Key Points
Mariska Hargitay is wishing her late mom, Jayne Mansfield, a happy heavenly birthday.
The Too Hot to Handle star died in a car crash in 1967 at age 34 when Hargitay was 3.
The Law & Order star has been open about how her mother being viewed as a sex symbol has influenced her career.
Mariska Hargitay is remembering her mom Jayne Mansfield.
The Law & Order: Special Victims Unit star shared a vintage photo of Mansfield on Sunday, April 19, which would have marked the actress’ 93rd birthday. The photo features Mansfield performing a stunt, suspended in midair thanks to wires and a stuntman. “Happy Heavenly Birthday mama Jayne✨💕💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗,” she captioned the post.
Hargitay also shared a photo of Mansfield smiling in a dress with gloves, holding a guitar.
Mansfield, best known for her roles in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, The Girl Can’t Help It, and The Loves of Hercules, died in a car crash in June 1967. She was 34. Hargitay was in the back seat of the car at the time of the crash but only suffered minor injuries.
Hargitay has been open about her late mother, who came back into the public’s interest with the HBO Max documentary My Mom Jayne. Speaking with Entertainment Weekly in June 2025, Hargitay said that it’s been “incredible to see how women were treated and really put into a box. That is something I was personally fighting against in every way. And now, how incredible it is to see women redefining themselves.”
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In the years that Hargitay has played Olivia Benson on Law & Order: SVU, she reframed the way she thought of her character while reflecting on the roles her mother was typecast into as a sex symbol, when Mansfield had more to offer than just her looks. Mansfield knew how to speak five different languages, along with playing the piano and classical violin.
“[Her] career made me want to do it differently,” Hargitay said of Mansfield in My Mom Jayne. “I disowned the part of myself that was my mother’s daughter.”
Whether or not Hargitay portraying the smart and strong detective as a foil to her mom’s sex symbol persona was intentional, Hargitay doesn’t know if she “thought that on a conscious level.”
“But everything about Law & Order and the character felt so right. It was what I wanted to do, what I felt I was capable of. I loved this character. I was a thousand percent sure that I wanted to do it. I had never been more sure about anything. When I read it, I was like, ‘This is it.’ Playing a woman with this kind of strength was so right to me,” she said.
Jayne Mansfield and Mariska Hargitay
Credit: HBO
“At the end of the day, I have picked roles and made very specific choices about the kind of career that I wanted to have,” Hargitay added. “So, it definitely played a part unconsciously.”
As for what trait she thinks Benson and Mansfield share? “Compassion,” she said. “I know that [my mom] was a deeply, deeply kind, compassionate, and empathetic, loving person. But Olivia is fearless and certainly not afraid of confrontation. She makes up her own rules and lives by a different code.”
Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly
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