Mama Recap: Law & Order: SVU

The 5/16/2018 episode of Law & Order: SVU was called “Mama” and was primarily about an 82-year-old woman named Maddie Thomas. She has Alzheimer’s and is living in a nursing home. It was the kind of story that you hope wasn’t ripped from the headlines and are too grossed out to look up whether it was!

The episode opened up with Lt. Olivia Benson learning over the phone from Chief of Police Dodds that Fin has been promoted to Sergeant and will be leaving SVU. Benson calls Fin in and expresses her disappointment that he’s leaving but congratulates him on his promotion. The scene switches to Peter Stone, on an outing with his sister, Pam. She wants to know why there are flowers and Stone says “to make us happy.” Pam quotes “Beauty is truth, truth, beauty. That is all ye know on earth and all ye need to know” from John Keats “Ode to a Grecian Urn,” telling her brother that he used to say that all the time. Stone says it was their dad who said it and they head back to Bayview, Pam’s facility.

When we first see Maddie, she is enjoying “Paper Doll,” Joe Piscopo’s tribute to Frank Sinatra, but has a negative reaction when an Esconso Gardens’ nurse offers her marzipan cookies.

After the show, she brings up the topic of marzipan cookies with the same nurse and matter-of-factly says she was raped as she downs her medicine. The cavalry (SVU) soon arrives and Dr. Lee escorts them to Maddie’s room, explaining she tends to blend fiction with reality because of her condition. Maddie’s daughter, Christine, prods her mom to tell Carisi and Rollins what happened but Maddie rambles about cookies and Frank Sinatra. They get enough out of her to take her to Mercy Hospital for a rape screen.

Rollins consoles guilt-stricken Christine who feels like she shoved her mom into an $18K-a-month “garbage heap” just so she wouldn’t have to deal with her. Benson arrives. They learn that everything so far is negative for rape. Benson asks them to put a rush on the DNA tests. She meets Maddie who says “Did he rape you, too?” Benson wants to know who and Maddie says “I like marzipan cookies.” Benson does too so Maddie decides they will be best friends. Back at the station, Rollins interviews “Frank Sinatra” who finds her insinuation sick and disgusting.

Rollins gets a lead from Maddie at lunch with her and Christine. Maddie pulls a knife on Rollins. That’s what it took for them to realize Maddie is not talking about a rape recent enough for physical evidence. They go to the bakery that Maddie sold 5 years ago to find a guy named “Max.” This proves to be 83-year-old Professor Leonard Maxwell, who came to the bakery faithfully on a daily basis and then just disappeared one day. Rollins questions him at the station, saying he has to tell her why he stopped coming to the bakery. He was deeply in love with Maddie but she was already married with a little baby (Christine). He even remembers the exact date of his last visit– February 13, 1966. He and Maddie made love in the kitchen. It was beautiful but she felt so guilty, she decided they should never see each other again. “And that was it,” Maxwell says. Rollins thinks a teddy bear is more threatening than he is but Benson wants him in a lineup much to the outrage of his grandson. “They’re old,” Maddie says and can’t identify him. In fact, when they run into each other in the squad room, Maxwell gets an even bigger shock when he tells her, “It’s me, Leonard” and she says, “I don’t know you.”

Later, at the Silverwald Retirement Home, another much more lucid woman, Patrice Connelly, reports being raped. The attacker’s name was Dan, which turns out to be the stolen identity of a dead man. They learn that fake Dan was working at nursing homes in various capacities: nurse, orderly, chef even. He worked in the kitchen at Maddie’s place and they find out that he delivered food to the residents in their rooms. He liked to hum show tunes from Broadway star Trudy Morris’s shows and claimed he knew her.

The detectives have images of fake Dan from security footage so they pay Trudy Morris a visit. She immediately identifies “Dan.” He’s her son, Henry Phillips and if they wait a few minutes, he’ll be back. When he shows up, they slap the cuffs on him and bring him to station.

Henry is rather flippant in interrogation, and Rollins knows he’s guilty because he doesn’t call the accusation “sick and disgusting” (like “Frank Sinatra”). He wants his lawyer. Meantime, Henry’s DNA comes up in the Connelly case but she has a heart attack and dies. Their only hope is Maddie, who recognizes Henry as her rapist but is just not a competent witness. Judge Peck throws the case out. When Stone delivers the bad news to Benson he mentions that there’s no press in the halls of justice so Henry isn’t quite as big of a shot as he thinks he is. Benson leaks the story and the next thing you see is a NY Post-type paper with the headline: “Broadway’s Bad Seed.” People start pouring into the precinct to report that their mothers were attacked, too.

Carisi and Rollins return to the home of Trudy Morris to pinch Henry, who loses it. His incestuous love for his mother pours out of him while Trudy sits there petting her dog, looking mortified. Henry used to brush her hair in the morning and he mentioned how soft her skin was after her bath. He’s the one who really loved her, not all her other men, he cried angrily and demanded to know why she couldn’t love him back, just a little. Ewww! So because of that, he preyed on older women. “Frank Sinatra” was right. Sick and disgusting! Nevertheless, the Nursing Home Abuse Center reports that, among other types of elder abuse, sexual abuse in nursing homes does occur and the perpetrators are usually employees, family members or health care attendants.

When Benson told Christine and Maddie that Henry’s going up the river for a long time, Maddie took her necklace off and put it on Benson. Maxwell came in with white chrysanthemums. Maddie delightedly buried her face in them and looked at him lovingly. Benson wanted to give Christine the necklace when they were alone but Christine said her mother meant for Benson to have it.

The episode ended with Benson returning to SVU. Fin is there. He got himself transferred back, seemingly before he ever really left, if you ask us.

By the way, in real life, the lovely Fionnula Flanagan is 76, Hal Linden is 87 and here’s a link to Joe Piscopo as Frank Sinatra dueting on SNL with Eddie Murphy as Stevie Wonder.

Selected Cast of “Mama”
Mariska Hargitay – Olivia Benson
Ice-T – Detective Odafin “Fin” Tutuola
Kelli Giddish – Amanda Rollins
Peter Scanavino – Dominick “Sonny” Carisi Jr.
Philip Winchester – Peter Stone
Amy Korb – Pamela Stone
Fionnula Flanagan – Madeline Thomas
Hal Linden – Leonard Maxwell
Joe Piscopo – Frank Sinatra Impersonator
Kathleen McNenny – Christine Ritchie
Anne Archer – Trudy Morris
Todd Alan Crain – Henry Phillips
Rutanya Alda – Patrice Connelly
Neil Hellegers – Dr. Malcolm Lee
Barbara Miluski – Judge Lisa Peck