Mariska Hargitay’s new documentary, My Mom Jayne, will explore her paternity and her reaction to meeting her biological father for the first time.

Mariska Hargitay is known to many as the star of Law & Order: SVU, playing the capable Olivia Benson. Starting from a detective, Benson moved up the ranks throughout the 26 seasons of the show to become a police captain. After playing the character for so long, it isn’t surprising that the role starts seeping into her real life.

During one of the most important moments in her life, Hargitay shared that she fully transformed into Olivia Benson in the way she handled it. It has to do with her paternity, which she will unravel more about in the upcoming documentary about her mother, My Mom Jayne.

Mariska Hargitay went full Olivia Benson when meeting her real father

Mariska Hargitay is getting to know more about her famous mother, Jayne Mansfield. In the ’50s Hollywood, Mansfield was one of the blonde bombshells, who was perhaps the most photographed woman of the time. Hargitay didn’t like this ‘s*x symbol’ image of her mother at all.

She shared in the trailer to the documentary My Mom Jayne, “Her career made me want to do it differently.” However, now she wants something different: “But I want to understand her now.” Mansfield died in a tragic car accident in 1967 when Hargitay was just 3. She was 34 at the time.

At one point in the trailer, Hargitay says, “I pulled out this picture, couldn’t believe what I was seeing. It was like the floor fell out from underneath me.” While it isn’t revealed in the trailer, it was a photo of Nelson Sardelli, who turned out to be Hargitay’s real father. In 1963, Mansfield filed for divorce from Mickey Hargitay and began a romance with Sardelli.

However, Mansfield reconciled with Mickey several months before Hargitay’s birth. She told Vanity Fair that she realized Sardelli was her biological father in her 20s. When she confronted Mickey, he denied it. Hargitay never brought this up again to Mickey. However, she visited Sardelli during a performance in Atlantic City when she was 30.

Sardelli was emotional seeing Hargitay and told her, “I’ve been waiting 30 years for this moment.” However, she was aggressive like her TV persona. She shared:

Hargitay believed that she grew up where she was supposed to. She shared, “I’m Mickey Hargitay’s daughter—that is not a lie.” She further shared that the documentary is also a love letter to her father, who adopted her as his own.

Mariska Hargitay’s siblings make appearances in the documentary

Mariska Hargitay’s documentary will feature her siblings: Jayne Marie Mansfield, Zoltan Hargitay, and Mickey Hargitay Jr. Since the SVU star doesn’t have many memories of her mother, her journey to understand her mother needed her siblings’ perspectives. She says in the trailer, “I’ve never talked to my siblings about their experiences.”

In the trailer, she is seen talking to her older sister, “You have all these memories, and I’m envious of that.” Jayne, who is 13 years older than Hargitay, says, “In the beginning, I had her to myself. She’d take me everywhere.”