1 of 5 | Crosby Fitzgerald and Luke Bracey star in “Little House on the Prairie,” on Netflix Thursday. Photo courtesy of Netflix
Luke Bracey and Crosby Fitzgerald said they portray Charles and Caroline Ingalls on Little House on the Prairie, on Netflix Thursday, as equal partners. The new adaptation of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books chronicles the family settling in Kansas.
In a recent Zoom interview with UPI, Bracey and Fitzgerald described the relationship between the parents, whom their daughters, Laura (Alice Halsey) and Mary (Skywalker Hughes), refer to as Ma and Pa. They credited Rebecca Sonnenshine’s adaptation, which Netflix already renewed for a second season, with laying their foundation.
“They respect each other and who each other are as people,” Bracey said. “One of the best foundations you can have for any type of relationship is trust and respect and belief in the other person.”
Fitzgerald said they created a Spotify playlist together before they even met. Tracks included “In Spite of Ourselves” by John Prine and “Our House” by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.
“We were immediately friends and that’s the relationship also that Ma and Pa had,” Fitzgerald said. “They’re teammates.”
The journey from Wisconsin to Kansas by wagon is fraught with natural peril, and when they arrive, they have to build their house before winter. Mistakes are made along the way and Charles admits when he’s made them.
“I like that he fesses up and he’s honest with himself,” Bracey said. “It might take Caroline pushing him but one thing I admire is that he’s not driven by ego as a man.”
In the late 19th century, Caroline is evolving traditional women’s roles, helping to build the house and challenge social prejudices in town.
“She does want to change and she does want to grow,” Fitzgerald said. “Otherwise she wouldn’t have married someone like Charles and wouldn’t be going on this adventure. She allows herself to be changed by both the prairie and also by her daughter, I think, who opens her eyes to being an open-minded person and being an inclusive person.”
Bracey finds the Ingalls’ evolution admirable.
“He’s a good example of no one’s perfect but you should just try to be,” he said of Charles. “He’s a good man who wants to be a good father and a good husband and a good member of the community. They’re traits that I admire and they’re things that I want to be in life.”
The original Little House on the Prairie TV adaptation ran for nine seasons. Michael Landon and Karen Grassle originally played Charles and Caroline.
Bracey already experienced stepping into a beloved role when he played Johnny Utah in 2015’s Point Break remake. He believes every movie or show could be somebody’s favorite, whether original or remake, and vice versa.
“It’s going to be someone’s favorite thing and also someone is not going to like it,” Bracey said. “That’s my parents, including. My parents are very, very often like, ‘That wasn’t very good, mate.'”
Fitzgerald tries to adopt Bracey’s attitude.
“It’s nice to have level-headed Luke to keep me in check about it,” she said. “It’s also nice to be a part of something that people care enough to have opinions about, honestly. So you just have to try not to take it personally.”
Like Ma and Pa in the show, Fitzgerald and Bracey support each other in the making of it too.
“We were both invested in a very similar way,” Fitzgerald said. “We wanted to honor this and have fun and take the work very seriously, not take ourselves too seriously, be really great examples on set to these two little girls. Turns out they were examples to us ultimately because they’re really amazing at their job and set the tone.”
Bracey concurred, adding that their bond continues when they’re not working.
“We always said to each other we’ve got each other’s back no matter what and we’re not going to let each other fall over,” he said. “That makes when the cameras are rolling just that much easier.”
Filming Little House did include a bit of hard labor. Scenes of the construction of the house involved real hacksaws.
“We sawed a log,” Fitzgerald bragged.
Hauling logs could have been a little Hollywood magic, Bracey admitted.
“Maybe a few of the ones we carried might have been a bit lighter but we sawed a log,” Bracey said. “It was certainly 35 degrees Celsius out there and she did it all in a corset.”
