Ma Ingalls: Michael Landon Was a Completely Sexist Asshole

The actress who played Ma Ingalls on Little House on the Prairie says co-star Michael Landon was a different person behind the scenes than the kind, wholesome character he played on screen. Karen Grassle, promoting a memoir, told the New York Post that her relationship with Landon went down the tubes after she asked for a raise and he wanted to pay her the same as the child actors. Landon, who was also the producer and the director, began body-shaming her in front of the crew and making boorish comments while filming. “Mike would say ‘c---” and make disgusting jokes about how a woman smelled after sex,” Grassle said. “As a woman in the 1970s film industry, I was so accustomed to these putdowns, it never occurred to me to sharply rebuke him.” Grassle, who also dishes about her drinking, affairs, and abortions in the book, says she reconciled with Landon before his 1991 death from pancreatic cancer.