One Of TV's Biggest Drama Stars Auditioned 'Many Times' For A Lead Role On Friends

It's genuinely hard to imagine Mariska Hargitay as anyone but Olivia Benson after multiple decades of her starring on "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit," and with the utmost due respect to Hargitay, it's hard to imagine her being funny. (That's not her fault. Olivia is the captain of a division of the New York police department that investigates heinous sex crimes, so she doesn't do a whole lot of, you know, laughing.) However, according to an interview that Hargitay did with Amy Poehler, she originally started out trying to be a comedian until her life unexpectedly pivoted her into the super-dark sex crimes TV show.

In an episode of Poehler's deeply charming podcast "Good Hang," Hargitay told Poehler that she actually auditioned for one of the most popular network comedies in TV history. "I did a lot of [comedy auditions]," Hargitay — the daughter of actors Jayne Mansfield and Mickey Hargitay — recalled. "I did 'Seinfeld,' and I did 'The Single Guy, and I tested for 'Friends' so many times." (Hargitay played an actor who auditioned for a "role" based on Julia Louis-Dreyfus' Elaine Benes in a "Seinfeld" episode that gets very meta, and she appeared on three episodes of "The Single Guy.")

When asked which character she tested for, Hargitay replied, "I think it's Monica — so long ago, again," obviously referring to Courteney Cox's Monica Geller. "But I always thought that I would end up being on a sitcom or doing comedy, that's what I thought." That is, quite obviously, not what happened at all; Cox went on to originate the role of Monica Geller, while Hargitay snagged the female lead on "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit." As it turns out, Hargitay also sorta credits her eventual success on the NBC procedural to, of all people, a psychic.

Yes, you read that correctly: Mariska Hargitay believes a psychic helped her find her path as an actor. How? Well, after she didn't book the role on "Friends" but was fresh off a run on "ER" (as Cynthia Hooper, an ER desk clerk and the overly-committed girlfriend of Anthony Edwards' Dr. Mark Greene in the show's fourth season), she found herself struggling in Los Angeles. "And it's so funny, I'm in L.A., struggling actor. I think it was after 'ER,'" Hargitay recalled. "I was like, 'What am I going to do? What am I going to do?' I loved 'ER,' but I had a development deal with DreamWorks, and I was developing a show, and it was à la 'Ally McBeal,' where it was a dramedy." (What became of that development deal with DreamWorks is unclear.)

That's when a friend took Hargitay to see a psychic, and here's how Hargitay recounted the incident. "'You see that face you're doing right now? You see that face?' [he said] ... I said, 'Yeah,'" the actor told Poehler. "He goes, 'You're gonna be famous for that face. You're moving to New York, and you're gonna be famous for that face.'"

To her credit, Hargitay did not believe the guy at the time — and he had a legitimately funny response. "And I said, 'Uh, no, I live in L.A., and I'm gonna be a comedian because I'm funny, and I'm pretty, and that is a deadly combination,'" she continued. "And he looks at me — and this is my favorite moment in my life — and he goes like this, 'I don't give a rat's ass what you say.'" The rest is history: "Six months later, swear to God, I got 'SVU.'"

During her chat with Amy Poehler, Mariska Hargitay proved that she is, in fact, funny. At one point, she said to Poehler, "How did I end up as America's sweetheart sex cop?! I should have been you!" I'm a longtime fan of her work on "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit," and I can pretty confidently say that I don't think the show would be as successful without Hargitay. More to the point, it probably would be over; as of this writing, "Special Victims Unit" has aired nearly 600 episodes over three decades, and it's been going steadily on NBC since it premiered in 1999. I do absolutely give a lot of that credit to Hargitay, who brings incredible depth and heart to her role as Olivia Benson.

When we first meet Olivia, she's a detective and partnered professionally with Christopher Meloni's equally iconic detective Elliot Stabler, and throughout the series, fans of both "Special Victims Unit" and Olivia get to watch her grow both as a detective and as a person. Over time, Olivia rises to the rank of captain, adopts a son (Noah, played as a young man by Ryan Buggle), and learns to grapple with her past, future, and present. As the product of a sexual assault, Olivia takes every single case pretty personally and is a strong advocate for the victims she aims to protect. With all due respect again, Hargitay would have probably been pretty good on "Friends," but I'm selfishly grateful that she crafted the role of a lifetime with Olivia Benson.

"Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" is available to stream on Hulu and Peacock now.