I had an unorthodox high-school experience; I shifted around to different schools. When I got to college and met Larry Sacharow, who ran the theatre department [at Fordham University in NYC], he was the first person to say ‘I believe in you.’ At that point, I just needed someone to say ‘I see you, I get you, let’s go.’ It’s an amazing thing to borrow someone else’s confidence in you; it can change your life.

I don't know my armpit from my elbow in Los Angeles.

Be yourself. You're okay. And it really doesn't matter what other people think.

I don't do detoxes or cleanses; they don't really work for me.

I like to do yoga, Pilates, dance, and things like that.

It's as interesting to me as someday getting to play in some beautiful period piece where the costumes are from a completely different era. This feels as extreme as that, and that's really liberating. It's really liberating to just go 180 from what my life is like. I love that! I love not having to think about clothes. I wanted to wear a uniform when I was in high school, but I couldn't. I was like, "It would be so much easier!"

It felt really nice to not have anybody talking about numbers, and no one is talking about ratings. From my experience, it felt like there was one person running the ship and it felt like there was space for Jenji to be at the helm. That's not what I've experienced in television before. It felt more akin to an interesting movie, where there were producers who were really excited by the work and wanted to make space for the director's vision to be sort of shared with an audience. It felt more cohesive.