Yahoo Lifestyle Melissa Gilbert Says ‘Little House On The Prairie’ Reboot At Netflix “Will Do Things We Didn’t Get To Do So Easily In ’70s”
TV’s original Laura Ingalls is speaking out about Netflix’s plans to reboot Little House on the Prairie.
In an interview with EW, Melissa Gilbert, aka the Laura in the long-running NBC series from 1974-1984, said, “there’s room in the Little House universe for all different kinds of stories to be told, just like there was always room in the Little Women universe to keep retelling that story.”
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“These are classic stories, and no one’s done it where they hewed to the books completely,” Gilbert said. “[The original] was Michael Landon’s interpretation, and now it’s time for someone else’s interpretation. And I think there’s plenty of room for that. And I think there’s a lot of other stories to mine beyond that. So I think this opens the door in a lot of ways for all kinds of Little House on the Prairie projects.”
Netflix recently revealed that it has greenlit a reboot of Little House, which has enjoyed a stunning resurgence on Peacock recently. Rebecca Sonnenshine (The Boys, Vampire Diaries, Archive 81) will serve as showrunner and executive producer on what Netflix is describing as a “reimagining” of the series based on the book series by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Other EPs are Joy Gorman Wettels for Joy Coalition, Dana Fox, Susanna Fogel and Trip Friendly for Friendly Family Productions — who’s been pushing for a reboot for years.
Gilbert went on to tell EW that the new iteration will “do things that we didn’t get to do necessarily so easily in the ’70s.” She’s referring to the diversity in casting that the new series hopes to achieve, but is also responding to a recent tweet by Megyn Kelly who lamented the possibility of Netflix “woke-fying” the beloved franchise.
“Did you watch the original? Have you seen the episode ‘The Wisdom of Solomon’? I don’t think we got more woke than that,” Gilbert told EW. “Did she see any of the episodes we did about drug addiction, about nativism, about Native Americans, chauvinists, anti-semitism, rape, child abuse, child neglect, industrialization? I mean, we covered everything that’s going on in the world still. It’s not my job to defend the word woke, but to my mind, it just means compassion for all. I don’t understand why that’s a bad thing, and I don’t think anyone can ever convince me of that.”
The new version from CBS Studios and Anonymous Content Studios is expected to follow Charles, his wife Caroline and their daughters Laura and Mary as they leave Wisconsin to settle in Independence, KS. There will be Osage characters, as the first season is based on the book Little House on the Prairie.
Other former cast members have commented on the reboot. Dean Butler, who played Laura’s husband Almanzo Wilder in the original series, said he felt initial sadness about the announcement. “One of the first feelings, in all honesty, is probably, well, ‘If this works, are they going to forget about what we did all those years ago?'” he said. “And then the next thought is, ‘It’s going to be very difficult to create something that touches people’s hearts in the way that the original did.’”
But Butler went on to say that “the audience has changed. What is the television audience and what do they want? … There’s a very different expectation. And if this adaptation of Little House can meet the expectation of this more current audience and bring along a few of those who have loved it, it’s going to be very successful.”
And Alison Arngrim, who played Nellie Oleson, tried to temper concerns about the Netflix adaptation. So far, none of the originals have been asked back to participate in the new version.
“This [show] is part of the Laura Ingalls Wilder multiverse,” she told one outlet. “So concerns that they’re going to run amok away from the books and make it into something weird — not happening. [Friendly Family Productions] will pull the plug on it before anything like that happens.”
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