An iconic Little House on the Prairie star recently revealed great tidbits about how her character’s evil side blossomed. Alison Arngrim played the role of Nellie Oleson on the series, and she took everybody back to a specific episode and experience in a recent podcast episode.
During the August 28 episode of the Little House: Fifty for 50 podcast, Arngrim and former co-star Dean Butler looked back on an episode that aired in 1976 titled “The Talking Machine.”
That episode was directed by Victor French, who also played Isaiah Edwards on the series. During the podcast, Arngrim recalled French’s direction during a specific scene that she declared was “freaking brilliant.”
In that particular episode, Nellie gets jealous that Melissa Gilbert’s Laura Ingalls gets attention from a new classmate, Jason. When Laura and Jason are walking by one day, Nellie pulls his attention away from Laura with her family’s “talking machine.”
The phonograph the Oleson family had was a rare commodity those days, and Jason seemed interested. A few moments later, Nellie quietly concocts an evil plan to embarrass Laura, who was essentially her nemesis.
Arngrim explains that French was “really good about how things should build,” nudging her to amp up her reactions further and further. With his support, Arngrim began to think like the Grinch when he smiled over his own evil plan in How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
While filming the scene, French coached her, “No. Worse. No, more evil. No, more terrible.” Then, Arngrim recalled, he brought up the comic books she had been reading that week on the set.
“I had been reading these horror comics that week on the set with werewolves and zombies and things. They’re very, very gory and fabulous. I was 13,” Arngrim explained. French told her to think of those comic books, and she recalled,
“Then you just see this fabulous, beautiful smile just overtake me. And he’s like, ‘Yes. That’s it.’ He absolutely rah rah’d, cheered me through it.”
Alison Arngrim on ‘Little House: Fifty for 50’ podcast
Nellie’s evil smile led to a stunt where she recorded Laura admitting she had a crush on Jason, which Nellie used to embarrass her. Despite coming up with what she thought was the perfect plan, in that episode, Nellie’s father found out what she had done and doled out consequences.
Podcast listeners got a kick out of Arngrim’s story.
One Instagram user commented about the episode, “It was freaking hilarious. Alison bringing the stories for us was the best!”
“Please, please please please put more episodes on your podcast. You guys are funny,” commented another fan.
“Yes! I love this podcast and this episode,” someone else added.
This story was originally reported by Parade on Sep 2, 2025, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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