Today Alison Arngrim as Nellie from “Our Little Farm” is indispensable. She originally auditioned for two other roles on the series, but to no avail.
From 1974 to 1982 she played the overbearing Nellie Oleson so convincing that this part should make her famous. The character did not correspond at all to Alison Arngrim’s nature: “I was very shy as a child – I was more the type who was beaten up by a Nellie Oleson in the schoolyard,” recalls the now 61-year-old actress in an interview with the magazine”zoomers“. “This character was the opposite of me – I was never that bold, and the things Nellie did and said to others I would never dare to do or say.”
Alison was already in front of the camera before “Our Little Farm”.
Born into a family of actors, Alison still lives in Los Angeles and had a few television appearances as a child actress before Little Farm. But she hadn’t gotten any roles since she was ten, and her parents told her that acting was probably over now.
Comeback attempt at the tender age of eleven
When the casting for the series “Our Little Farm” began, however, hopes arose of being able to get one of the two main roles. Alison auditioned for the roles of both Laura Ingalls and her screen sister, Mary Ingalls. “I originally auditioned for the roles of Laura and Mary, but finding Laura Ingalls was like finding Scarlett O’Hara – everyone auditioned,” she said.
Alison won’t be put off
After being turned down for the roles of Laura and Mary, the 11-year-old finally tried her luck as Nellie: “I had no idea who Nellie Oleson was until I went to the audition. So I did the scene from the episode ‘Country Girls’ ( Season 1, Episode 2) where she says, ‘My house is the best house in Walnut Grove’ and Michael Landon and the producers laughed hysterically. They begged me to do it again. And like any good child actress I said: ‘Oh yes, what should I change?’ And they laughed and said, ‘Nothing, just read the part about the house again.'”
When Alison was still on the way back with her father after the audition, the agent called at home and said that she had the role: “I was hired on the spot. I was stunned.”
