When Netflix unveiled feminist prison dramedy Orange Is The New Black in 2013 it seemed an interesting experiment on the part of a plucky upstart with aspirations above its station. But that was prior to the internet-fueled second coming of Binge Television – and before Netflix established itself as one of the premium purveyors of quality drama, with hits such as House of Cards, Daredevil and Bloodline.
Three years on, Orange Is The New Black returns as one Netflix hit among many. Season three ended on a cliffhanger of sorts, with Litchfield Penitentiary freshly privatised and busloads of new inmates arriving. Details of the forthcoming series are, of course, under wraps, but certain details have leaked out. We know that Litchfield has a bad case of overcrowding (meaning breakfast is served from the middle of the night and there’s a shortage of tampons) while the presence of a celebrity prisoner has brought an invasion of paparazzi drones hovering over the courtyard.
So far so quirky. Yet beneath its playful exterior, Orange Is The New Black remains one of the most dazzlingly clever properties on TV. It depicts female friendships with an authenticity that makes other shows look like paternalistic parodies, and poses genuinely subversive questions as to what we want from small-screen drama.
Consider the ostensible ‘heroine’, Piper Chapman (Taylor Schilling). When we met her in season one, she was a girl next door betrayed by a crime from her past and thrown in the slammer. But behind the butter-wouldn’t-melt exterior it was quickly made clear that Piper was no angel. She could be manipulative, cruel and vindictive – and audiences had to ask themselves whether they really wanted to root for her.
“I get this question all the time – ‘how do you feel about people not like Piper?’ “ Schilling told me when we met last year. “It blows my mind. The conversation was not about about Tony Soprano or [Breaking Bad anti-hero] Walter White not being likeable. But for there to be a girl on television we might not like is a big deal. Even fans are going ‘we don’t like you’. It’s fascinating – and it’s wonderful that I am part of the conversation.”
And while it's sad that we are even still having this conversation in 2016, Orange wins further kudos for its commitment to diversity on TV, with a cast that includes gay, trans, and racial minorities. Piper is in the audience surrogate position of having to interact with people completely alien to her picket fence civilian life.
“Diversity is one of the finest and most important points in the show – the prison sets up is the perfect context to see all these different people,” the actress said. “It provides an opportunity for us to see that they are not their crime. It provides a window into all parts of them. In fact, I think it might be harder to see those parts if it didn’t take place in a prison. There’s not much you can hide after you’ve gone that far down the scale. You’ve nothing to lose – when you hit rock bottom everything is on the table. It is a beautiful, glorious thing – everything is up for grabs.”
Embodying this commitment to doing things different is trans actress Laverne Cox, who in 2014 graced the cover of Time magazine (officially a Big Deal even in these days when the established media is much reduced in influence).
“What is happening with trans people is that more and more of us are coming forward and saying this is who we are,” she said to me in 2015. I got a letter from a transperson who said, ‘I’ve been living in stealth for four years now’. I’m coming out now – because of you. That is a lovely thing – being able to be in full ownership of who you are.”
“All the characters are written with such humanity,” Cox said. “My job is to step into those boots and deliver the truth of who that woman is, a woman who has touched so many people and opened so many minds. That is really what it is about – when we see people as human beings, all the misconceptions and prejudices melt away. You can really achieve an awful lot on television when the story is as multi-dimensional and complicated as Orange.”
Even in retrospect the success of feels a little unlikely. Who would have guessed viewers were crying out for a sexually fluid fem-com set in a prison? Certainly show-runner and creator Jenji Kohan was as blindsided as everyone else.
“I don’t know if it’s the subject, the characters, the way it’s consumed or a combination of all those factors, but people’s investment with these women is greater than anything I’ve seen before,” she said in 2014. “I don’t set out to write female lead shows, necessarily. I like deeply flawed characters. When they come to me, or when I’m introduced to them, I follow the stories and the people, rather than setting out to do a female lead thing.”
Orange is the New Black season four begins on Netflix on Friday June 17.