Mariska Hargitay

It was a very interesting journey, this film, but also to couple that with the mourning, the longing, the yearning, but also the kind of embarrassment and shame and then wishing that my mom was something else and the complication with her voice.

That was a really big thing to me.

It wasn't who she was, but also I was trying to connect to something real.

So when I heard that voice, it was just like, you're not getting in.

There's no getting in.

And that was one of the most profound moments.

GIFs in the archival film, I would see these moments that I'd never seen before and hear her in her lower register and in her true authentic self just talking normally and go,

And it was sacred.

It was holy.

It was everything that I wanted.

I just find that staggering and truly like remarkable.

And that's why when I was 34, I was convinced that was the year that I was going to

My mom died at 34.

And when I was 34, I got in a motorcycle accident.

A car hit me at a stop sign.

And I remember I went flying through the air.

And when you're in an accident like that, everything slows down.

And it was so slow.

And I remember going, wow.

It's really happening.