'Law & Order: SVU' star Mariska Hargitay celebrated a milestone month in January, celebrating her 60th birthday and the 25th season of the hit series, but things could have been much different. do not have.
In a new interview with People magazine, Hargitay said she had “no interest in acting” until third grade, when her favorite teacher, Sister Margaret, told her, “I think you should try acting.” “It was,” he revealed.
“She saw me,” Hargitay added. “She always saw me, my soul.”
Hargitay attended Marymount High School in Los Angeles and admitted that he “used to talk a lot and get into trouble.” But Sister Margaret “was the first person to call me an extrovert.
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Mariska Hargitay told People that a nun in high school encouraged her to pursue acting. (Nathan Congleton/NBC via Getty Images)
“I was an athlete as well, so I think she was looking for a way to get that energy out. She knew I had this little engine. And she challenged me to play. And I got the lead and I loved it a lot. ”
The actress reunited with Sister Margaret at the Colleagues' Annual Luncheon last year and shared Capture that moment on Instagram.
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“And then I had the most wonderful surprise of the afternoon: my favorite teacher and one of my most important mentors, Sister Margaret from Marymount High School! I'm so glad it's true!” She wrote in the caption of the post.
The Joyful Heart founder told People magazine, “She was such a perfect person because she loved to laugh and she loved God. And although she was an authoritative figure, she was very human. I felt very safe with her because she was approachable.”
Hargitay reunited with Sister Margaret at the 2023 Colleague Spring Luncheon. (Stephanie Keenan/Getty Images for colleagues)
“She wasn't the intimidating nun you were afraid of. She was part of the team. She looked at me, was interested and understanding, and was very affectionate. I always felt like they were taking care of everything. It's inclusive, kind, and nurturing. ”
Thanks to Sister Margaret's guidance, the actress was able to follow in the footsteps of her famous family.
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Hargitay is the daughter of 1950s and 1960s sex symbol Jayne Mansfield, who starred in films such as “The Married Man's Guide'' and “Will Success Ruin Rock Hunter?''
Mansfield had one daughter from her first marriage to Paul Mansfield. She then met and married actor and bodybuilder Mickey Hargitay in 1958, with whom she had three children, including Mariska. Mansfield and Mickey divorced in 1964, and she married her third husband the same year. They had one child but divorced in 1966.
Hargitay was in the car when her mother died in an accident in 1967. (Taylor Hill/Getty Archive Photo)
In 1967, when Hargitay was only three years old, Mansfield died in a car accident at the age of 34. Hargitay was in the car with his mother and two brothers at the time of the accident. All three children survived.
Hargitay was raised by her father, who emphasized to his daughter the importance of hard work.
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“My father gave me a lot of advice and raised me at a young age,” she said at the 2019 parade. “My father achieved many unattainable goals, and he did so with his own drumbeat. He used to say to me, 'Does it matter what people think?' He was very clear about what he needed to be successful. ”
Over time, Hargitay spoke about how she coped with losing her mother at an early age and how it shaped her.
Hargitay with his father Mickey Hargitay in 2003. (J. Countess/WireImage for Universal Television Productions)
“I think I learned about crises at a very young age, and I learned at a very young age that crises happen, and there are no guarantees, and we keep going,” she said in 2021. She spoke to Glamor magazine as part of its Woman of the Year issue.
“And then I change it. It's like my superpower, a product of having trauma early in life. I've spent the last 50 years – how old am I? – I’m 57 years old, so I’ve kind of spent 54 years trying to figure out what happened,” and why and what to do about it?
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“I obviously spent most of my childhood in that frozen place, trying to survive, really survive. My life has been a process of peeling back layers, trusting, and trusting again.”
Hargitay felt that having a child deepened her bond with her mother.
Jayne Mansfield holds six-week-old Mariska Hargitay. (Archive Photo/Getty Images)
“It was a relief to understand her in a new way,” she told Good Housekeeping in 2010. She said: “Being her mother has healed me. I now understand the love she had for her and I feel closer to her because of it.”
She and actor Peter Herrmann have three children: August, Amaya, and Andrew.
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The two first met in 2001 on the set of Law & Order: SVU, where Herman guest-starred as a defense attorney.
Three years later, they got married and have been together ever since.
Peter Herman and Hargitay have three children. (Dimitrios Cambris/Getty Images)
“I'm at a point in my life where my relationship with him is getting better and better, and marriages don't always go like this and things don't always go deep. But I learned so much,” Hargitay recently told Today. .
“Peter always says this beautiful thing about breaking up and getting into a marriage, and I think that's what we've been living through, because at this time in my life, Because I feel a lot different here than I did when I was 15 or 18” — and I'm confident in our love. ”
Hargitay frequently shares tributes to her husband on Instagram. On their 19th anniversary in August, she shared a photo from her wedding with the caption, “19 years. Best dance of her life. Only dance of her life.”
Another lasting relationship in Hargitay's life is with Olivia Benson, the character she played on Law & Order: SVU.
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Ice-T, Mariska Hargitay, and Christopher Meloni attend the “Law & Order: SVU” 25th anniversary party. (Todd Williamson/NBC via Getty Images)
The spinoff debuted in 1999 and has aired 25 seasons, making it the longest-running primetime drama in television history.
“It's amazing to have the privilege of actually seeing the evolution,” Hargitay told Today earlier this month. “Olivia Benson is kind of the perfect feminist story. We really get to see this woman grow into power.
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“It's hard to process. Everyone says '25 years,' but I'm so grateful to have been able to be at this time in my life and all of it.”
Hargitay has won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for his work on the show, but he recognizes the show's impact beyond awards and entertainment.
Hargitay played Olivia Benson on “Law & Order: SVU” for more than 25 years. (Jose Perez/Bauer Griffin/GC Images)
“I think we're telling people stories that haven't been told before, stories that need to be told. We're working with an attention to detail that should have been part of our culture for a long time.” “It's incredibly powerful and changed the narrative about how survivors are treated,” she told Hollywood News during the show's anniversary event this month. told the reporter.
The paper noted that she became visibly emotional and said, “This is an important show.”
The star recently opened up about her sexual assault story in an essay for People magazine, revealing that she was raped by a man she considered a friend when she was in her 30s.
Hargitay admitted that she had struggled to process the trauma for years, but as she told “Today,” she wanted to come forward to “put a name” on her experience.
In her essay, she wrote, “This is the painful part of my story. The experience was terrible. But it defined me, just as no other part of my story defines me. It doesn’t define us. There is no single thing.” Part of someone's story defines them. ”
Hargitay celebrated her 60th birthday on January 23rd and said, “I have never been more excited about a birthday than I am today.'' (Arturo Holmes/WireImage)
Hargitay celebrated her 60th birthday on January 23rd.
“I'm so excited and I don't think I've ever been more excited for a birthday,” she told “Today” ahead of the big day.
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“It’s about… owning everything about yourself,” she added. “And to have room to love and appreciate all the things that we've pushed away or judged. But the idea is to own that and have compassion. It's like a motherly feeling to have in all parts. And I think that's what's so exciting right now.”
In another interview on “Hoda and Jenna,” she added, “I've never felt so much peace. I think peace is something I've been chasing for a long time.”
