‘Orange Is the New Black’ Star Alysia Reiner Talks ‘Down Dog’ And Fig’s Fate For Season Three

2014 will be a tough year to beat for actress Alysia Reiner, who had roles in almost a dozen projects including streaming sensation Orange Is the New Black, network drama How To Get Away With Murder, indies like Kelly & Cal, and big budget rom-coms like That Awkward Moment. It’s no secret Reiner has range, and now she’s starring in yoga dramedy, Down Dog, part of Amazon’s latest batch of pilots, which have the chance of getting a series order based partially on viewer votes.

For Amazon Instant Video users, being able to choose the fate of a series is fresh and excitingly interactive, but for an actor, it seems like it might be slightly more stressful. We chatted with Reiner, who assures us that this isn’t the first time she’s ventured into unchartered territory, given her off-Broadway background and jumping in with both feet for Orange, a pioneering streaming series. “One of the things I love about art,” Reiner explained, “is making it and letting go and letting people decide whether they like it or not. And not feeling responsible for that in a way. But with [Down Dog], I felt a little bit more like, ‘I hope they like it!'”

There’s very little not to like about Amazon’s new comedy series. Down Dog tells the story of Logan (Josh Casaubon), a charming thirtysomething who has breezed through life on his good looks and laid-back personality. Just when he thinks he’s found the golden ticket to coast through the rest of adulthood as a SoCal yoga instructor, his girlfriend and business partner, Amanda (Paget Brewster), decides she’s had enough, leaving Logan and the future of their yoga studio hanging in the balance, or lackthereof.

Reiner, who has popularized the roles of the ruthless Natalie “Fig” Figueroa on Netflix’s Orange Is the New Black and the no-nonsense D.A. Wendy Parks on How To Get Away With Murder, leaps to the other end of the spectrum as Gabrielle, the willowy, zen assistant to Amanda, who remains fiercely loyal to her former boss, even after she flees the coop. Unsure if Logan can handle running the business on his own (he can’t even find the checkbook, for cryin’ out loud), Gabrielle begs Amanda over the phone to come back, which, unfortunately, Logan overhears and, going against his instinctive type-B tendencies, fires her.

Whatever assumptions we had about Gabrielle leading up to this point are forgotten after a flash of Fig’s familiarity comes through. Logan has made an epic mistake in firing Gabrielle, and this is certainly not the last we’ll see of her. “It’s kind of like if Fig went to rehab and got really into yoga,” Reiner says of Gabrielle. When asked if she often finds herself channeling Fig in recent roles, simply because of the character’s depth and complexity, Reiner confessed, “The truth is, I feel like Fig and Wendy Parks taught me to be a lot stronger and stand up for myself. I’m a lot more like Gabrielle.”

Our hopes are high for this tiny comedy, which, as we’ve already predicted, could be a big hit for Amazon, but in the meantime we asked Reiner for an Orange update. When we left Fig last season, she was packing up her office after Caputo’s blackmail threat scared her enough to hand down her position and leave Litchfield behind. This came after she discovered her husband canoodling with his male campaign manager and before she had to face Caputo’s, er, “beer can” in one last shot at manipulation. Needless to say, things weren’t looking so great for Fig, making audiences wonder if she would even make it back for Season Three. Reiner herself wonderedabout Fig’s fate, and as the last few episodes of Season Two were wrapping up, she received a “beautiful letter” from showrunner Jenji Kohan. “[Jenji] said, ‘We love you and we love what you’re doing with [Fig], but this is just the way the character has written herself. This is where her arc has gone.'” So imagine Reiner’s surprise when Kohan and her writers changed direction and decided to keep Reiner and Fig in the mix.

Will Fig finally be a senator’s wife like she’s wanted for so long? Will her embezzlement crimes land her in an orange jumpsuit? Even though Season Three is confirmed for a summer release, we couldn’t help but enquire. “Here’s the biggest clue I can tell you,” Reiner said. “The amazing thing with the Orange Is the New Black writers is that you never know where they’re going. I don’t think I’ve ever read an episode ever where I wasn’t deeply surprised by something. You’ll be equally as surprised as I was when I read it.”

Stream the Down Dog pilot (and don’t forget to vote for it when you’re done) on Amazon Prime Instant Video, watch the first two seasons of Orange Is the New Black on Netflix, and stream How To Get Away with Murder on Hulu and Hulu Plus.

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Photos: Everett Collection