Orange Is the New Black Trivia
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This Orange Is the New Black trivia quiz has 100 free questions with answers and covers all seven seasons of the Netflix series: Piper Chapman's arrival at Litchfield, Alex Vause and the drug money that put them both inside, Red's kitchen, Vee's gang war, the used-panty business, Poussey's death, the three-day riot and the move to Max. It also digs into the real story behind the show — Piper Kerman's memoir, the Connecticut prison she actually served time in, and the ex-girlfriend who became Alex — plus casting near-misses, the abandoned psychiatric hospital used as the set, the Regina Spektor theme, and the record-setting Emmy run. Early questions are gentle enough for anyone who has seen a season or two; the later ones reward people who noticed who blinks in the title sequence and which actress auditioned for a different inmate. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries and cast biographies before publishing, so you can trust the results and argue about them freely.
30 of 100 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01On which streaming service did Orange Is the New Black premiere in 2013?
Netflix
Netflix renewed the show for a second season two weeks before the first had even premiered.
Q 02Before Orange Is the New Black, Jenji Kohan created which Showtime comedy?
Weeds
Weeds ran for eight seasons on Showtime. Kohan then took her prison series to a streaming service because, she said, she wanted to be first on a new frontier.
Q 03Orange Is the New Black is based on a memoir by which real woman?
Piper Kerman
Piper Kerman's 2010 book made her an advocate as well as an author: she has twice testified before US Senate committees about conditions in federal prisons.
Q 04In Orange Is the New Black, what is the SHU that inmates dread being sent to?
Solitary confinement
Solitary confinement: the SHU is not only for rule-breakers, as Sophia is locked in it after she threatens to sue the prison over an attack on her.
Q 05How long is Piper's original prison sentence?
15 months
15 months was also the real sentence handed to the memoir's author. On screen it lasts far longer, since Piper is not released until the end of season six.
Q 06What crime landed Piper in prison?
Carrying drug money through customs
Carrying drug money through customs: Piper did it once, for her girlfriend, and had built a quiet life in New York by the time the charge caught up with her about ten years later.
Q 07Who plays Piper Chapman?
Taylor Schilling
Taylor Schilling was the first actor cast. The Golden Globes nominated her as a drama actress for the first season, then as a comedy actress for the second.
Q 08Which Dawson's Creek actress discussed playing Piper Chapman with the creator of Orange Is the New Black before other commitments intervened?
Katie Holmes
Katie Holmes met the creator about the part but was committed elsewhere, at a point when, the creator said later, nobody yet knew what the show would be.
Q 09In Orange Is the New Black, what was Sophia Burset's job before she went to prison?
Firefighter
Firefighter: the job's medical training pays off during the season-five riot, when Sophia stops a guard who has been shot from bleeding to death.
Q 10Laura Prepon, who plays Alex Vause, first found fame as Donna on which sitcom?
That '70s Show
That '70s Show made Prepon a star. She first read for Piper, but the casting director felt she would never look scared in prison, which made her right for Alex instead.
Q 11Who plays Piper's fiancé Larry Bloom?
Jason Biggs
Jason Biggs left as a regular after two seasons, once the engagement was over and Larry had taken up with Piper's best friend.
Q 12Which Star Trek: Voyager star plays kitchen boss Galina 'Red' Reznikov in Orange Is the New Black?
Kate Mulgrew
Kate Mulgrew auditioned with Red's origin story: she bursts a mobster's wife's breast implant with a punch, which leaves her family owing the mob a favour.
Q 13What nationality is Red, the inmate who runs the prison kitchen?
Russian
Russian: Red gives the addicts she helps only two strikes before cutting them off because, as she puts it, 'Russians don't play baseball.'
Q 21Roughly how long does the season-five riot in Orange Is the New Black last?
Three days
Three days: all thirteen episodes of the season unfold inside that window, until an armed tactical team storms the prison to end it.
Q 22In Orange Is the New Black, which guard forces his way onto Red's kitchen smuggling route to bring in drugs?
Mendez
Mendez, nicknamed Pornstache, uses Red's supplier for his drugs until she helps to set him up: he is caught with an inmate and suspended.
Q 23Which villain of Orange Is the New Black's second season beats Red with a padlock inside a sock?
Vee
Vee strikes from behind in the greenhouse the morning after she and Red had shaken hands on a truce.
Q 14Which character earns the nickname 'Crazy Eyes'?
Suzanne Warren
Suzanne Warren was cast by accident: the actress taped an audition for the track star Janae, and the creator watched it and gave her Suzanne instead, with no second reading.
Q 15What pet name does Suzanne give Piper because of her blonde hair?
Dandelion
Dandelion: when Piper turns her down, Suzanne takes her revenge by urinating on the floor of Piper's cubicle in the night.
Q 16Which Orange Is the New Black actress won Emmys in both comedy and drama categories for the same role?
Uzo Aduba
Uzo Aduba won as a comedy guest actress in 2014 and a drama supporting actress in 2015, because the show changed category in between. Only Ed Asner, as Lou Grant, had done the double before.
Q 17Why did Orange Is the New Black move from comedy to drama at the 2015 Emmys?
A rule on hour-long shows
A rule on hour-long shows: from 2015 the Emmys counted them as dramas unless a panel agreed otherwise, and the panel ruled that this series had to compete as a drama.
Q 18Who plays Tasha 'Taystee' Jefferson?
Danielle Brooks
Danielle Brooks's Taystee wins parole in season one, finds no support waiting for her outside, and is soon back inside after violating it.
Q 19Which actress played Poussey Washington in Orange Is the New Black and later starred in The Handmaid's Tale?
Samira Wiley
Samira Wiley's character is killed off in season four, and the series ends with Taystee launching a loan fund for newly released women in Poussey's name.
Q 20Which corrections officer accidentally kills Poussey in season four?
Bayley
Bayley pins Poussey to the floor while guards clear a peaceful cafeteria protest, and she suffocates. The prison's handling of her death sets off the riot that fills season five.
Q 24Who plays Nicky, Red's most trusted assistant, in Orange Is the New Black?
Natasha Lyonne
Natasha Lyonne planned to read for a different inmate, but the producers already wanted her for Nicky and would not let her.
Q 25In Orange Is the New Black, which terminally ill inmate drives off in the prison van to end season two?
Miss Rosa
Miss Rosa, a former bank robber with only weeks to live, is left the keys by a sympathetic inmate and runs down the season's villain on her way out.
Q 26Which real-life transgender actress plays Sophia Burset?
Laverne Cox
Laverne Cox's twin brother, the musician M Lamar, was cast to play Sophia before her transition in the flashback scenes.
Q 27Which milestone for openly transgender performers did Sophia Burset's actress reach in 2014?
An acting Emmy nomination
An acting Emmy nomination: she was up for guest actress in a comedy, the same category as two of her castmates, and one of them beat her to the award.
Q 28What is the nickname of Tiffany Doggett, played by Taryn Manning?
Pennsatucky
Pennsatucky shot a clinic worker for mocking her, but anti-abortion campaigners took it for a protest, hailed her as a hero and gave her free legal help.
Q 29Which corrections officer fathers Daya's baby?
Bennett
Bennett lets another guard take the blame for the pregnancy, proposes to Daya, then loses his nerve after meeting her family and drives away for good.
Q 30Which Piper business venture in season three smuggles goods out of prison via a friendly guard?
Used panties
Used panties: Piper first paid the inmates who wore them in ramen flavor packets, then had to pay cash when Flaca threatened a strike, and fired her for it.