"Orange is the New Black" broke all expectations, becoming one of the most-watched original series on Netflix.
The comedic prison-drama drew an audience comparable to successful cable and TV shows, according to a third-quarter letter to shareholders by CEO Reed Hastings and CFO David Wells.
Season 2 of the popular series is currently in currently, with a premiere date set for some time in 2014.
In a web exclusive video for "Conan", actress Natasha Lyonne recently spilled some beans on the upcoming season.
"In the season finale, the other prisoners hold my character down and run a brush through my hair. ...There's a new warden in town ... Dustin Diamond!"
Meanwhile, the future of Laura Prepon's role in OITNB is still unclear. Some reports stated that she will return for season 2 only to wrap up her character's storyline and return for future seasons, while other state that she will definitely be returning for the next season.
In an interview with Variety last month, Prepon herself addressed the exit rumors: "It depends. Scheduling is kind of intense. But I'm definitely coming back for the second season. I love the show and my character is a bad ass. [Series creator] Jenji Kohan, I love her, and all my girls, I miss them so much. I'm definitely coming back."
OITNB beat original series "House of Cards" as the most watched series. The latter received 14 Emmy nominations this year, and became the first ever web-series to win Primetime Emmy awards.
The prison drama was not eligible for the Emmy awards 2013 but will be eligible next year.
The success of both "Orange is the New Black" and "House of Cards" lead to Netflix upping its spending on original projects for the next year. New projects will include documentaries and new movies.
In a Q3 earnings review, Netflix Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos said: "On the movie side, I'd keep my mind wide open to what those films would be and what they would look like. And really the driver of it is, like we were able to break convention on television by offering all episodes at once, something that consumers have really loved, we'd like to do more of that in the movie space, in that today we're held to the traditional pay television model, meaning the movies are not coming to Netflix until they hit pay television, almost a year after they are in theaters. Even though that window is moving, I don't know that it's moving aggressively enough for people who really do have experience more in a demand or more on-demand lifestyle around their content. So I think that the more we could be aggressive with windowing by taking more control over the content earlier in the process, that would be good for our members."
