\n<\/p>\n
Hargitay sees a link between the familial silence-breaking of My Mom Jayne<\/em> and her work with her Joyful Heart Foundation, a nonprofit for survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence, and child abuse. In 2017 she produced I Am Evidence,<\/em><\/a> a documentary about thousands of unprocessed rape kits languishing in America\u2019s police lockers. Last year, she revealed<\/a> that she had been raped by a friend during her 30s. \u201cThat was my own parallel journey with shame and not wanting to carry that anymore,\u201d she says, \u201cwanting for so long to be free of [the secret].\u201d<\/p>\n I Am Evidence<\/em> (directed by Trish Adlesic, who also coproduced My Mom Jayne,<\/em> and Geeta Gandbhir) made Hargitay fall in love with filmmaking, and she plans to make more documentaries. \u201cThat\u2019s one of the things I\u2019m carving out in my future at SVU,<\/em> making sure that I can have the balance.\u201d When I ask about the fate of television\u2019s longest-running character, she clutches her heart. \u201cI\u2019m not done with Olivia Benson yet,\u201d she replies. \u201cShe\u2019s got more work to do.\u201d<\/p>\n For now, though, Hargitay is preparing herself for My Mom Jayne<\/em>\u2019s premiere at Cannes. Mansfield appeared at the festival in 1958, leaving behind a trail of glamorous photos. There\u2019s Mansfield posing in a bikini with a chihuahua; Mansfield waving from the airplane steps; Mansfield in a gown facing a wall of photographers\u2014always smiling, always in character as Jayne Mansfield, bombshell. \u201cThe fact that I get to take her back and to tell her<\/em> story there, I just don\u2019t have the words,\u201d Hargitay tells me, vibrating with nervous excitement. As we finish our conversation, she thinks about everything it took to get her to this point. \u201cThirty years, and now it\u2019s coming out.\u2026 It\u2019s wild.\u201d She beams so hard, I worry that her cheeks might explode. \u201cI feel like I\u2019m seven!\u201d<\/p>\n