's good. People. You
Speaker 1: know what this episode is called. I Want to Be
Speaker 1: Friends with Melissa Gilbert. That's it. That's the headline, and
Speaker 1: everything else is just uh I sing on the cake.
Speaker 1: So um. I will start with one of the things
Speaker 1: that you wrote that I loved, which is external matter
Speaker 1: more than the internal. And the reason I kind of
Speaker 1: love that quote is because I lived in Los Angeles
Speaker 1: for a million years and I, you know, I was
Speaker 1: kind of I was a fat teenager. I didn't sort
Speaker 1: of rely on the exterior. And then I found when
Speaker 1: I was out in l A. I wasn't the girl
Speaker 1: that went to the gym, you know. I was like, Oh,
Speaker 1: I'll be the funny sidekick. You know, I'm gonna I'll
Speaker 1: stay in that lane. And over time, I've watched so
Speaker 1: many women that I used to know in l A
Speaker 1: who got caught up in that web of I have
Speaker 1: to be perfect and beautiful and young and it's um
Speaker 1: And to me, it's such a cautionary tale because the
Speaker 1: depth they've gone to to you know, remain in the
Speaker 1: fountain of eternal youth has been very difficult to watch. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's hard. It was completely impossible for me to do anymore.
Speaker 1: It's exhausting, trying to fight a natural process to fit
Speaker 1: into a mold that everybody else feels you should be in.
Speaker 1: It's fruitless and pointless and frustrating. I mean, you know
Speaker 1: how many fifty year old ingineuse are there. I'm sadly
Speaker 1: quite a few who think they are and are trying
Speaker 1: to be. Yeah. And I remember a few years ago
Speaker 1: my agent saying, yeah, there's no more roles for you,
Speaker 1: and I said, I don't understand what that means. And
Speaker 1: he said there's no more roles for women of your age.
Speaker 1: And I was like, well, does Diane Lane know this,
Speaker 1: because you need to tell the rest of us. And
Speaker 1: I thought. It hit me on such a deep level
Speaker 1: that I ended up going out and creating a show
Speaker 1: called Nightcap, which was on Pop TV, which is a
Speaker 1: network no one had ever heard of. But for me,
Speaker 1: it fueled this kind of thing of I'll show you
Speaker 1: there's no roles for women my age. Um, and it's
Speaker 1: the anger sort of got me ignited to do this.
Speaker 1: But I I guess I've always fought against that, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. And whenever somebody says no, you
Speaker 1: can't or there's no roles for you, or you have
Speaker 1: to look like this. I go, I'll show you. I'll
Speaker 1: show you. And I think you have that in you too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's I definitely do. I spent almost my entire life
Speaker 1: just pinning my hands behind my back and saying watch
Speaker 1: this right and leaning forward, and I'll just create my
Speaker 1: own opportunities. Then I'll write something like you did. And
Speaker 1: and I think that a lot of that, that tenacity,
Speaker 1: you know, it's important, and it's especially important as women
Speaker 1: and women who are older. They there's this I don't
Speaker 1: know why, but we tend to be forgotten and pushed
Speaker 1: away and look through and you know, we start to
Speaker 1: become invisible and like you know, cute old ladies and
Speaker 1: it doesn't make any sense. And I read your book, um,
Speaker 1: the last one, like in a day. I loved it.
Speaker 1: But there's a thing that we hopefully get that I
Speaker 1: have that I see in you too, this kind of
Speaker 1: grounded center. This is me. I like ice cream. I'm unapologetic.
Speaker 1: I've earned my opinions. I know what I don't want
Speaker 1: in this world. And the other thing that is so
Speaker 1: stupid that they're underestimating is we're the consumers. Why they're
Speaker 1: not selling to us is beyond me. We have the money.
Speaker 1: I completely And by the way, we're also watching the shows,
Speaker 1: So start creating content with themes and stories and people
Speaker 1: that look like us, because that's who's watching television and streaming. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we are your advertising dollars. We are exactly who the
Speaker 1: people you should be focused on. And it's just so
Speaker 1: mindlessly youth youth, youth, youth, youth oriented. And yes, we
Speaker 1: do need content for young people, but come on, there's
Speaker 1: the rest of us here too. I completely agree. And
Speaker 1: by the way, I have an eighty eight year old
Speaker 1: mother who has was it is a formidable person who
Speaker 1: did all kinds of amazing things in her life, and
Speaker 1: she says to me all the time, there's nothing out
Speaker 1: there for me that there's that Jane Fonda show, but
Speaker 1: I don't look like her. I'm eighty eight years old.
Speaker 1: Don't put me out to pasture. Yea, My mom's the same,
Speaker 1: she's eighty six. Yeah, So let me ask you this, because, um,
Speaker 1: we are very similar now, but we didn't grow up
Speaker 1: in a very similar way. You were a child star
Speaker 1: and I'm sort of fascinated with that world because one
Speaker 1: of my friends is Brooke Shields, and I say to
Speaker 1: her all the time. You should be dead or in rehab.
Speaker 1: I don't understand how you're doing dishes or trying to
Speaker 1: make lasagna right now because of that insanity that you
Speaker 1: guys went through at such a young age. I mean,
Speaker 1: you were in the entertainment factory when your frontal lobe
Speaker 1: was still developing. You saw things that one shouldn't see
Speaker 1: at such a young age. Yeah, but but look at
Speaker 1: you now, So why what? What are the things that
Speaker 1: it took to get you to be sitting here with
Speaker 1: a healthy marriage, in a fabulous cabbage cottage and with
Speaker 1: a with a dog chewing on a two toy next
Speaker 1: to you, Like, what is that arc? It's it's it's
Speaker 1: long arc. And I think the most important thing for
Speaker 1: me was about thirty years of therapy. Really, it took
Speaker 1: a lot um. I've had conversations with I can't tell
Speaker 1: you how many former kid actors and child stars. I
Speaker 1: even produced a documentary for any several years ago with
Speaker 1: my friend Tony Dow who just passed recently. It was
Speaker 1: called child Stars, Their Story and by and large the
Speaker 1: common thread. And I even had a conversation this weekend.
Speaker 1: I for the first time met Corey Feldman and had
Speaker 1: this conversation with him. The problem wasn't so much the
Speaker 1: factory or the studio, although that did have its issues
Speaker 1: and the sets in the business. It was the way
Speaker 1: our families handled it and our family dynamics. The more
Speaker 1: dysfunctional the family, the more deadly it could be with
Speaker 1: the kids. Um And and the interesting thing I talked
Speaker 1: about with Corey Feldman was, um, you know, we we
Speaker 1: kind of quickly touched on people we knew in common,
Speaker 1: and and I told him I'd seen his documentary and
Speaker 1: we touched on that. And I was talking about, um,
Speaker 1: my son. Somehow I brought up my son, Michael, who
Speaker 1: had gone on tour with me in a musical, and
Speaker 1: you know, because we were saying we wouldn't have professional kids,
Speaker 1: and I said, I took him with me and I
Speaker 1: watched him like a hawk. He was with me, so
Speaker 1: there was nothing going to happen. But he was telling
Speaker 1: me his son just turned eighteen, and I said, don't
Speaker 1: you find it? Did you find it? Incredibly healing that
Speaker 1: because with me, when I turned eighteen, like when he
Speaker 1: turned eighteen, then you get your cooking money and now
Speaker 1: you're an adult, and now you're responsible for everything, and
Speaker 1: there's just all this weird stuff that happens when you're
Speaker 1: a kid actor and you turn eighteen, and watching my
Speaker 1: son's all four of them turn eighteen, so just blithely
Speaker 1: like it was just another number was actually really healing
Speaker 1: for me. And I asked him if he noticed that too,
Speaker 1: and he said absolutely, because my kids a kid, do
Speaker 1: you feel like you were robbed of a childhood at all?
Speaker 1: I mean, do you feel like you couldn't go out
Speaker 1: and be just a girl on the run. I felt
Speaker 1: responsible to behave a certain way in public because I
Speaker 1: felt like I was an example to other kids, which
Speaker 1: was a thing I probably put on myself more than anything. Um.
Speaker 1: I also made the mistake once of reading a fan letter. Um,
Speaker 1: I wasn't really privy to all of that stuff, and
Speaker 1: I snuck into the room where the fan mail was
Speaker 1: and I pulled one fan letter out and it happened
Speaker 1: to be one from a little girl who said, my
Speaker 1: daddy says he'll hit me less if I'm more like you.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, And I think I was eleven. That's
Speaker 1: too much. Yeah, And that was like I took that
Speaker 1: on for sure. Of course, I felt immensely responsible now
Speaker 1: for her well being too, so course, Um yeah, there
Speaker 1: were there were things now I don't My childhood was
Speaker 1: my childhood, and I was really lucky. I grew up
Speaker 1: on a set that was really kid friendly. Um we
Speaker 1: did have you know, we played, we did stuff, we
Speaker 1: got dirty. I had, you know, the requisite broken bones
Speaker 1: and sore throats. The thing for me was unlike other kids,
Speaker 1: I still had to go to work even with a
Speaker 1: sore throat and broken bones. And did you still have
Speaker 1: you know, all the things sort of young adults have,
Speaker 1: which is the first kiss? I mean, was all that
Speaker 1: somewhat protected? I? I think about my teenagers in COVID,
Speaker 1: you know, and I always said, like they should be
Speaker 1: out robbing liquor stores and getting pregnant like all the
Speaker 1: all the teens do, but they were stuck with their parents,
Speaker 1: you know, watching documentaries. But did you feel like you
Speaker 1: had of all the typical milestones of I did. I did,
Speaker 1: And much to my mother's credit, because my father, my
Speaker 1: father had passed away when I was eleven, and so
Speaker 1: my mother was my primary parents all my life. Um,
Speaker 1: she she was actually very protective of me. So I
Speaker 1: didn't go on my first date till I was sixteen.
Speaker 1: I wasn't allowed to pierce my ears till I was eighteen. Um,
Speaker 1: and then of course, you know I turned eighteen and
Speaker 1: pierced my ears three and four times. Um, not just
Speaker 1: your ears, I would imagine. I know, actually it was
Speaker 1: at that point it was just my Well, no, I've
Speaker 1: never paarceded anything. I have tattoos. That's another conversation. Um,
Speaker 1: I am. I I kind of got a little nuts
Speaker 1: in my early twenties. That's when I really like, I
Speaker 1: just went a little wild and um, no different than
Speaker 1: anybody else who was in college. I would imagine. I
Speaker 1: think my life, My life was like a party. It
Speaker 1: just happened to be a Hollywood frat party. And they
Speaker 1: weren't frat boys. They were bratt boys, brat pack boys.
Speaker 1: So it was a little different, and you know, people
Speaker 1: were watching what we were doing. But I also came
Speaker 1: up at a time where paparazzi we're just paparazzi, and
Speaker 1: v I P rooms were still v I P rooms,
Speaker 1: so you could go to the back and just act
Speaker 1: like idiots and nobody really cared. Now everyone's got a phone,
Speaker 1: so everyone's a paparazzo, So there's really no privacy anywhere,
Speaker 1: so you know. Um, so you are nestled up in
Speaker 1: your cabbage, your term which is a cabin and a cottage.
Speaker 1: Right you're there right now? No, actually I'm not. I'm
Speaker 1: in our apartment in the city. Pliss is married to
Speaker 1: the director, Chimmothy Bussfield. Um. This is our two weeks
Speaker 1: of um doctor's appointments and follow ups. Who's having a
Speaker 1: colonoscope this week? We are both meeting with gastro and
Speaker 1: trologists tomorrow to have our colonoscopy consultations. I love that
Speaker 1: you asked you're not having a couple's colonoscopy because that's fun. Well,
Speaker 1: we we've talked about what I mean, if you want
Speaker 1: to get really into this, I don't know, Tim, Are
Speaker 1: you okay with me talking about thumbs up? Um? We
Speaker 1: talked about doing it at the same time and just
Speaker 1: having a his or hers. But our apartment here in
Speaker 1: the city is a nice, perfect little piano tear one bedroom,
Speaker 1: one bathroom, so prep day could get a little hectic
Speaker 1: with the two of us doing it at the same time.
Speaker 1: And this the plumbing in this building is very sensitive,
Speaker 1: so I think we might want to stagger. I think
Speaker 1: you should stagger or somebody should maybe go to a hotel. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it will be very competitive and there's somebody's going
Speaker 1: to lose the race, you know what I mean. And
Speaker 1: competitive is good, and your dog is going to get
Speaker 1: a mixed message about what he's allowed to do around
Speaker 1: the apart exactly. And I sort of like in my
Speaker 1: head I pictured the scene in the bathroom and Bridesmaids,
Speaker 1: you know, and it just doesn't see smart. There's a
Speaker 1: lot more to come after the short break and we're
Speaker 1: back with more. Go ask Galey, you did buy this
Speaker 1: cabbage cabin cabin cottage. Yes, cabbage. I conflated the two
Speaker 1: words and it's stuck. So now it's the cabbage, which
Speaker 1: is a fantastic word. And I feel like in this
Speaker 1: world of pinterest and everything and you know, the cottage
Speaker 1: cozy culture, that cabbage may have a life of its own,
Speaker 1: Like it could be a whole industry that people could
Speaker 1: tap into, that could be monetized by you. It could
Speaker 1: be Well, I do have the Modern Prairie website and
Speaker 1: we just launched a lifestyle thing, so I have it.
Speaker 1: It's a place for women and older particularly to share
Speaker 1: their experience, their thoughts, their ideas, their skills. All of
Speaker 1: the women that we prom mote as our mavens and
Speaker 1: our makers are All of our products are made by women,
Speaker 1: and everything has a story, and we have a wellness section,
Speaker 1: and then there's kitchen and home and garden and all
Speaker 1: of that, which is so fantastic because I think, particularly
Speaker 1: knock on Wood, coming out of this pandemic, I think
Speaker 1: people are realizing that there's a coziness that they want
Speaker 1: to keep, that there's a connection to community and family
Speaker 1: and friends that that they want to nourish. There is
Speaker 1: a kind of metaphoric and physical kind of back to
Speaker 1: basics what's important ye that I'm trying to hold onto,
Speaker 1: which seems like you've really tapped into. Yeah, it's the
Speaker 1: simple things that really mattered. Look when when you back
Speaker 1: it all up to a couple of years ago, and
Speaker 1: we couldn't as a nation get toilet paper, everything else
Speaker 1: falls away. You know, what's a manicure, what's a spa day,
Speaker 1: What's I mean? All of these things become so wildly unimportant,
Speaker 1: And um, I found that I really enjoy that simplicity
Speaker 1: and that I don't like you. I don't want to
Speaker 1: lose it. I don't want to go back to what
Speaker 1: we were. I learned so much about myself and and
Speaker 1: Tim and I together found this place of true peace
Speaker 1: and tranquility and quietness. And you know, We've got chickens
Speaker 1: and we have our garden, and I'm constantly just dirty
Speaker 1: and sticky and sweaty and happy. And we cook, we
Speaker 1: go to I mean, we're we are old funny duddies.
Speaker 1: We go to sleep at ten, we wake up at six,
Speaker 1: we go to bed at eight, So we are you
Speaker 1: are the funny duddiest, Yes, because George does get up
Speaker 1: at three o'clock in the morning to do m so right, Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: and yeah, that's not my excuse. But I like a
Speaker 1: lot of sleep, and I'm going to go to bed
Speaker 1: with my husband, so you know, I'm the same way.
Speaker 1: I'm sleep is one of my favorite things to do.
Speaker 1: It maybe my favorite activity ever. I get into it
Speaker 1: like I care about the pillow. I love a pajama
Speaker 1: if George allows me to keep them on. I like
Speaker 1: the whole nesting process. We have two dogs that bury
Speaker 1: it like it's a whole Eskimo thing that we have
Speaker 1: going on in our house, which I love. We were
Speaker 1: the exactly the same. The bed is the center of
Speaker 1: the house, and when we travel we take our sheets.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm a I'm a big princess in the person,
Speaker 1: and I love my betting. I totally get it. Are
Speaker 1: you going to be selling betting on your website? You know,
Speaker 1: we haven't talked about that yet. Maybe I don't know
Speaker 1: right now. The only textiles we have our kitchen. We're
Speaker 1: really focused on kitchen because women, the women who have
Speaker 1: subscribed so far really want to hear the kitchen stuff.
Speaker 1: And then we did something really interesting. Um I did
Speaker 1: a little Instagram Facebook life thing with a woman I loved.
Speaker 1: Her name is Christine Simple, and she's a life coach.
Speaker 1: But she's like she's she's a gnarly fantastic life coach
Speaker 1: and she's just all about simplicity and loving yourself. That's
Speaker 1: really what you gotta do, and like starting so small,
Speaker 1: just smile at yourself in the mirror. That's like it.
Speaker 1: And she's she's amazing. So we did this this forum together,
Speaker 1: and we put out a questionnaire to our members and
Speaker 1: said what do you want us to focus on? And
Speaker 1: the number one subject that came back was grief, grieving
Speaker 1: and healing, and so we're just now putting together another
Speaker 1: forum with my best friend Sandy, who lost her firstborn
Speaker 1: son when he was sixteen to meningitis and then not
Speaker 1: only recovered from the grief herself, but also became a
Speaker 1: grief counselor and then wrote a book on it called
Speaker 1: How to Survive the Worst That Can Happen, which is
Speaker 1: like a step by step workbook on how to get
Speaker 1: through that if if it's at all positive. And so
Speaker 1: we're going to start without and so these are the
Speaker 1: kind of things that I want that sort of sense
Speaker 1: of community back that we don't have anymore because we're
Speaker 1: also we were so siloed before COVID because of politics,
Speaker 1: and then COVID and social media. Yes, well yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean you've got some you know people. George carlin Um,
Speaker 1: who is one of my favorite stand up comics in
Speaker 1: the whole world, once said, the degree to which a
Speaker 1: person is an asshole grows exponentially the further away you
Speaker 1: are from them physically. So if you're across the room
Speaker 1: from that guy, you go, that guy's an asshole. But
Speaker 1: if he's standing here, you go, that guy's an asshole.
Speaker 1: And social media has made it even worse. People will
Speaker 1: say the most horrible things, but they would never say
Speaker 1: them to your face. And I think that it really
Speaker 1: got exacerbated when we were all locked down too and
Speaker 1: then and then the politics and the heat of the
Speaker 1: summer and the social unrest and the racial reckoning and
Speaker 1: all of that stuff just exploded. And nobody knows how
Speaker 1: to I mean, most people don't know how to be
Speaker 1: kind anymore, Like we all forgot how to be polite
Speaker 1: at least, and it's you know, it's getting worse. It
Speaker 1: is getting worse. But one thing I wanted to say
Speaker 1: about sort of going back to basics and community is
Speaker 1: one thing I've noticed about women our age is that
Speaker 1: we can finally, like my friend Katie used to say,
Speaker 1: we no longer have to be sexy sexy. We get
Speaker 1: to wear big straw hats and grow tomatoes now, and
Speaker 1: we just need to you embrace that. Next chapter, you go,
Speaker 1: I'm good with this. So what have I learned and
Speaker 1: what I want to do? And one thing that I've realized,
Speaker 1: you know, I discovered clamming during the pandemic, but I
Speaker 1: realized I want to go, Oh, I will take you anytime,
Speaker 1: I really will, absolutely I went yesterday actually and got
Speaker 1: a hundred clams. And it was so it is just
Speaker 1: so it's my meditation. And I now I don't even
Speaker 1: use the rake. I sit in the sand and I
Speaker 1: just use my hands and I pulled them up and
Speaker 1: then I give them all away, give the give a
Speaker 1: bunch to the local vet. And that this, you know,
Speaker 1: And I realized that I have another friend who used
Speaker 1: to be Obama's chief of staff and she now is
Speaker 1: an upstate making jam. And so we find these things
Speaker 1: that of course, when you're twenty two, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: it's not cool to be like, hey, I make jam,
Speaker 1: but I knit. Yeah, I'm knit. She makes jam, but
Speaker 1: like it's so delicious now that she's like driving it
Speaker 1: down to ze Bar, you know it. It's now it's
Speaker 1: like baby boom. But I know so many women that
Speaker 1: have found these you know, she she's making it into
Speaker 1: a business. But small things that bring us so much joy.
Speaker 1: And they're simple, they're really simple things. It's simple, and
Speaker 1: you have to at least I did this. I came
Speaker 1: to this moment where I thought, well, what am I
Speaker 1: going to do with this last third of my life?
Speaker 1: Am I still going to keep pushing and rushing and
Speaker 1: doing and going. I mean to the point of even
Speaker 1: when I was running for off years ago, is that
Speaker 1: the direction I want to go? Or do I really
Speaker 1: want to lean into this peaceful, settled You know, I
Speaker 1: love having freedom. I don't really feel particularly consciously ambitious.
Speaker 1: I'm still wildly competitive, I always will be, UM, but
Speaker 1: I'm I've taken the pressure off to have to win.
Speaker 1: I just compete with myself now I don't have to
Speaker 1: beat anybody else. And UM, I just I think a
Speaker 1: lot of women are at this age reassessing what is
Speaker 1: this last third? I want the freedom to be at
Speaker 1: mar kids are all over the country. I want to
Speaker 1: go see the grandkids whenever I have free time. I
Speaker 1: don't want to lock myself into doing things that, um,
Speaker 1: I don't want to do anymore. And one of the
Speaker 1: one of the things I've learned to do is how
Speaker 1: to say no. And I, you know, spent so much
Speaker 1: of my life saying yes to everything. Well that's a
Speaker 1: hard lesson, by the way, no matter what you do
Speaker 1: where you are, you know that you learned to say
Speaker 1: no to, especially with people that don't make you feel good.
Speaker 1: Like I used to accept every invitation. Oh, yes, yes,
Speaker 1: me too. Of course I wanted, so I'm going to
Speaker 1: show up. And it wasn't until I married George that
Speaker 1: he went, what what are you doing? You know, don't
Speaker 1: be so easy and and he sort of taught me.
Speaker 1: And his great thing was, you know, so and so
Speaker 1: has invited us to a barbecue. Pretend it's happening right now,
Speaker 1: do you want to go? And it was always no,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, No, I would rather sit
Speaker 1: be sitting here and reading a book with you. And
Speaker 1: you know, it was always saying yes for other people, always,
Speaker 1: never for myself. Yea, the same, exactly the same. And
Speaker 1: now that I'm saying no to so many of these things.
Speaker 1: And we don't do these things because we don't want to.
Speaker 1: When we actually go to something, it means something. And
Speaker 1: people who know us that know that we're not out
Speaker 1: all the time, but if we show up, it's because
Speaker 1: we really care. I'm thinking of like little things. A
Speaker 1: friend of mine, Isabel Gillis, wrote a book called Cozy,
Speaker 1: and it's all about things like little things in life
Speaker 1: that you can find that are just cozy. And one
Speaker 1: of the things she says is cozy is making dinner
Speaker 1: in the summer in your bathing suit. And I was
Speaker 1: thinking about cozy things in your life and one of
Speaker 1: them is and and correct me if I'm wrong. When
Speaker 1: you guys have guests come to your cabbage, you take
Speaker 1: a polaroid picture of them and hang it on the wall,
Speaker 1: which is such a lovely thing because it's not only
Speaker 1: very artistic and creative, but I love that, you know,
Speaker 1: you the guests sort of lives on forever until until
Speaker 1: they come back. Yeah. Yeah, and it it makes it.
Speaker 1: It makes the cabbage that much more special because people
Speaker 1: leave their imprint behind and we want people to know
Speaker 1: that they leave an imprint on us too. So, UM,
Speaker 1: I have to go back to one thing when you
Speaker 1: were talking about being a child star and that whole
Speaker 1: thing of Hollywood. Um, are you still friends with Rob Low?
Speaker 1: I know you guys were engaged. No, we we I don't.
Speaker 1: I talked to Chadlow more than I talked to Roblow,
Speaker 1: and that's not even very often. That was just something
Speaker 1: I'm that I didn't know about you, And when I
Speaker 1: read it, I went, look at that. But he's he's
Speaker 1: not somebody though that you you put in your documentary
Speaker 1: about child stars. Well, no, because he didn't really. He
Speaker 1: wasn't really a child star. We got together. We were
Speaker 1: the same age when we were seventeen, and he didn't
Speaker 1: do the outsiders until we were eighteen and I was
Speaker 1: still in little house in the prairie. Then how old
Speaker 1: were you when you were engaged? Twenty three? We've been
Speaker 1: together like six years when we got engaged. Still twenty
Speaker 1: three is so young, no kidding. But I still managed
Speaker 1: to become a mother at twenty four, So yes, you did.
Speaker 1: But that's interesting because I was engaged a few times,
Speaker 1: but I only said yes because I didn't want to
Speaker 1: upset them. I didn't want to hurt their feelings, but
Speaker 1: I knew I was going to marry them. You had
Speaker 1: to learn how to say no. No. Literally, you would
Speaker 1: have done it now. If they asked you now, you
Speaker 1: would have said no. Oh yes, I would have said,
Speaker 1: well I said no. Then. I just was like, I
Speaker 1: didn't want to upset them at the beginning. But I
Speaker 1: was thirty six when I got married, and I feel
Speaker 1: like that's kind of the right time. Actually. It is
Speaker 1: like I tell my daughters to just you know, you
Speaker 1: don't know what you want, and I said, you know,
Speaker 1: there's a reason I dated the French director, and that,
Speaker 1: this and that, and now out in the world, I
Speaker 1: don't look at any human being go oh, I wonder
Speaker 1: what that's like. Yeah, me too, same same, I just
Speaker 1: go oh, I know what that is. Yeah, keep that
Speaker 1: away from me. Yeah. I think before I went into therapy,
Speaker 1: I put myself in jeopardy all the time in so
Speaker 1: many different ways, just by having no boundaries, dating someone
Speaker 1: who didn't treat me right, being engaged to someone who
Speaker 1: didn't treat me right, marrying someone I probably should not have.
Speaker 1: I'm glad I did because I have a gorgeous son
Speaker 1: out of it. But I look back now and go,
Speaker 1: oh my god, what was I doing? I was? It
Speaker 1: was also dramatic and melodramatic and needlessly crazy and under
Speaker 1: the microscope and under the microscope. But you know, if
Speaker 1: you take any of it away, I don't get to hear.
Speaker 1: So it was all worth it. And I learned a lot,
Speaker 1: and I tried to impart a lot of those lessons
Speaker 1: onto the boys, and then now consequently with the grandchildren,
Speaker 1: who were predominantly female so far. So I now have
Speaker 1: all these ladies around me, which is that's so great,
Speaker 1: that's exciting. Yeah, which is also making me much more
Speaker 1: fierce politically, because now we're talking about my granddaughters and
Speaker 1: I don't I'm not having it. I'm with your sister,
Speaker 1: I'm with you. We're going to take a short break
Speaker 1: and we'll be right back. Welcome back. Speaking of your
Speaker 1: granddaughters and what's happening. What did you learn from your
Speaker 1: few years in politics? Because I grew up around it,
Speaker 1: you know, I grew up in d C. Everybody was
Speaker 1: a political journalist. I can't believe I ended up marrying
Speaker 1: George Stephanopolis. You know, I thought I'd married Timothy Busfield,
Speaker 1: but I was so granted. It was during Watergate, but
Speaker 1: I found politics so corrupt. I hated it. Everybody in
Speaker 1: d C was having affairs. People were breaking into the
Speaker 1: Watergate and I ran off and went to n y
Speaker 1: U and then went to l A. And so I'm
Speaker 1: fascinated by someone like you who was out in Hollywood.
Speaker 1: And then you had your congressional run in sixteen for
Speaker 1: a seat in Michigan as a Democrat correct Michigan's eighth district,
Speaker 1: And what are your takeaway from that experience? You know,
Speaker 1: my political activism, it was always there to a certain extent.
Speaker 1: It was very issue oriented. It was either I was
Speaker 1: speaking out in behalf of abused children or women's rights,
Speaker 1: medical rights and rights to choose. And then I became
Speaker 1: the president of Screen Actors Guild, and while I was
Speaker 1: President of Screen Actors Guild, I also got elected to
Speaker 1: the f l C i O Executive Council, and so
Speaker 1: I then got my feet really wet in that political
Speaker 1: union world and it was a whole other ballgame and
Speaker 1: it really piqued my interests. So when they came to
Speaker 1: me and asked me to run a TIM and I
Speaker 1: talked about it quite a bit, I definitely went into
Speaker 1: it naively. I knew it was going to be hard.
Speaker 1: What I discovered was I don't like to do things
Speaker 1: where I have to fit into a mold. And I
Speaker 1: the thing that really backed me up, aside from people
Speaker 1: not listening to my opinion necessarily or Tim's opinions and
Speaker 1: just kind of shooting us down because this is the
Speaker 1: way it's done, the thing that really got me was
Speaker 1: when they sat me down and said, look, we all
Speaker 1: know you're funny, and that's great, but could you dial
Speaker 1: the humor back when you're out amongst the people, because
Speaker 1: they need to take you seriously as a politician. That
Speaker 1: got me, and then the other thing that got me
Speaker 1: was I had two wardrobes. I had the candidates clothes
Speaker 1: and then I had my clothes, and you know, a
Speaker 1: lot of nice Calvin clein sheath dresses with a blazer
Speaker 1: in a sensible shoe and my little linen overalls and
Speaker 1: T shirts. And we were having a fundraiser in a
Speaker 1: beer garden in Detroit with the head of the d
Speaker 1: Triple C and the Michigan Democratic candidates. So I had
Speaker 1: on jeans and a T shirt and a blazer, albeit
Speaker 1: on Armani blazer, but jeans and a T shirt and
Speaker 1: a blazer. And my campaign manager came to pick me
Speaker 1: up and said, you can't wear jeans and I said,
Speaker 1: we're going to a beer garden. Yeah, you should be
Speaker 1: in jean shorts. There sawdust on the floor. He said, no,
Speaker 1: you've got to change. And that's when I thought, oh,
Speaker 1: this is just this is not going to go well.
Speaker 1: But I put up with it, was willing to do it,
Speaker 1: and then my body gave out. My spine. My spine
Speaker 1: literally left the building. My net went cab Louie. I
Speaker 1: had to have surgery. The recovery was like eight weeks.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have been able to do anything physically. Everybody went, Nope,
Speaker 1: you can't. We're going to have to find someone else.
Speaker 1: And I had just gotten the nomination, the Democratic nomination.
Speaker 1: So when was sixteen. Now, can you imagine if I'd
Speaker 1: gotten elected. I can't either. I would have lost my mind. Yes,
Speaker 1: I think you would have. I don't think I could
Speaker 1: have operated in there in that atmosphere. But I think
Speaker 1: what you have held on too, and what led you
Speaker 1: in the first place, was you have very strong thoughts
Speaker 1: and ideas and values that make you an activist. And
Speaker 1: so that's still there, right, The passion is still there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the passion is definitely there. I disagree with your campaign manager.
Speaker 1: I think if you are authentically yourself, you would have
Speaker 1: done just as well, if not better. Yeah. I think
Speaker 1: back then too, people were still a little afraid and
Speaker 1: trying to keep everyone in the cookie cutter a mole.
Speaker 1: And I think when Trump got elected, all that sort
Speaker 1: of went out the window, and now we have, you know,
Speaker 1: this sort of free for all of all these people.
Speaker 1: But I think that Tim and I because if there's
Speaker 1: anyone who's maybe even more of a feminist and a
Speaker 1: supporter of women's issues. It's him. He and I feel
Speaker 1: like we're both better boots on the ground at this point.
Speaker 1: Like in twenty twenty, we launched a podcast. We only
Speaker 1: did it for a little while. We just did it
Speaker 1: through the election, and it was really politically driven. We
Speaker 1: were getting our opinions and ideas about politics across and
Speaker 1: endorsing in talking about the candidates we respected in the
Speaker 1: candidates we didn't. But you know, it's just it got
Speaker 1: to be a lot. That's not to say we won't
Speaker 1: do it again. I don't know. We're talking now about
Speaker 1: shooting some videos of a character I created when we
Speaker 1: lived in Michigan, a gal named Tammy Crip and Fister,
Speaker 1: and we may actually get our points across using Tammy.
Speaker 1: And you know, Tammy is a big well she's she's
Speaker 1: from Minnesota originally, but you know now she lives in Michigan,
Speaker 1: but Minnesota is better, but she's out. She loves that Trump,
Speaker 1: So she might actually make an appearance if she needs to,
Speaker 1: to talk about just wonderful things he's gonna do. Oh god,
Speaker 1: I would love to hear from her. I'd like to
Speaker 1: hear a nice, healthy debate with her. I could have
Speaker 1: a nice debate when you could debate her. We could
Speaker 1: do that. I would love to debate her. We could
Speaker 1: make that happen. She doesn't think that he might go
Speaker 1: to jail or she think Trump has a shot. Oh no,
Speaker 1: he's not going to a jail. He didn't do anything wrong.
Speaker 1: It's all those other people. You know. It was a
Speaker 1: big false flag. Oh, I can't wait till damn he's ugash. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she's fun. What are your five favorite things in life
Speaker 1: right now that just bring you happiness and bliss besides
Speaker 1: your husband and your kids. Oh, come on, it was
Speaker 1: going to be my first. I know, I know that's
Speaker 1: a given. Your dog, Well, I love her. Yeah, she's
Speaker 1: really Our neighbors actually told us this about her in
Speaker 1: their right. She's a good citizen. She's a good citizen.
Speaker 1: She really is a good citizen. I mean, this is
Speaker 1: the dog who on her own when she walks in
Speaker 1: New York City. Nobody told her to do this. She
Speaker 1: peas on the sidewalk, she poops in the gutter. She's
Speaker 1: a good citizen. But do you still pick it up
Speaker 1: in the gutter? Oh? Yeah, because we're also good citizens.
Speaker 1: I'm just making sure she is owned by so the dog.
Speaker 1: I love. I love my home. I love life up there.
Speaker 1: I love knitting and cross stitching in my recliner. Oh,
Speaker 1: by the way, the recliner is something that you fought
Speaker 1: against that your husband Timothy wanted to buy. And by
Speaker 1: the way, every heterosexual couple, I feel has this fight
Speaker 1: where the man wants to bring in the ugliest chair
Speaker 1: he could possibly find. I had that with George. I
Speaker 1: threw it away, and you now live in it. It's
Speaker 1: my chair. You curl up in it, I do. I
Speaker 1: stretch out and love that. I fall asleep open it.
Speaker 1: I watched television in it. I clean it with Murphy's oil.
Speaker 1: So because it's I don't even know if it's like
Speaker 1: some sort of crazy pleather, it's a naga hide or
Speaker 1: something god awful. So you treat it like it's your
Speaker 1: saddle a little bit. It is. It's my Yes, it's
Speaker 1: exactly right. So I'll add that to the list. Actually,
Speaker 1: I love my recliner. Let me tell you something that
Speaker 1: I'm looking forward to. I want to get two recliners
Speaker 1: so that Timothy or in my case, George, has a
Speaker 1: recliner himself. And cover it in that faux sheep skin
Speaker 1: so it's not only cozy and goes back and the
Speaker 1: foot thing comes up, but you're in sheepskin, so it
Speaker 1: is so cozy you'll never get up, be like sleeping
Speaker 1: in an ug. Yeah. So for Timothy, because he can't
Speaker 1: hear us talking, Yes, I think a Christmas gift or
Speaker 1: a Hanukkah gift should be his own recliner in sheepskin.
Speaker 1: You'll thank me. This will be like the greatest marriage
Speaker 1: tip I could give another couple. This is true, and
Speaker 1: what would end up happening is that he'd end up
Speaker 1: with the Naga hyde and I'd end up Okay, just
Speaker 1: so you know, no, No, the undercurrent is all about
Speaker 1: you taking care of you. Just who we're clear and
Speaker 1: your website, your website of which you're curating these incredibly
Speaker 1: crafty women, crafty women in wonderful products at www dot
Speaker 1: Modern Prairie dot com. I'm on it. It's really fun
Speaker 1: and our community is really growing, and I'm really happy,
Speaker 1: really happy. I think women are gonna love it. I
Speaker 1: think here comes a big statement that it's just going
Speaker 1: to cause problems, but I think that our whole democratic
Speaker 1: system is threatened by the idea of women coming together
Speaker 1: because I think when women come together, a lot of
Speaker 1: seismic things happen. And I think even on a website,
Speaker 1: when women come together with their own creativity, it's powerful too.
Speaker 1: So I think collectively, the more times we can to
Speaker 1: grab each other's hand, it's an incredibly powerful thing. Look,
Speaker 1: I'm just looking at the picture of you guys on
Speaker 1: the beach walking for um was on Instagram joyful Heart
Speaker 1: for joyful Heart, and I did a play reading for
Speaker 1: Joyful Heart gosh years ago here in the city, and
Speaker 1: just that alone, that was a group of women walking
Speaker 1: for something they truly believed in and supported and supporting
Speaker 1: one another, and it it is. It's very powerful, and
Speaker 1: you can't When you join women together like that, the
Speaker 1: most extraordinary things get done. Absolutely, just talking to you, Melissa,
Speaker 1: I am empowered and happy and you've brought me good
Speaker 1: feelings and I feel enlightened and happy. So thank you.
Speaker 1: So before I let you go. In my podcast, go
Speaker 1: ask Alli, I like to turn the tables a little
Speaker 1: bit so it's not just me asking a bunch of
Speaker 1: questions and say, you get to ask me a question
Speaker 1: about anything. Oh gosh, Okay, so many dumb questions that
Speaker 1: went through my head, like just do something stupid like
Speaker 1: panties or a song or a big pick one or something.
Speaker 1: But then I realized, there's actually a real question I
Speaker 1: want to ask you. Okay. One of my favorite movies
Speaker 1: is It's Complicated. But one of my favorite or two
Speaker 1: of my favorite scenes are the ladies together scenes. Again,
Speaker 1: here we are with women talking with women and empowering women,
Speaker 1: and you had a female director. I just like a
Speaker 1: dumb general question. What was it like? Did you have
Speaker 1: the best time with them? Was it a dreamy set
Speaker 1: or was it weird or what? Yes? And I'm glad
Speaker 1: you picked that because I would be honest about anything.
Speaker 1: And this was a good one because you know, I've
Speaker 1: been on sets before that weren't friendly, and you know,
Speaker 1: and you have to be funny and you're calling your
Speaker 1: agent crying. So this was so good. And I was
Speaker 1: so intimidated, you know, because it was a Nancy Myer's film,
Speaker 1: it was Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin. It's one of those
Speaker 1: you don't sleep two nights before the gig. So I
Speaker 1: came on set and the first thing we shot was
Speaker 1: the dinner scene, and it was if I had known
Speaker 1: them my whole life. And we laughed, and I was,
Speaker 1: of course eating the food because it was so Nancy
Speaker 1: had really delicious, amazing food always on set, even a
Speaker 1: tray of gooey French cheeses that were off to the
Speaker 1: side that you don't even saw on camera but you
Speaker 1: could smell. And at one point Meryl said, Alie, if
Speaker 1: you keep taking a bite, you're gonna have to keep
Speaker 1: eating because Nancy is going to do like forty takes.
Speaker 1: And so when Nancy would yell cut, it wasn't like
Speaker 1: we would all disperse and go to our trailers. We
Speaker 1: would sit in the sofas and we would talk about
Speaker 1: Bernie made off. We would exchange carrot cake recipes. Rita
Speaker 1: was constantly having hot flashes, so we would all like
Speaker 1: wave magazines at her. And it was you know, I
Speaker 1: think the reason that it felt good watching it was
Speaker 1: because it was is authentically nice and cozy, and it's
Speaker 1: everything you would hope it to be. So it was
Speaker 1: the best experience. I hated leaving the set at night,
Speaker 1: and I just love all the women that I got
Speaker 1: to do it with. Oh that's so cool, and and
Speaker 1: I gotta follow up. I can't. I can't just let
Speaker 1: it go. You can't follow off. How much of it
Speaker 1: was improv and how much of it was written? Would
Speaker 1: you say, like roughly percentage wise? I would say it
Speaker 1: was all scripted, all scripted. Yes, it was all scripted, Nancy,
Speaker 1: she sticks to the script. I mean I played kind
Speaker 1: of as much as I could. But it was a ball.
Speaker 1: It was absolutely a ball. Oh my gosh, Melissa, this
Speaker 1: was so great. This was not work at all. This
Speaker 1: was just fun and this was my podcast. I want
Speaker 1: to be friends with Melissa Gilbert. Did I succeed? You did?
Speaker 1: I'm seriously want to come clamming. I'm a serious well
Speaker 1: and then I'm coming upstate because there's a lot of
Speaker 1: stuff upstate I love to do, so absolutely. I like
Speaker 1: Auntie king up there, I like Raspberry picking up there,
Speaker 1: like the whole Upstate scene. And I have such awe
Speaker 1: and respect for you, and I can't wait to take
Speaker 1: you clambing. Really, we're holding you to it. Bring your wellies.
Speaker 1: I will and the dog. Oh yeah, no, we won't
Speaker 1: be able to get her out of the water, but yes,
Speaker 1: I'll bring her. I love it. Thank you for listening
Speaker 1: to Go Ask Ali. I might be crazy, but I
Speaker 1: think Melissa Gilbert's next show is coming off the Prairie
Speaker 1: and clamming with Ali. I don't know, but it smells
Speaker 1: like a hit. If you would like to know more
Speaker 1: about Melissa, you can follow her on Instagram at Melissa
Speaker 1: Gilbert Official. You got to read her book Back to
Speaker 1: the Prairie Home Remade a Life Rediscovered, and her website,
Speaker 1: which I can't wait to click onto, is Modern Prairie
Speaker 1: dot com. Be sure to subscribe, rate and review the podcast,
Speaker 1: and follow me on social media on Twitter at Ali
Speaker 1: E Wentworth and on Instagram at the Real Ali Wentworth. Now.
Speaker 1: If you'd like to ask me a question or suggest
Speaker 1: a guest or topic, I'd love to hear from you,
Speaker 1: and there's a bunch of ways you can do it.
Speaker 1: You can call or text me at three to three
Speaker 1: three four six three six, or you can email a
Speaker 1: voice memo right from your phone to Go Ask Gali
Speaker 1: podcast at gmail dot com. If you leave a question,
Speaker 1: you might hear it. I'm Go Ask Gali. Go Ask
Speaker 1: Gali is a production of Shonda land Audio and partnership
Speaker 1: with I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from Shonda Land Audio,
Speaker 1: visit the I heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.