Christopher Meloni took a trip down memory lane, dishing on his favorite Law & Order: SVU scene opposite longtime on-screen partner Mariska Hargitay.
Speaking in a recent interview with Us Weekly, the Organized Crime star pointed to a particularly fraught moment within the grisly crime procedural’s world — and one that would have repercussions for his character Elliot Stabler and Hargitay’s Benson for seasons to come.
“My favorite Law & Order: Special Victims Unit scene featuring myself and Mariska Hargitay was when Lou Diamond Phillips had a gun to my head, and Stabler told Benson to take the shot,” Meloni revealed, referencing the Season 7 episode titled “Fault.”
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Recognized by fans as an especially difficult episode, the aptly named installment caused a seismic shift within the duo’s friendship. When hunting down serial killer and sex offender Victor Gitano (Phillips), the characters are forced into a life-and-death decision that results in the murder of a child after both of them prioritized each other’s safety, letting their relationship cloud their professional judgment.
Earlier in the episode, Stabler chooses to check in on Benson, whose throat is cut by Gitano, rather than saving a boy Gitano kidnaps and eventually kills. Later on, Benson is forced into a similar compromising position, in which she is unwilling to risk Stabler’s life, held in the balance as a hostage of Gitano’s, and refuses to take the shot. With this conflict of interest, Benson opts to request a new partner at the episode’s close.
“We were bound to each other in that moment as people and characters. And I think Mariska was eight months pregnant at the time, so it’s a moment I find particularly special,” Meloni concluded. (Hargitay is a mother of three, and her eldest son August Miklos Friedrich Hermann was born in 2006, following the airing of “Fault.”)
The will-they-won’t-they dynamic between Benson and Stabler has continued over 25 years and a sprawling serialized franchise, despite Meloni’s departure from SVU due to failed contract negotiations in 2011. Though there are occasional crossovers, and a much-discussed almost-kiss early last year, the pair now occupy different worlds: Hargitay returned to form on SVU with its Season 26 premiere Oct. 3. Meanwhile, Meloni is set to reprise his role in Season 5 of Organized Crime, which recently found a new home in parent company NBC’s streamer Peacock.
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