The Glorious Former Roles of the ‘OITNB’ Cast
With the second season of Orange is the New Black finally released (and most likely completely consumed), almost everywhere you turn is new info about the cast or the upcoming third season. We just can’t get enough OITNB!
One of the great things about this show is a lot of the cast is pretty new to us so we get to fall in love with them for the first time. Obviously, we knew Laura Prepon from That 70’s Show and Jason Biggs from American Pie and Natasha Lyonne and Taryn Manning from our ’90s and 2000s movie love. (And, of course, Kate Mulgrew as Captain Janeway from Star Trek: Voyager.) Even by now most of us know that Yoga Jones was the voice of Patti Mayonnaise on Doug. You might even remember Taylor Schilling from her role as Zac Efron love interest in The Lucky One.
But a new piece of the OITNB puzzle was just revealed and it is INCREDIBLE. The (almost) mute kitchen worker, Norma, played by Annie Golden was an ’80s DELIGHT! Obviously we knew she could sing from her performance in the Christmas pageant (AND her many stints on Broadway, natch) but check out her video for “Hang Up the Phone” off the Sixteen Candles soundtrack that is just a pure joy to watch and listen to. (New song of the summer?)
Speaking of people with secret (or at the very least forgotten) singing careers…right around the time Crossroads was out, Taryn Manning was performing as Boomkat on places like All That:
Go to 6:10 for her performance!
OMG. That performance is just, amazing. I can’t believe I never knew she was in a band!
Okay, I know I said we knew Natasha Lyonne from Slums of Beverly Hills and But I’m A Cheerleader, etc but did you know she was also on Pee-Wee’s Playhouse as a kid?
Yep, that’s Natasha Lyonne in the center playing “Opal!”
This next one is one of my favorites. You know when you’re watching a show and you see someone and you’re imagining them in a different scene and you can’t put your finger on it and then it finally comes to you? That feeling of triumph? Well I had that watching the first season of Orange is the New Black last summer when Lea DeLaria aka Big Boo came on-screen.
Yep! She’s the woman who hits on Phoebe in the Friends episode “The One With the Lesbian Wedding!” Phoebe has been inhabited by the spirit of her dead massage client (obviously) and misses her when she goes away after seeing “everything” – the last thing being a lesbian wedding. Well Boo comes up to her, thinking she’s bemoaning the end of a relationship and hits on her.
(AND she does a similar thing playing a fan of Elise’s who they run into in a lesbian bar in The First Wives Club also.)
