Mariska Hargitay on Filming 600 Episodes of ‘Law & Order: SVU,’ Benson’s New Journey and Revisiting Her ‘Intense History’ With Stabler

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Mariska Hargitay is capping off her stellar year with yet another milestone: 600 episodes of “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” the NBC crime drama on which she’s starred as the indomitable Captain Olivia Benson since 1999. The hour, titled “Obedience,” airs on Nov. 12 and is highlighted by the return of Benson’s former partner Elliot Stabler, played by Christopher Meloni. Since his departure in 2011, Meloni has popped in for a handful of guest appearances, but this time was special.

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For Hargitay, the months leading up to the shoot were wildly eventful: In September, she took home two Emmys for her documentary “My Mom Jayne”; the following week, she hosted the show; then she flew right back to New York and started filming Jalen Brunson’s episode of “SVU” the following day. Four days after that ended, production on Episode 600 began.

So when it came time for the celebration dinner, Hargitay nearly passed. “I wanted to go home and go to bed,” she says. But like the leader she is, she went anyway. Huddled around two tables was the current cast and crew, creator Dick Wolf, Wolf Entertainment chief operating officer Peter Jankowski and, of course, Meloni.

“It was one of the most extraordinary, meaningful nights, and unexpectedly so to me,” Hargitay recalls. At the start of the evening, “Dick got up and said, ‘This has never happened, and it will never happen again.’ And everything just landed that night.”

Hargitay was asked to give a toast, which she read in full during our conversation, shedding tears as she spoke.

“Here we are at episode 600, and it really doesn’t feel totally real — which in a way is exactly how it should feel, because it’s as if we all get to live in this dream of what you thought might be possible someday,” her speech began. “And you’ve shown that it’s not only possible, but it’s so much better than anyone could have imagined.”

The episode was also better than she could have imagined, with the hour tackling the always fraught relationship between Benson and Stabler as they reopen an old case. Plus there are a few scenes, she says, that include “fun moments when they kind of mirror Mariska and Chris.”

Jankowski says Meloni “will always be a part of the show’s DNA,” no matter how long he’s been away. “There is something reassuring about seeing Mariska and Chris work together just like old times. The difference is that for the last 15 years it has been Mariska’s show. She is the alpha dog now.”

Hargitay took over at the top of the call sheet after Meloni’s exit and stayed there. As both star and executive producer, she now takes home nearly $850,000 an episode. She has also, through her Joyful Heart Foundation, helped to shift the narrative around sexual assault and given victims a voice they felt they’d lost.

The 600th episode leans into Benson’s personal journey in a way the show never has. “It’s about a woman having her voice and being submissive or subservient in a way, or giving up our power or our instinct, and that’s an important story to tell,” she says. “Because so many women identify with that.”

The episode also unpacks her dynamic with Stabler and their “intense history,” which makes working together very complicated. “Every relationship is fraught. Every relationship has power dynamics, and will they/won’t they, and what could have been and what isn’t and why, and could they and can’t they, and the complexity of all that.”

And it all works onscreen: “Some things are a mystery,” she adds, “and I think chemistry is one.”

Hargitay ended her toast to the “SVU” family by telling Wolf, “You truly have television — the kind of vision that lets you see and dream and believe far enough and wide enough to create some of this. All those years ago, when you sat there with this idea for the show, and you said, ‘Huh, this might work,’ you used your television, your foresight, to look many years in the future.”

Jankowski adds that while so much in the TV landscape has shifted and is changing every day, sometimes the right people can overcome the impossible. “One hundred episodes used to be the measuring stick of success on network TV,” he says, “which makes ‘SVU’’s 600 episodes almost surreal.”

NBC Entertainment chairman Pearlena Igbokwe says what’s even more “remarkable” than the episode number is the impact the show continues to have.

“Dick Wolf created a series with a rare ability to evolve with the world around it while never losing sight of the humanity at the heart of its stories. Mariska Hargitay as Olivia Benson is more than an iconic television character,” she says. “She represents the kind of strength, empathy and courage we all hope to have on our side. So many extraordinary artists have contributed to ‘SVU’ over the years, and together they’ve created a legacy that is truly unmatched.”

“Law & Order: SVU” airs on NBC Thursdays at 9 p.m. ET.