Before Mariska Hargitay became “America’s sweetheart sex cop,” as she famously described herself on her Good meeting with Amy Poehler podcast appearance, the veteran TV actor thought she would be an actress and tested for Friends “several times.”
Discussing his affinity for comedy with the Parks and Recreation former student, Hargitay said, “All I wanted to be was you,” reflecting on her childhood through The Groundlings, the famous Saturday evening live pipeline improv school and sketch comedy troupe.
“I did a lot of [comedy auditions]”, Hargitay told Poehler of his comedic roles early in his career. “I did Seinfeldand I did it Single guyand I tested Friends so many times.
When asked what role she auditioned for, Hargitay said, “I think it’s Monica – so long ago, again. But I always thought I’d end up on a sitcom or doing comedy, that’s what I thought.”
However, a chance encounter with a medium highly recommended by his friends reveals a different destiny.
At the time, the My mother Jayne the documentarian had just finished her role as Cynthia Hooper in EAST and was a “struggling actor”. Through her development contract at DreamWorks, she was working on a comedy-drama in the vein of Ally McBeal. But during a routine trip to New York, she visited a psychic on Long Island at the request of her friends, who “started telling me all these incredible things.”
“He said to me, Amy, ‘See that face you’re making right now? See that face?’ …I said, “Yeah. He says, ‘You’re going to be famous for that face.’ You move to New York and you’re going to be famous for this face,” she recalls. “And I said, ‘Um, no, I live in Los Angeles and I’m going to be a comedian because I’m funny and pretty, and that’s a deadly combination.’ And he looks at me – and it’s my favorite moment of my life – and he says, ‘I don’t care what you say.’
She concluded: “Six months later, swear to God, I got SVU.”
Hargitay portrayed the pragmatic and fiercely protective New York police officer-turned-captain Olivia Benson in Law & Order: SVU since 1999. The Dick Wolf-created NBC mainstay is currently airing its 27th season.
Watch the full episode below:
