Mariska Hargitay is known for her long and storied acting career, playing the role of Olivia Benson on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit since 1999, and now appearing in the same role in Law and Order: Organised Crime.
But what some viewers might not realise is that it runs in the family.
The actress has deep roots in Hollywood, thanks to her mother, ’50s bombshell and sex symbol Jayne Mansfield.
Unfortunately, Mariska did not get to know her mother very well, with Mansfield having tragically passed away in a freak accident – one Mariska miraculously escaped from.
Mariska was born on January 23, 1964 as the youngest child of Mansfield and her second husband, Hungarian actor, body builder and former Mr. Universe 1955, Mickey Hargitay.
The couple had met and fallen quickly in love in May 1956 and tied the knot in January 1958, days after her first divorce was finalised.
After they wed, they took their show on the road. Mickey made his debut as an actor with a small part in Mansfield’s film Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957), before going on to be her leads in Italian films such as The Loves of Hercules (1960) and L’Amore Primitivo (1964).
The couple also made a name for themselves touring in stage shows and nightclub acts as a performing team, with Mansfield sporting her iconic leopard-spot bikini. A highlight of the show was Mickey using his strength to toss Mansfield around his waist.
Mariska has two older brothers, Miklós and Zoltán, as well as three half-siblings – Jayne Marie Mansfield and Antonio “Tony” Cimber, from her mother’s first marriage to Paul Mansfield and third marriage to Matt Climber respectively, as well as Tina Hargitay, from her father’s first marriage.
Her parents were divorced in May 1963, before she was even born, but found their fast-tracked Mexican divorce was not recognised in America. They reconciled a few months before her birth in 1964, but soon separated again, with the divorce being recognised in August.
Mariska would end up spending only three short years with her mother before she would witness her death before her own eyes.
On that fateful night of June 29, 1967, Mansfield, her attorney and boyfriend Sam Brody, their 20-year-old driver Ronnie Harrison and her three children with her second husband were bundled up in a 1966 Buick Electra 225, leaving Biloxi, Mississippi after two shows there for New Orleans, where Mansfield was to appear on WDSU’s Midday Show the next day.
The party never made it to their destination. At 2:30am, their car had slid under the back of a Johnson’ tractor-trailer, which in turn had slowed down to an insecticide fog-spraying truck.
The accident took the top of the Electra clean off, killing the three adults in the front seat on impact. Mariska and her two brothers, who were asleep in the backseat, escaped with minor injuries.
Thus began the urban legend that Mansfield was decapitated during the accident, with police crime scene photos showing the car with some blonde hair tangled in the front windshield, seemingly affirming the theories. Though Mansfield did die of severe head trauma, the decapitation theory has been debunked.
Since her death, there has been a push to fit trucks with an underride guard to ensure horrific accidents like this don’t happen again. In America, this bar is sometimes called the “Mansfield bar”.
After her mother’s death, her father Mickey came to pick Mariska and her siblings up, raising them in Los Angeles with his new wife, airline stewardess Ellen Siano, who he wed in 1968.
“The beauty is that families are made in so many different ways, and that was my reality as a child,” Mariska commented in a 2018 People interview “Growing up, my family was made in such an interesting and unique way.”
Despite her mother’s legacy, Mariska did not like to be compared to her. Instead, she began her career following her father’s stead. At 18, having been newly crowned Miss Beverly Hills USA, she had told Time in 1982, “My dad was Mr. Universe, so it would be fun for me to be Miss Universe.”
She would go on to compete in Miss California USA and place fourth-runner-up before enjoying a short but action-packed film and TV career, before finally turning to her magnum opus, Law & Order: SVU.
Mariska ended up becoming very close to her father, with the proud dad even once appearing in a 2003 episode of the show, making a cameo as a witness to a violent crime.
She lost her father soon after, in 2006, to cancer.
For a daily dose of 9Honey, subscribe to our newsletter here.
”It was huge to lose this person who was my everything, my strength, my power, the person who believed in me… But I got to say goodbye, and I remember it was very calm, and he just looked at me and he said, ‘Mariska… Always’,” he recalled.
“I already carried his fire, the lessons that he taught me, his compassion, his love, his kindness. Now I do feel that he’s with me. Even though he’s not here physically, I carry him.”
Despite not getting the chance to know her mother as intimately as she did her father, she says that all it takes to connect with her is to “look in the mirror… She’s with me still.”
Mariska describes Mansfield as an intelligent and loving woman and mother, as well as being a sex symbol.
“She was just so ahead of her time. She was an inspiration, she had this appetite for life, and I think I share that with her.”
Now 59, Mariska herself has settled down and grown her family in an unconventional way. She met her husband, actor Peter Hermann, on the set of SVU in the early 2000s, marrying him in 2004. They welcomed their son in 2006 before going on to adopt her next two children, a daughter and a son, both born and adopted in 2011.
Living with the loss of her mother, yet her memory being very much alive in both home and career environments, has created a unique way to deal with loss for Mariska.
“In my life, certainly I’ve tried to avoid pain, loss, feeling things. But I’ve learned instead to really lean into it, because sooner or later you have to pay the piper,” she said.
“I’m not saying it’s easy, and it certainly hasn’t been for me… There’s been a lot of darkness. But on the other side things can be so bright.”