What Laura Prepon Says Made Directing ‘Orange Is The New Black’ Easier

“Orange Is the New Black” fans know Laura Prepon as Alex Vause, but they might not realize that the actress has stepped behind the camera. Season 7, out Friday, includes Prepon’s third directing stint on the Netflix drama, and she revealed that motherhood made the job easier.

Prepon told International Business Times that, of course, directing multiple times helped make her more comfortable. However, her first episode was particularly intense. It was “The Reverse Midas Touch,” the Season 5 episode where Piscatella (Brad William Henke) tortures inmates, including Vause, and right after filming, Prepon learned some life-changing news.

“I found that I was pregnant right after I wrapped my episode directing,” Prepon explained to IBT. “I was like, ‘Oh my God. I was pregnant during all those torture scenes?’ So that first experience directing was crazy, but it turned out great, obviously, because I worked really hard at it and it was awesome. But I think, just like with anything when I directed the second time on ‘Orange,’ I just knew what to expect more.”

The actress gave birth to daughter Ella in August 2017, and she says that being a parent made directing different. “I feel like the thing that really actually changed my directing was becoming a mother, truthfully,” she said.

“For me, after becoming a mother, you’re so terrified and stressed out about protecting this little being that you’re obsessed with and that you love. A love that you can’t possibly explain, because it’s so intense, and I’ve never experienced anything like that,” she stressed. “Those early days of being a first-time mother, when you’re trying to make sure your kid is breathing in the middle of the night, and why aren’t they eating, and what’s wrong, and what’s that cough, and are they choking. It’s terrifying. And there was a lot of stress around that because I just didn’t know as a first-time mom.

“So when I directed after that I was like, ‘I know what real stress is now.’ I know what it actually means to be stressed and scared about keeping this little baby safe. So when I went back to work as a director I was like, ‘I got this.’ People would be stressed out about the location being messed up, or this or that, whatever. And I was like, ‘It’s no big deal.’”

Prepon, who plans to balance acting and directing jobs after “Orange Is the New Black” ends, could only reveal a little about her episode.

“We had a very beautiful and heartbreaking storyline having to do with our immigration storyline that we had through the entire show this year,” she teased. “I also had a storyline about multiple generations in a family being incarcerated and how that kind of manifests, and that was a really interesting thing to be able to portray.”

She promised that the episode would also include some comic relief. “We have this intense drama and then we also have these incredible moments of levity. And then I have this wonderful storyline with Piper [Taylor Schilling] and Cal [Michael Chernus] that’s wonderful and light,” Prepon said. “You get the see Piper in a way that you haven’t really seen her before, trying to embrace her life on the outside. That was really fun and special.”

Prepon is proud of her episode, and audiences can see it now. The final season of “Orange Is the New Black” released Friday on Netflix.