‘The Waltons’ Star Mary McDonough and Melissa Sue Anderson of ‘Little House on the Prairie’ Once Bonded Over Being Young Actors
Mary McDonough and Melissa Sue Anderson both grew up on TV. McDonough starred as Erin Walton in the hit CBS series The Waltons, while Anderson played Laura Ingalls’s older sister Mary on Little House on the Prairie. When the two actors ended up working together on a made-for-TV movie in the early 1980s, they bonded over their experience as young people in Hollywood.
Mary McDonough and Melissa Sue Anderson co-starred in ‘Midnight Offerings’
Both McDonough and Anderson rose to fame on period TV dramas that celebrated a simpler way of life. But in 1981, they were both cast in very different kinds of roles in the TV movie Midnight Offerings.
In the movie, Anderson plays a teenage witch named Vivian who uses her powers for evil in an attempt to keep control of her boyfriend, football star David (Patrick Cassidy). But when David expresses an interest in good-girl Robin (McDonough), things get ugly, especially once Vivian’s rival realizes she also had magical abilities. With its modern setting and themes of witchcraft, Midnight Offerings was a far cry from the world of Walton’s Mountain and Walnut Grove.
‘The Waltons’ actor was intimidated by the ‘Little House on the Prairie’ star
In addition to her work on Little House on the Prairie, Anderson had appeared in TV movies such as The Loneliest Runner, episodes of The Love Boat, and multiple ABC Afterschool Specials. But McDonough had done little work outside of The Waltons. For her, landing the role of Robin was a big coup, as it allowed her to show that she was more than just Erin Walton.
“I felt like I had won the lottery,” she recalled in her 2011 memoir, Lessons From the Mountain.
Anderson and McDonough didn’t know each other prior to filming, and The Waltons cast member was a bit intimidated by her more famous co-star, who “seemed bold and confident.” Anderson smoked, dated older men (her boyfriend at the time was Frank Sinatra Jr.), and drove a Mercedes. McDonough wrote that she felt like “a geek” compared to the “savvy and sophisticated” Anderson.
McDonough and Anderson bonded over their experiences as child actors
Despite their differences, Anderson and McDonough eventually bonded. One evening, dense coastal fog rolled in during a long night of shooting. McDonough realized the hazardous conditions meant it would take her a long time to drive home, and she and Anderson both had to be back on set early the next morning. The two actors decided to spend the night at a nearby motel.
McDonough and Anderson borrowed items they needed for their impromptu sleepover from the makeup and wardrobe departments. At the motel, they “lit up cigarettes and talked and laughed and smoked and talked.”
“We talked about being on shows and working as a kid,” McDonough recalled. “We shared what our sets were like and wearing the wardrobe on a period show. Yuck!”
“No one knows what it’s like to work as a kid better than another kid actor,” McDonough added. “It’s an unspoken bond I have experienced with most child performers I have met.”
Unfortunately, Midnight Offerings didn’t receive great reviews when it aired. But McDonough didn’t mind. She was glad to “have gotten off [Walton’s Mountain] for a brief moment.”
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