Little House on the Prairie cast explains why the beloved series wouldn't work today - 40 years after it went off-air

It's been 50 years since Little House on the Prairie premiered on CBS in 1974. 

The cast of the show – who appeared on GMA earlier this year – reunited earlier this month at the Monte Carlo Television Festival in Monaco. 

Karen Grassle, Alison Arngrim, Melissa Sue Anderson, Matthew Labyorteaux, and Wendi Lou Lee sat on a panel and reflected on their favorite memories from the show. 

They also addressed fans questions about a reboot or reunion of the beloved series. 

'There have been lots of attempts to do a Little House on the Prairie again,' Grassle, 82, who played the show's matriarch Caroline Ingalls, explained to People. 

'There have been shows, there have been a musical, and I think we had a unique experience and it can't be repeated.'

'Michael [Landon] was a genius at casting and writing,' she added of her onscreen husband, who played Charles Ingalls.

'He understood things about how to translate that material into television for the public that was beyond what most writers understand. 

'And he had his thumb on the pulse of the public and understood what people were longing for, and you don't find that every day,' she gushed about the late actor who was also an executive producer and writer for the show.

'And then the fact that we were all so perfectly cast was a kind of genius,' she added, looking at her costars.

But ultimately, what Grassle, the late Landon and the rest of the cast had was lightning in a bottle with Little House on the Prairie. 

Based on the beloved series of children's novels by Laura Ingalls Wilder – portrayed by Melissa Gilbert in the series – the show premiere in September 1974 and ran for nine seasons.

Anderson, who played eldest sister Mary Ingalls, had her own reason for thinking a reboot wouldn't work and its because Landon wouldn't be part of it. 

'Little House works on television because of him,' she said. Landon died in 1991.

Arngrim, 62, who played Nellie Oleson in the series is ready to take on a new role if there was ever a reboot of Little House – her mother.

'I always joke that if they do redo the entire thing, I am ready to play Mrs. Oleson. Absolutely, I'm down for that,' she sassed.

Little House on the Prairie followed the adventures of the Ingalls family as they built a homestead and life in the 19th century Midwest.