Olivia Benson

Detective Olivia Benson is a fictional character on the NBC police procedural drama Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, portrayed by Mariska Hargitay.

Characterisation

Concept and creation

Series creator Dick Wolf has a daughter named Olivia and a son named Elliot, for whom he named the two lead detectives in the series. Wolf conceived Benson as a detective in the Manhattan Special Victims Unit, which investigates sex crimes and abuse. She is partnered with Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni). She is tough, empathetic, and gets emotionally involved in cases. Executive producer and head writer Neal Baer has explained that Olivia is "the empathetic, passionate voice for these victims", in contrast to Elliot, who embodies "the rage we feel, the "How can this happen?" feeling". Of their partnership, Baer assessed that: "They both represent the feelings that we feel simultaneously when we hear about these cases. That's why they work so well together."

Benson's empathy for victims has roots in her personal life; she was a child of her mother's rape. Her mother Serena (Elizabeth Ashley) was an abusive alcoholic. In season two episode "Taken", Benson's mother dies in a drunken stupor falling down a flight of subway stairs outside the entrance to a bar. In a later episode, "Intoxicated", she mentions being engaged briefly when she was 16 to a 21-year-old student of her mother's. Benson graduated from Siena College. While there, she held a membership in a sorority. In addition to English, Benson speaks some Spanish and French and is able to Mirandize in three others.

Relationships

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Stabler (left) and Benson (right) in the SVU episode "Authority".

Hargitay has characterised Benson and Stabler's relationship as "very complicated". Her assessment is that: "Sometimes it's very much like brother and sister, and I think the reason that they're so close is that they share a passion for their jobs and for the people. They have a mutual respect for one another. I think that the average lifespan of an SVU detective is four years because of the difficulty and stress involved. They're been doing it for longer than that, so they feel like they're in their own world almost. There's also sexual chemistry between them, it's so loaded and layered. People ask me if they'll ever get together - and people want that, and sometimes I think even Olivia wants that - but I don't think that will ever happen." Baer agrees that a romantic relationship between the two is unlikely, though commented: "You never can say never".

Hargitay has stated that her favourite SVU scene occurs in season 7 episode "Fault", when Benson is faced with the possibility of losing Stabler: "Lou Diamond Phillips [a murderous kidnapper] has a gun to Elliot's head. I'm negotiating [with him to drop the gun]. It was a painful, high-stakes scene. Elliot and I have to admit what we mean to each other... He is everything that [my character] Olivia has. So this was where we really got that to pay off."

In the show's first season, Olivia has a brief affair with one of her SVU colleagues, Detective Brian Cassidy (Dean Winters). It is implied that she ends it in the episode "Disrobed" when he gets too close. Cassidy leaves the precinct at the end of the episode. In the season nine episode "Closet," the SVU squad are surprised to find out that Benson has been in a relationship with journalist Kurt Moss (Bill Pullman) for three or four months. It only comes out because Internal Affairs are investigating Benson and Stabler in a case in which the department accidentally outed a professional football player. By the end of the episode she breaks up with Moss.

While Benson has only been portrayed in relationships with men, Benson has, according to lesbian entertainment website AfterEllen.com, "attracted a large lesbian following". Fan speculation exists over alleged sexual tension between Benson and Assistant District Attorney Alexandra Cabot, which Baer admits to indulging: "We read the fan sites. We know that people are into the Alex-Olivia thing. All the codes are in there."

Development

Hargitay has deemed the storyline which saw Benson find her paternal family: "probably the biggest thing that's ever happened to Olivia." She feels her character is a role model for young girls, revealing: "I get letters saying, 'I want to do the right thing like Olivia. I want to be strong like Olivia. My friend did this, but I didn't do it because of Olivia.' For me, when a television show has that kind of positive effect on young people, it is great. I think it is a good thing that we are shedding light on darkness. I think it is a good thing to make young girls aware."

Storylines

On two separate occasions (Season 1's "Disrobed" and Season 3's "Wrath") Benson is forced to kill a suspect. In the episode "Fault", she suffers a slash wound to the throat while pursuing a child rapist. Though the cut is superficial, she and Stabler later begin to falter in their police work as it transpires that neither is willing to risk the other's life in order to catch the killer. Benson briefly transfers into the computer crimes unit, but the first two cases she works on involve SVU. In the episode "Web," Benson returns to SVU as Stabler's partner.

In the 2006 season premiere episode "Informed", Benson takes a leave of absence from SVU to work with the FBI and successfully infiltrates an eco-terrorist group. Several episodes later, SVU tries to get in touch with her so that she can testify in a rape trial. Near the end of the episode, her time with the FBI comes to an end and she returns to SVU. However, when she comes back to SVU headquarters, she finds that her replacement, Dani Beck (Connie Nielsen), looks overly-friendly with Stabler. She then tells Cragen that she is not ready to return and requests that her visit to Cragen not be mentioned to Stabler. She soon returns as Stabler's "handler". They both comment on how the other has changed since their original partnership. The case they are working on leads to a perpetrator donating a lobe of his liver to his estranged wife, and when Benson and Stabler realize they are the same blood type, each agrees that they would give the other a kidney if it were needed.

In the episode "Haystack", Benson learns that kinship analysis may help her learn more about her past. She has her blood tested and, at the end of the episode, discovers that she has a brother named Simon Marsden. In the episode "Florida" she visits the wife of her biological father, Joseph Hollister. The wife, however, has Alzheimer's disease and manages to tell her that Joe left a house to her half-brother Simon before forgetting who Olivia is. At the coroner's office, she finds out that he died about 10 years ago due to pills mixed with alcohol; the death was ruled a suicide. After talking to his coworker, Olivia finds out that he was depressed. Dr. Huang postulates that the depression caused him to rape women to make them feel as bad as he did. Apparently Olivia's father also kept track of her throughout her life which leads her to believe that her mother made up the rape because she doesn't believe a rapist would track the child whom he fathered through rape. However, when she visits the house of one of the other rape victims from the same area and time period as her mother's attack and shows her a picture of Joe Hollister, the victim says that he was her rapist as well.

Benson's brother Simon is a suspect in several incidents of stalking. Olivia's interference in that case leads to Cragen's ordering an independent psychological assessment to determine her fitness to remain at SVU. During the episode "Florida", Benson is caught by Agent Dean Porter, her handler while undercover, for sending money to her brother while on the run. Faced with the facts, she tells him the truth and cooperates in re-capturing her brother in return for not being arrested and charged. It is later revealed that Captain Julia Milfield, the detective who had worked her brother's case in "Philadelphia", had framed Simon for the rape because she mistakenly believed he had raped her sister when they were in high school. In the season 8 ender episode "Screwed", Benson decided to tell Internal Affairs Bureau the truth about her actions while Simon was on the run, even though she realizes that it may end her career. Simon urges her to tell IAB that he forced her to lend him the money, but she believes it best to tell the truth. Benson is suspended for several weeks for her actions, returning for the premiere of season 9.

In the season 9 episode "Undercover", Olivia goes undercover in a women's prison where one of the corrections officers is suspected of raping women in the facility. She is taken to a basement room in the prison and is almost raped. In the season 10 premiere, "Trials", Olivia is dealing with the aftermath of her sexual assault. She reveals that she cannot sleep and has canceled several dates. She is also having flashbacks of the attack. At the end of the episode, Olivia is seen talking to a therapist about the assault.

Reception

Hargitay has won a number of awards for her role as Benson: 'Individual Achievement for Best Female Lead' and 'Outstanding Female Lead' Gracie Awards in 2004 and 2009 respectively, an Emmy for 'Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series' in 2006, a Prism Award for 'Performance in a Drama Series Episode' in 2007, and a Golden Globe for 'Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series' in 2009. Of her Emmy win, Hargitay commented: "It makes me only want to be better. Now I'm an Emmy winner. I have to step it up."

The San Francisco Chronicle's John Carman has called Hargitay as Benson "the show's weakest performer". Fellow San Francisco Chronicle writer Jean Gonick however, has deemed Benson a suitable role model for teenage girls, calling her: "courageous and strong, and unspeakably gorgeous", and writing that "Olivia Benson is our own special hero. She battles evil, avenges her mother, faces her demons but refuses to date them." Writing for Entertainment Weekly, Ken Tucker criticized Benson and Stabler as: "the most naive, bleeding-heart molester busters in America."

External links

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