Spoiler alert: This article contains spoilers for Episode 2 of the Little House on the Prairie reboot, which is now available on Netflix.
For Little House on the Prairie OG viewers, there’s nothing worse than Laura Ingalls’ childhood bully, Nellie Olson. But Netflix’s latest take on this popular tale takes things to a very meta level with a spooky scene that pays homage to the iconic pop culture nemesis.
In episode two of Netflix’s new Little House on the Prairie remake, young Laura Ingalls (Alice Halsey) and her older sister Mary (Skywalker Hughes) find themselves lost in the wild near their new home on the prairie in the 1870s. As “Mama” Caroline (Crosby Fitzgerald) and “Papa” Charles (Luke Bracey) race to find them, they encounter a trio of sinister-looking figures in the woods. Among them was Ida, played by Alison Arngrim, best known for her role as Nellie Olson on NBC’s “Little House on the Prairie.”
Alison Arngrim as Ida in Little House on the Prairie
Eric Zakanowicz/NETFLIX
Every version of Little House is a story of survival, but the Netflix drama sticks to its family-friendly roots, with the scariest scenes in which a dirty and disheveled Ida (Arngrim) attempts to hold the girls hostage until John Edwards (Warren Christie) quickly arrives to save the day. Still, it’s a completely different side of Arngrim than anything audiences have seen before.
“Little House on the Prairie” showrunner Rebecca Sonnenshein told Variety, “We’ve always wanted Alison Arngrim to be on the show.” “So when we were writing episode two, I was talking to some friends and saying, ‘We want Alison Arngrim to play this woman. Do you think she would do it?’” And they were like, “Maybe!” Much later, when I actually decided to make it, she said yes. I read her autobiography and it was very good. She’s so smart and cool and funny and funny. And she did it. She came to the show and was so excited. She was very good at sports. She said, “Can I put something more on my teeth?” surely! keep it up!
Once Sonnenschein secured Arngilm’s cameo role, he had a hard time keeping it quiet. Mainly because I forgot that I had already told people about my dream casting.
Little House on the Prairie: Andrea Greening, Alison Arngrim, Ida
Eric Zakanowicz/NETFLIX
“Then one of my friends said, ‘Did you catch Nellie?'” And I said, “That was the big secret!” Wait, who said that? ‘And they said, ‘You did it! ”’ Sonnenschein says. “Oh yeah, I’ve always wanted to do this. Yeah, I forgot about it two years ago, but I was like, ‘I want Nelly to be on my show. Would she be willing to do it?'”
Having Arngrim as a fun villain is just one of the ways the new “Little House” pays homage to the original “Little House,” which aired for nine seasons on NBC from 1974 to 1983. Sonnenschein also met with other original cast members, including Melissa Gilbert (Laura), and both shows are produced by Friendly Family through Friendly Family Productions.
“[Executive producer]Tripp Friendly was very involved with the cast of the original show and events, and had the opportunity to meet many of them,” Sonnenschein said. “I went to an event called Lolapalooza and got to meet Dean Butler (Almanzo Wilder) and Charlotte Stewart, who played Eva Beadle Sims, who was so charming. And Grace (Brenda Turnbaugh and Wendy Tarr). I also met one of the actresses who played the role that Nbeau shared (now Wendy Lu Li), and they were so nice and excited. They’re like, ‘We want everyone to see it!’
However, Sonnenshein, who calls Gilbert “the sweetest, loveliest person in the world” and an “icon,” was quick to remind her that she is not her Laura and that “we do not own the original series.”
“We’re not licensed. We have nothing to do with it,” Sonnenschein says. “But of course, we’re drawing from real life, even if it’s not in the book, so we overlap just like they do.”
“Little House” has already been renewed for season 2 on Netflix, and season 2 episodes are currently in the works, which will feature Willa Dunn as the new Nellie Olson. But Sonnenschein is first and foremost a fan of Wilder’s Little House series, which started it all, so he relies on the text rather than mentioning Arngrim’s performance.
“I watched some of it when I was a kid, but we didn’t have cable when I was a kid, so I couldn’t always watch it,” Sonnenschein says. “I had to make sure my antenna could pick it up. And because I didn’t have cable, I couldn’t watch it on reruns. So I didn’t watch a lot of the old series. I think I went back and watched the pilot just to see what they did, but in general, it’s just from the book.”
