'Orange Is The New Black' Cast Talks Season 2 at ATX Festival

Orange Is The New Black season 2 premiered on Friday on Netflix and before we were treated to hearing some of the cast speak about it at the ATX Festival, we screened the first episode of season 2. Without giving any spoilers away, as season 2 is still pretty new, I’ll say that we get a look a more of Piper’s backstory all the way back to when she was a tween, we find out the fate of Pennsatuckey after Piper’s beatdown in the season 1 finale, and there’s definitely more pee.

When Uzo Aduba (“Crazy Eyes”) , Lea DeLaria (“Big Boo”) and Danielle Brooks (“Taystee”) took the stage, the audience went wild. This is a show where the recurring characters are just as well-written and well-cast as the main character, and arguably more interesting,and seeing the three interact onstage gave that audience the feeling that the cast is like a family off-screen.

The ladies are still growing used to the new-found level of fame that came with the show, but love the attention and appreciation from fans. Uzo didn’t realize what an iconic character Crazy Eye had become until her twitter started to blow up shortly after the release of season 1 and Danielle is still not accustomed to people stopping her on trains but is genuinely grateful for the recognition nonetheless.

The cast shared stories about filming the second season of the show, with Uzo and Danielle confessing to being best friends and Lea claiming that she loves to be the funniest one in the room, but is often outshone by co-star Natasha Lyonne and her dog, Root Beer. Danielle Brooks mused about a time she ran into co-star Constance Shulman (“Yoga Jones”) in a store before Constance had a chance to go over the script in season one, so when Danielle approached her to say hi Constance looked at her like she didn’t know who she was! They made up shortly after and no love was lost 🙂

When asked what qualities the ladies would like to take from their characters, Lea stated that she’s pretty similar to her character and Uzo loves Suzanne’s ability to live life to the fullest. Danielle spoke about Taystee’s growth into a woman this season, and having respect for Taystee’s growing willingness to embrace her womanhood.

The cast reflected that one of their favorite qualities of the show is that there are no women are represented as caricatures and that the heart of the show is essentially that “we are all more than what we may seem on the outside,” as summed up by Uzo Aduba.