“I’ve spent most of my life feeling ashamed of my mother… a person that I have no memory of… a person who’s voice I didn’t want to hear,” recalls Award-winning actress and freshman director Mariska Hargitay near the close of her touching new film, My Mom, Jayne.  The feature-length documentary debuts on HBO tonight, Friday, June 27, 2025, 8:00 – 10:00 p.m. ET/PT (see below for streaming details).

Whether you’ve watched the landmark Dick Wolf juggernaut, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, from its premiere episode on NBC in September 1999 or caught up via reruns… or, like me, never tire of watching repeat episodes, the one constant throughout the series’ record-breaking 26 season run, is fearless, resilient, compassionate Olivia Benson.

The years have been good to Olivia Benson.  Rising up through the ranks of the New York City Police Dept.’s (NYPD) sex crimes unit from detective to sergeant to captain, the character of Olivia Benson has seasoned appreciably from fictional NYPD cop to iconic champion for women and men of all ages who have faced sexual abuse and assault.

Benson’s appeal and longevity have everything to do with the beloved actress who has devoted her career to playing her.  Mariska Hargitay carries Benson’s mantle off screen as an advocate for the rights and dignity of sexual assault victims and the capture and conviction of their assailants.  Hargitay founded the Joyful Heart Foundation in 2004, which not only aims to end the backlog of untested rape kits in the U.S. via its “End the Backlog” initiative, but also strives to change the dialogue surrounding sexual assault, domestic violence and child abuse.

Captain Olivia Benson and actress/activist Mariska Hargitay share another more provocative storyline: They’ve persevered despite having had mothers who left them with unresolved scars and few if any positive mother-daughter memories.

While Olivia Benson’s scripted traumatic childhood has periodically impacted her casework for better or worse, it has taken Mariska Hargitay 60 years to face and untangle her own complicated backstory.  Her determination to squash the false narratives and misconceptions spun in the media and within her own family about her mom, celebrated 1950s and ’60s sex symbol Jayne Mansfield; her dad, aka Mr. Universe Mickey Hargitay; and her siblings, came six decades after the horrific car crash in 1967 that killed her mom at age 34 and almost took her own life at three.

Happy occasions and photo ops were few between Mariska aka “Maria” Hargitay and her mom, Jayne Mansfield, who died in a car crash when Mariska was 3.  Photo 12/Alamy Stock Photo. Courtesy of HBO.

With My Mom, Jayne, Hargitay set out to untangle the misconceptions blurring her mom’s public and private persona and to bring clarity to her own lineage.  Fraught with unexpected twists, her journey to set the record straight was far from easy.

“After she passed away, the moment that’s always stayed with me is when I found my baby book,” remembers Hargitay. “All of my siblings had one. But when I looked through mine, it was practically empty.  So on top of having no memories, I think it just gave me a sense of more loss.  It was like this little hole in my heart.”

Jayne Mansfield‘s backstory will be a revelation to anyone who remembers her only as a textbook dumb blond with a voluptuous body and kittenish voice; posing in sexy, skintight outfits by her heart-shaped pool or on the arm of her body-builder husband, Mickey Hargitay; or acting sultry in pot boiler B-movies.

Despite her high IQ, multi-language fluency, childhood training as a violinist and concert pianist, and her dream to be taken seriously as an actress, she was forced to use “pin-up publicity to get her foot in the door” of the sexist male movie execs and casting agents who made and marketed celebrities in 1950s and ’60s Hollywood.

Director Hargitay uncovered wonderful family photos and ephemera and vintage family and archival film and TV clips to tell her mother’s story in and out of the public eye… with her husbands, especially Jayne’s second husband, Mickey Hargitay, and lovers; with Jayne’s mother and grandmother; and her expanding brood of young children. At the height of her celebrity, Jayne Mansfield was not only a popular cover girl, but entertained the troops with Bob Hope, and appeared on seminal period TV and talk shows, the latter often with her expanding brood of kids in tow.

Archival clips from her performance on “The Ed Sullivan Show” (as a violinist!) and popular appearances on talk shows hosted by Groucho Marx, Edward R. Murrow, a surprisingly smarmy Jack Paar, and annoyingly perky Merv Griffin (who engages in some banter with tiny Mariska aka “Maria”) are delightful additions to this film.

And finally, there are touching memories and plot twists to unpack from Mariska’s siblings, those known and those new to her, as well as input from her beloved stepmom, Ellen Hargitay.

Actress/director Mariska Hargitay (right) finds closure when she revisits her childhood and elevates the legacy of her mother, actress Jayne Mansfield (left), in MY MOM JAYNE (HBO).

Mariska Hargitay brings a welcome level of maturity and insight to a complex story that demands the ability to make peace with a deep reservoir of loss and grief and shame and move forward with acceptance and joy.  I can’t imagine anyone not being moved by her journey and the film that she made to record it.

My Mom, Jayne debuts on HBO tonight, Friday, June 27, 2025, 8:00 – 10:00 p.m. ET/PT.  (Check listings for repeat screenings on HBO in the days and weeks ahead, availability on HBO On Demand and HBO Max for streaming.)

The film promises to be an evergreen addition to film and TV history and popular culture courses in colleges and universities, as well as women’s studies in college, library and group counseling settings dealing with mother-daughter relationships. –Judith Trojan