Before Olivia Benson: Mariska Hargitay as an Italian Princess:

Today when Mariska Hargitay’s name is mentioned, the first thing we think of is Olivia Benson of “Law & Order: SVU.” Mariska has been playing Olivia Benson since the show’s premiere on September 20, 1999. She’s been playing the role so long that, to some people, she IS the show and it would be hard to imagine her in any other role.

Mariska Hargitay as Olivia Benson in “Payback”,
the first episode of “Law & Order: SVU”

But, before “Law & Order: SVU”, Mariska had other roles. One of them was as an Italian princess in Season 3 of “Wiseguy,” a crime show that also had a lot of comical moments. “Wiseguy” ran from September 1987 to December 1990 on CBS. Mariska, then 26 years old, appeared in one episode, called “Romp”, that aired on February 7, 1990.

This was a stand-alone episode that had nothing to do with any of the undercover operations that federal agent, Vinnie Terranova (Ken Wahl), got involved in when he was in hot pursuit of the bad guys. Vinnie found out that, Jimmy, one of his Brooklyn high school chums, was in trouble with a loanshark right before Jimmy was supposed to get married to Mariska’s character, Debbie. In high school, Vinnie, Jimmy and another friend, “Mooch” (who is now a highly paid attorney), were known as the Three Stooges and they go around doing the Three Stooges’ laugh. There’s also a lot of nyuk, nyuk, nyuks when they ran off after Debbie crashed Jimmy’s bachelor party. Here’s Mariska like you’ve never seen her before (unless you already saw this episode).