In The Little House On The Prairie, behind the smiles and the landscapes of Walnut Grove, there were very real tensions between certain actors. Among the conflicts, that between Radames Pera, interpreter of John Sanderson Edwards, and Melissa Sue Anderson, alias Mary Ingalls, particularly attracted attention.
Mary Ingallsperformed by Melissa Sue Anderson, really had no luck. When fourth season, she becomes blind, completely turning his life upside down. However, this twist might never have happened.
An aborted plot
According to Alison Arngrima.k.a Nellie Oleson the plague of the series, Michael Landon had originally planned for Mary to marry John Sanderson Edwardsplayed by Radames Pera. “ Michael had decided to postpone the whole plot around her blindness indefinitely and concoct a romantic plot for her. Radames was supposed to marry her“, she explains in her autobiography.
This project fell through due to Melissa Sue Anderson : “ Melissa Sue hated Radames refused to kiss him, and he ended up to leave there series. So, of course, that meant Michael had to to come back has the old plot and make her blind“, revealed Alison Arngrim, showing that tensions existed on the set of the series.
Radames Pera, for his part, gave his version of the facts. “ Michael Landon had written a very special character who was to develop a relationship with Mary Ingalls, played by Melissa Sue Andersonot. But I had to integrate into the group. Some immediately welcomed me warmly and others did not. Melissa Sue, who I was supposed to interact with the most, was a little younger than me. She was maybe 13 and I was 15. When Michael decided to develop this romantic relationship between us, I think she just wasn’t ready to play that. It was pushed a little by Michael. »
Furthermore, Melissa Sue Anderson’s behavior has often been criticized on the film set.
A relationship doomed to failure The Little House On The Prairie
Radames Pera spoke about his frustrations facing resistance from Melissa Sue Anderson. “ Despite all my efforts to be professional with her and invite her to develop this alchemy on screen between our characters, she did not want to. It became very frustrating for me as a professional actor to be faced with this resistance unprofessional“, he confided.
According to him, Anderson’s reluctance to play a romantic relationship on screen was due to his young age. “ Looking back, I understand. She just wasn’t ready. Fortunately, we were both talented enough that it didn’t show in our performances. But Michael knew it was a problem and that things weren’t clicking between us.“
There disappearance sudden by John Edwards of the series was a shock for Radames Pera, especially when Michael Landon announced it to him in a brutal manner. In fact, he says that when he was supposed to shoot a scene, Landon said to him: “ We just shot the scene where we find your corpse“. This dry end marked the end of his role in The Little House On The Prairie.
A brutal conclusion
Melissa Sue Anderson also shared her feelings about this in her autobiography. She admitted that she didn’t feel much chemistry with Radames Pera. “ I don’t remember who my teenage crush was at that time. (…) Radames Pera was simply not on my list of “handsome kids. »“
Tensions between Radames Pera and Melissa Sue Anderson on the set of The Little House On The Prairie therefore have strongly influenced the development of their characters.
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