That Mariska Hargitay is the daughter of Jayne Mansfield is a type of issues everybody who is aware of something about both of them appears to know — in some circumstances perhaps the one factor. Even Hargitay — who was solely 3 years outdated when, in 1967, her mom died in a highway accident, which she and two brothers survived — had a lot to study her, and he or she spent most of her life not studying it. Now, in her inquisitive 60s, she has put that belated search “to know her not as the sex symbol Jayne Mansfield but just as Jayne, my mom, Jayne” into a tragic, candy, beneficiant documentary movie, appropriately titled “My Mom Jayne,” which involves HBO Friday.
Apart from a number of pictures and contextless clips, Hargitay doesn’t flip a highlight on her personal profession, maybe assuming that 26 seasons of “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” communicate for themselves. (In 2024, she was the highest-paid actress in tv.) 1 / 4 of the way in which by the twenty first century, Mansfield will likely be principally identified to connoisseurs of mid-century tabloid tradition and followers of Frank Tashlin, who directed her within the comparatively big-budget movies “Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?,” wherein she had appeared on Broadway, and “The Girl Can’t Help It,” from which Paul McCartney discovered Eddie Cochran’s “Twenty Flight Rock,” impressing John Lennon sufficient to let him into his group. Many could have seen a much-reproduced {photograph} of Sophia Loren giving side-eye to Mansfield pouring out of a costume at a Hollywood operate with out with the ability to determine both of them. Such are the sorrows of passing time.
Documentaries wherein the director makes use of movie as a solution to strategy some unknown facet of household historical past will not be unusual. There are, for instance, Sarah Polley’s “Stories We Tell,” which, like “My Mom Jayne” offers with late-discovered questions of parentage; Carl Colby’s “The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, CIA Spymaster William Colby”; “Bright Leaves,” Ross McElwee’s movie about his household’s involvement within the tobacco enterprise; and “2 or 3 Things I Know About Him,” wherein German director Malte Ludin unpacks the story of a high-ranking Nazi father. There’s nothing that darkish in Hargitay’s household historical past, however there’s trauma and tragedy: for the actor, who needed to be taken critically, and did attempt, lastly, to course-correct her picture; for the particular person, who suffered from what was in all probability despair, turned to alcohol and capsules, made some unhealthy decisions in males and died younger, at 34; and for the youngsters she left behind, making an attempt to make actual an individual they barely knew, or don’t bear in mind in any respect — to fill “this little hole in my heart,” says Hargitay.
Mariska Hargitay at a storage unit together with her mom’s belongings in a scene from “My Mom Jayne.”
(HBO)
Mansfield, who moved from Texas to Hollywood in hopes of turning into a dramatic actor was as an alternative remade within the picture of Marilyn Monroe, the age’s signature big-breasted blond bombshell. Auditioning for Paramount casting head Milton Lewis, she mentioned, “He just seemed to think that I was wasting, as he said, my obvious talents. And he lightened my hair and tightened my dresses, and this is the result.” A willingness to pose for cheesecake photos, at a time when film magazines proliferated and males’s magazines have been approaching, sealed that deal: “I used my pinup-type publicity to get my foot in the door. … I use it as a means to an end.”
That she was greater than a pinup was not even then a secret — a Life journal cowl story on the time of “Rock Hunter” referred to as her “Broadway’s smartest dumb blonde.” Showing on Groucho Marx’s TV present “Tell It to Groucho,” the host — who had appeared within the movie of “Rock Hunter,” says, “You’re not the dumb blond that you pretend to be. I think that people ought to know that you’re really a bright, sentimental and understanding person. This is a whole facade of yours that isn’t based on what you actually are. This is a kind of act that you do, isn’t it?” And but it didn’t matter whether or not she was smarter than the characters she performed, or the character she performed in public, or that she spoke a number of languages and will play the piano and the violin. (“Who cares? Kiss me!” mentioned Jack Paar, interrupting her as she performed the latter.) It made her seem to be a contradiction in phrases, a performing seal, somewhat than a posh human being.
As to her daughter: “At a certain point I began to carry a lot of shame about her image as a sex symbol and all the choices that came with that. So I pushed the idea of my mom further and further away from my life.” She determined that her personal profession would look very totally different.
Mariska was born close to the tip of Mansfield’s marriage to Mickey Hargitay, a Hungarian athlete and adagio dancer, who grew to become Mr. Universe after shifting to America; it appears to have been a loving relationship, even after their divorce. However in her 20s, Mariska grew to become conscious, independently, that her organic father was an Italian nightclub entertainer named Nelson Sardelli. She was offended, she says, at her lifeless mom “for leaving me in this mess. And for hurting my father. And for leaving me feeling so alone and untethered.” On the identical time, she questioned whether or not her organic father knew about her, and if he did, “Why didn’t he claim me?” At 30, she went to Atlantic Metropolis the place he was performing, and mentioned, “I understand you knew my mother.” She informed Mickey concerning the assembly — he was conscious of the information, which he had saved secret — and he was so upset that she by no means introduced it up once more. (“Don’t read the books about your mother,” he had informed her earlier. They’re “full of lies.”)
Giovanna Sardelli, left, and Pietra Sardelli are Mariska Hargitay’s half-sisters by the use of her organic father, Nelson Sardelli. (HBO)
Mariska Hargitay grew up together with her siblings Mickey Hargitay Jr., left, Jayne Marie Mansfield and Zoltan Hargitay. (HBO)
Paradoxically, her mom’s wayward romantic life left Hargitay with a passel of siblings, all of whom are current right here, and with whom she appears pretty to very shut: older sister Jayne Marie Mansfield, from Mansfield’s first marriage; brothers Zoltan Hargitay and Mickey Hargitay Jr., with whom she grew up; Tony Cimber, Jayne’s son from her temporary third marriage, to director Matt Cimber, when the household quickly grew to become “Italian” and Mariska grew to become Maria; and sisters Giovanna and Pietra Sardelli, from her organic father’s marriage. (“I don’t know how the hell you got me to do this,” says Mickey Jr., sitting for his interview.) Stepmother Ellen Hargitay fills in lots of holes, with out claiming to know all the things about all the things. (Mickey Hargitay — “my rock” — died in 2006.)
Though the substance of the movie is just not manufactured, there’s artwork within the presentation. Clips representing Mansfield’s rise to fame are scored darkly, as if to say, this was not the way in which to go. As a result of the director is an actor, she is aware of the right way to be on digital camera; her siblings are much less … skilled, however make sturdy particular person impressions. Hargitay is cautious to let everybody have their very own say, or maintain silent, however these discussions, seemingly had for the primary time, are inevitably dramatic and sometimes very shifting. There are a number of visible results, to point hazy reminiscences, and a by line constructed round a white piano embellished with cherubim, which ends the movie on a cheerful notice.
Certainly one of Hargitay’s themes is the toxicity of fame, particularly when it’s awarded not in your accomplishments however your attributes. (Edward R. Murrow describes Mansfield as “the most photographed woman in show business,” a superlative she definitely inspired.) However we get glimpses of a girl who, like her daughter, we’d wish to know extra of. Jayne Marie remembers accompanying her to go to wounded troopers at Walter Reed hospital. She’s nice within the Tashlin comedies, taking part in off her public picture, but additionally offering glimpses of the particular person inside it, whereas a scene from “The Wayward Bus,” based mostly on a John Steinbeck novel, demonstrates that given the prospect, she may deal with straight drama.
With higher administration, or being born into a unique time — actors these days take pleasure in cheesecake with out being outlined by it, because the discuss exhibits and purple carpets repeatedly show — she may need been taken as critically as she had hoped to be. However that’s a narrative for a unique universe.
