Melissa Sue Anderson
| Melissa Sue Anderson | |
|---|---|
| Born | September 26, 1962 Berkeley, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1972–present |
Melissa Sue Anderson (born September 26, 1962) is an American-Canadian actress. She played the role of Mary Ingalls on the NBC television series Little House on the Prairie. She starred on the show from 1974 until 1981, leaving after Season 7, but later appeared in 2 episodes of Season 8 in late 1981. She won an Emmy Award for her performance in Which Mother Is Mine? (1979). One of her more recent performances was as First Lady Megan Hollister in the 2006 television mini-series 10.5: Apocalypse.
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[edit] Biography
Anderson was born in Berkeley, California. Her show business career began when a dance teacher urged her parents to find an agent for her. She began doing TV commercials, and soon she was in demand for television roles. One of those included that of Millicent, the girl who kissed Bobby and induced him to see fireworks on The Brady Bunch. At age eleven, she won her role in Little House on the Prairie ahead of hundreds of competitors. She left in 1981 and continued acting in television shows like The Equalizer, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and Murder, She Wrote.
She has been described as mild mannered and unpretentious, similar to her Mary Ingalls character. Her first publicly known romance was with actor Lorenzo Lamas, with whom she made an appearance in the film series The Love Boat in which two friends (Lorenzo and Melissa) resist the matchmaking efforts of their parents. After this short romance, she dated Frank Sinatra, Jr., who at the time was more than twice her age. She says, "It was fun, but never really wild. That's just not me."[citation needed]
She won an Emmy Award for her performance in Which Mother Is Mine?, an ABC Afterschool Special (1979), and was nominated for a 1978 Primetime Emmy Award for Best Leading Actress in a Drama Series for her work on Little House on the Prairie. In 1976, Michael Landon asked Anderson if she would appear in his autobiographical film,The Loneliest Runner. Anderson agreed to play Nancy Rizzi, his first girlfriend, saying she was very thrilled to have been asked. She also secured a Spanish 'TP de Oro' Award for 'Best Foreign Actress' for Little House (1980). She was the associate producer for the next to last TV project Michael Landon made before dying: Where Pigeons Go to Die (1990).
In 1998, she was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
With husband Michael Sloan, she has two children, daughter Piper (born February 1991) and son Griffin (born June 1996).
She has lived in Montreal, Quebec, Canada since 2002. She and her husband became naturalized Canadians in 2007 [1]
[edit] Filmography
[edit] Films
| Year | Film | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1974 | Little House on the Prairie | Mary Ingalls | TV movie |
| 1976 | The Loneliest Runner | Nancy Rizzi | TV movie |
| 1977 | James at 15 | Lacey Stevens | TV movie |
| 1979 | Survival of Dana | Dana Lee | TV movie |
| 1981 | Midnight Offerings | Vivian Sotherland | TV movie |
| Happy Birthday to Me | Virginia 'Ginny' Wainwright | Nominated for a Young Artist Award | |
| 1982 | An Innocent Love | Molly Rush | TV movie |
| 1983 | First Affair | Toby King | TV movie |
| 1984 | Chattanooga Choo Choo | Jennie | |
| Goma-2 | Kukki | Uncredited | |
| 1986 | Dark Mansions | Noelle Drake | |
| 1988 | Memories of Manon | Yvette Marcel | TV movie / As Melissa Anderson |
| The Suicide Club | Laura Donovan on TV | ||
| Far North | Young Nurse | As Melissa Anderson | |
| 1989 | The Return of Sam McCloud | Colleen McCloud | TV movie / As Melissa Anderson |
| 1990 | Forbidden Nights | Marie Shapiro | TV movie / As Melissa Anderson |
| Dead Men Don't Die | Dulcie Niles | As Melissa Anderson | |
| 1998 | Earthquake in New York | Dr. Marilyn Blake | TV movie / As Melissa Anderson |
| 2000 | Thin Ice | Tanya Ferguson | TV movie |
| 2006 | 10.5: Apocalypse | First Lady Megan Hollister | TV miniseries / As Melissa Anderson |
| Crazy Eights | Hospital patient | Uncredited | |
| 2007 | Marco Polo | Mother | TV miniseries / Voice / Uncredited |
[edit] TV series
| Year | Title | Role | Seasons | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1973 | The Brady Bunch | Millicent | 5 | Never Too Young |
| 1984 | "Murder, She Wrote" | Eve Cristal | Episode 6, Season 1 | |
| 1974–81 | Little House on the Prairie | Mary Ingalls | 1–8 | Nominated for an Emmy Award |
| 1988 | The Equalizer (TV Series) | Yvette | 3 | The Mystery of Manon |
[edit] Producer
- Where Pigeons Go to Die (1990) — associate producer
