Netflix continues to roll out the original programming. Following up on the fourth season of Arrested Development, which debuted on the streaming video subscription service last month, is Jenji Kohan's new series Orange is the New Black, a drama about a woman who's sent off to prison for a year. The new trailer gives us a look at what life on the inside is like for her, and hints at a story of transformation.
Based on Piper Kerman's memoir Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison, the series stars Taylor Schilling as Piper Chapman, a young Brooklynite woman who finds herself incarcerated after her decade-old relationship with a drug-running woman named Alex (Lauren Prepon) earns her some time in a federal penitentiary. Piper must leave behind her cushy life in New York and her fiancé Larry (Jason Biggs) to do her time and pay back her debt to society.
The story appears to be set mainly inside the prison, though it looks like we get some glimpses of Piper's life in the "before," which should offer some nice contrast to who she was before she went inside. In addition to Schilling, Biggs and Prepon, the cast also includes Kate Mulgrew, Natasha Lyonne, Pablo Schreiber, Taryn Manning, Elizabeth Rodriguez and Alysia Reiner, among others.
As a Netflix subscriber, I'm excited to see what the service gives us next, given that none of their original series is anything like the others. As a Weeds fan, I'm also excited to see what Kohan has done with this story. There's potential for another great series in this one.
Orange if the New Black debuts on Netflix on July 11.
