You could be forgiven for forgetting that Yael Stone was born and bred in Sydney, Australia.
As Lorna Morello in Netflix prison drama Orange Is The New Black, she speaks with a magical tilt to her voice.
It’s Boston meets New York meets old-school gangster.
The accent is the tip of the iceberg, with Yael admitting the whole OITNB experience has been eye-opening.
“I’m some nobody from Australia,” she laughs when asked about landing the role in a show that would make her a household name.
“By all rights I should have been shaking in the corner, being like, ‘What am I doing here in New York?’”
Instead, she stepped up. In fact, Yael was so convincing during the audition process that the writers made Lorna – who was meant to appear in only one episode – a permanent member of the cast.
Before OITNB, Yael had worked steadily in Australia, falling in love with the industry at a young age.
“My first job when I was 13 in Australia was with Rachel Griffiths in the film Me Myself I,” Yael, now 32, recalls.
“She played my mum and it was such a great experience. From there, I was hooked.”
Yael as inmate Lorna Morello in Orange Is The New Black.
Now, she is a solid member of the OITNB family and her on-screen relationship with fellow inmate Nicky Nichols (Natasha Lyonne) has become one of the most fascinating elements of the show.
“They’re such an unexpected pairing, really, if you break it down,” Yael says.
“Nichols is this highly intelligent, highly cynical hipster, whereas Lorna can be kind of narrow-minded.”
Last season, the pair kept their relationship mostly platonic.
Fans are desperate for Morello and Nichols to get back together.
But when we sit down with Yael in New York during a break from filming, she admits even she doesn’t know what’s in store for her character.
“You never know what’s coming,” the actress explains. “I get emailed a script and I read and discover just like everyone else.”
While OITNB has been signed up by Netflix for an additional two seasons, Yael knows nothing is ever guaranteed.
So it’s probably smart that she regularly heads home and busies herself with other projects.
Earlier this year, she starred in SBS crime thriller Deep Water.
“I loved it so much and it really made me get on my game,” she says.
“The character in Deep Water couldn’t be more different from Lorna. I was a cop – on other side of the law, but pursuing similar ideas of social justice and telling stories that need to be told.”
Yael will next appear in Foxtel’s adaptation of Picnic At Hanging Rock, before returning to the US to film season six of OITNB.
Not a bad effort for a “nobody from Australia”
