‘Law & Order: SVU’ Boss Details Benson’s Focus in Season 28

“We don’t prevent crimes. We just sort of pick up the pieces.” When this long-running drama returns, those words, said by Capt. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) in the premiere, exemplify what she’ll be grappling with in Season 28.

The first case, about whether a person can consent while voluntarily drunk, exemplifies that as Law & Order: SVU returns on October 8. Below, showrunner Michele Fazekas previews that and more.

Last season, you addressed the possibility of Benson and Fin (Ice-T) retiring, or at least thinking about it. So, after she fought to keep her job at SVU last season, what’s the focus for Benson this season?

Michele Fazekas: Yeah, I do think she did answer that question, am I still doing this job? And the answer is yes, because she can kind of do nothing else. But what I didn’t want to shy away from is she’s nearly 30 years on this job. And what I got interested in this season was somewhat inspired by the case that we are doing in the first episode, which is a case that really highlights as far as we have come in the investigation of sex crimes and in how we, as a society, view sexual assault and how we define sexual assault; in some ways, we’re still back 30 years ago. So, it’s a case that is really kind of disheartening for Benson. And she ends up saying, “Oh, in some ways, yes, nothing has changed.” And she actually says aloud in the first episode, “We don’t prevent crimes. We just sort of pick up the pieces afterwards.” And so [she’s] grappling with that. Then I wanted to see what she does with that: How does Benson push against her own boundaries?

When she was partnered with Stabler [Christopher Meloni], Stabler sort of dealt with that frustration and he would rough up a suspect. Obviously, Benson’s not going to do that, but how does Benson push further to get justice and even sort of challenge her own ideas of what is ethical and what is the right thing to do? How far will she go to get justice? I like playing with those boundaries and pushing against them because it is a little bit of being, not [in] despair so much, but certainly disillusioned, as you can be with the justice system when things seem to be so stacked against you. I like putting her in that spot and seeing what she does with it.

And so that’s what we’ll be seeing from her arc this season?

Yeah. And what I like is it’s still in that neighborhood of, you’ve been doing this for almost 30 years, and when you look back on your career and many things have changed and the things that haven’t changed, you do start to ask yourself, what is the point then? Obviously there is a point, but I like putting her in that position of you’re assessing your life and assessing your career.

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What can you say about the premiere case itself?

The premiere case is a case where actually the way that the law is written — I’ll put it to you this way. Do you think that if a person is really drunk, even voluntarily drunk, that they can consent to sex?

No.

They can. I was shocked, but the way that the law is currently written — and the legislature was trying to change it, and I think they ran out of time in their session over the summer — you have to be, I think the wording is physically incapacitated or passed out. But if you are voluntarily drunk, basically a jury could still be like, “Well, but you can consent to sex.” The law is written that way. I was shocked. I’m like, “How did I not know this?” And Benson knows that, but it’s still like… It really does sort of go with a jury. And a jury will often blame someone for their actions like, “Well, you did all of this leading up to it. So, fair or not, you are going to be blamed for voluntarily getting really, really drunk.” When I read the article about this law that was going to be passed, I was shocked. I couldn’t believe it.

How about guest stars in the premiere?

Yes, we have J. Smith-Cameron, who is going to be recurring as a jury consultant who is a peer for Benson. The other thing about Benson is she’s the boss, so, when she’s despairing or disillusioned, you’re not going to really talk to your employees, the people who are your subordinates, because as much as she’s friends with them and she’s friends with Rollins [Kelli Giddish], as a good manager, you’re not going to do that. So, I like giving her somebody who’s very, very experienced in a different way, who she can have these conversations with. J. Smith Cameron is coming in; she’s great.

And we have a new ADA, Hawkins [Jelani Alladin], who will be basically trained by Carisi [Peter Scanavino], who Carisi kind of initially doesn’t like. Carisi’s thing about him is that this is a pit stop for him. He’s kind of a rich kid, and he went to Harvard, and he’s going to get a few years under his belt, putting away bad guys, and then he’s going to go run for office. And for Carisi, that’s so distasteful. I will say that Hawkins, in some ways, has a much more healthy way of approaching a work-life balance. Hawkins is like, “Yeah, I’m here. I’m really good. And I want to put away bad guys,” but his thing is like, “I’m not going to make it my whole life.” And so I like having that. It’s a nice new energy to have in the crew.

What’s coming up for everyone else this season?

Bruno [Kevin Kane] has a great arc where they’re working on this really upsetting case — they’re all upsetting, but anytime you’re dealing with children, it’s especially upsetting. He sort of takes one for the team and ends up staying up all night looking for victims in child sexual abuse material. And this is what these people do. This is what you have to do. And I can’t imagine it. It just seems horrible. And so he does it, and it has consequences for him. It really kind of messes with him. These are the cases where you’re like, as a writer, “Why are we doing this?” I know it’s the show, but it’s hard. It’s hard to research it. It’s hard to write about it. And it’s important, and it feels important, but it’s rough, and it’s rough on everyone.

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We’ve changed up the partnerships where Bruno and Rollins are going to be partnered together and Curry [Aimé Donna Kelly] and Griffin [Corey Cott] are going to be partnered together. And that’s just a nice — But it’s all the same people coming back. No one’s left. And obviously the nice thing about this show is you can change it up. So, in one episode, maybe other people will be partnered together. But I like these partnerships. It’s a nice change.

After what you put Fin through last season, starting with the premiere and then how he came back, how is he this season? Is he completely settled back in?

He’s good. He’s in the role of a bit of a mentor for everyone. He’s the one who is clocking Bruno’s struggle and can kind of advise on that in a nice way. But he’s also out interviewing suspects. And so no, he’s good. He came out of the last season sort of recommitting as well.

Rollins settled back in at SVU last season. She didn’t come back though the way that she would’ve wanted to because Tynan (Noma Dumezweni) kind of gave her no choice but to come back to SVU. How is she feeling about that now that the Tynan of it is behind her?

I think she has settled in, and yeah, she’s all in.

Rollins and Carisi — it did take a while for them to get together, but they have been very stable, especially since they got married. I’ve liked that. Are we going to continue to see that this season?

Yeah, absolutely. I think that they have — and when we see them together in the squad room or stuff like it, you can see them ribbing on each other. She ribs on him a little bit for not liking his new ADA trainee, and she teases him like, “Well, he’s a snazzy dresser, and Sonny’s a little threatened by that.” But it’s good-natured. I like that they have a stable home life and they’re a strong team together.

Last season dealt with Tynan as the ongoing storyline. You talked a bit about what Benson is going through this season. Is there another ongoing storyline with a recurring character or a threat to the squad this season or anything like that?

Not so far, no. I think we told that story last season.

So, the ongoing story is more so what each character’s dealing with this season?

Yeah. And they’re all sort of struggling in different ways with — what I would say that’s a theme is a lot of the cases that they’re working on are this gray area of where there’s an early episode where the victim is a child and also the perpetrator was kidnapped as a child. So, now you’re looking at, OK, horrible crime, but this person who committed this crime was a victim of a crime. And so you’re looking at what are — There’s kind of only bad outcomes here. What is the best bad outcome? I like those sort of gray areas, and I like the people hashing that out and what that means. And it sort of highlights that struggle of, yeah, we’re picking up the pieces here as best we can, but it’s not going to be this happy ending.

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'SVU': Is Christopher Meloni Returning for More Than Just Episode 600?

You’re reaching episode 600 this season, which is so exciting. Congratulations. What can you tease?

I’m not going to give away too much, but it’s going to be — I think in years past, they’ve sometimes done these big reunion episodes like bringing back [characters]. And so it’s going to be the show. It’s going to be our characters and going back to the heart of the show and what it is.

What about crossovers with Law & Order? Have you started talking about those?

We’ve talked about it. There’s nothing in the works, but certainly we’ve had Baxter [Tony Goldwyn] on. I like being able to have Tony come in because he is the DA in our world as well. And so he and Carisi had a great scene together. And that’s fun to be able to, even if it’s not a full crossover, have the shows talking to each other.

Benson and Baxter’s dynamic is also great.

Yes, he’s terrific. He’s such a good dude.

We had Kelli in our ATX studio, and she had mentioned that Dick Wolf and Mariska both said they definitely want to reach 30 seasons. Have you started thinking about how long you see the show going? Because it can keep going…

I feel like the real answer is as long as Mariska wants to do the show. I know 30 is the number that people throw around because it’s a nice, round number. But no, what I have learned being on the show early, because I was on Seasons 3 through 7, and then coming back, and my initial nervousness about it was like, how do you do this? Hasn’t every story been told? And then when I got into it, it’s like, oh no, that is what’s so great about a show like this is the engine of the show runs forever. You will always find cases to do. And then what it’s really about is, how do you put your characters in these cases, and how do you develop your characters aside from the plot? The plot will always be there, but really, what it is, what are these characters doing within that plot?

Law & Order: SVU, Season 28 Premiere, Thursday, October 8, 9/8c, NBC