Laura Prepon, Tom Cruise and 'Orange is the New Black' Drama

Laura Prepon is at the center of a rumor cyclone these days, and the rumors regarding her romantic and professional lives are being linked in somewhat surprising ways. Does who she’s dating have anything to do with what jobs she’s taking?

Prepon had a central role in the first season of the hit Netflix series “Orange is the New Black,” but soon after the show’s first season began streaming, it was announced that Prepon’s character, Alex, would not be a regular in the second season. Now BuzzFeed reports that Prepon will be back for the show’s third season, should there be one, after appearing in four episodes of the second season.

The other Prepon rumor making the rounds is the claim that she’s dating Tom Cruise and has been since last fall. Several sources are suggesting that the romance is real, although both actors deny that there’s anything going on between them.

Some anonymous sources are going even further, suggesting that Cruise is responsible for Prepon’s departure from “OITNB.” Both Cruise and Prepon are Scientologists, and the organization is not keen on the idea of homosexuality—and Prepon’s “OITNB” character is a lesbian. However, if the claim that Cruise put his foot down and made Prepon leave the show, it doesn’t explain why she’d be willing to come back—or why Prepon, who is herself a Scientologist, took the role in the first place.