The first season of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit premiered on NBC on September 20, 1999 and ended on May 19, 2000. Created by Dick Wolf, it is the first spin-off of Law & Order and follows the detectives of a fictional version of the NYPD Department`s Special Victims Unit investigating sex crimes. SVU originally aired Monday night at 9/8c EST, but was moved to Friday nights at 10/9c after the ninth episode. Showrunner Robert Palm felt too disturbed by the subject and left the season after the season ended. [1] The fourth episode is expected to be produced for the new season of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and is scheduled to air today. Family members of the two main detectives appeared in the opening episode. Kathy Stabler, Elliot Stabler`s wife, was played by Isabel Gillies. Gillies played Kathy Stabler over the next 11 years, either as a guest star or as a recurring actress. She remembered that she was about to buy a wedding dress when she got the call to be on CSR.
Elizabeth Ashley was cast as Serena Benson, Olivia`s mother.[4] Serena Benson no longer appeared in CSR, but was mentioned several times. Her character`s story as a rape victim who never got justice — and whose abuser was Olivia`s biological father — plays a role in many later episodes. In the final episode, the third of the new season, we saw Bensen trying to help a pop star cope with her toxic and abusive relationship, and Rollins struggling to separate her professional and personal life as she brought the stress of her work to her home. Unlike the original Law & Order, filming for SVU began in North Bergen, New Jersey because there wasn`t enough real estate available to get a studio in Manhattan. Production personnel were always told to think the area was Manhattan. As with Law & Order, the writers of the series worked mainly in Los Angeles.[4] However, CSR featured more women writers, with the series aiming to bring a “strong perspective of women” to the screen. [3] Writer Dawn DeNoon mentioned that many writers were fired during the first season because their scripts were not up to date. The film stars Christopher Meloni as Detective Elliot Stabler and Mariska Hargitay as Detective Olivia Benson after auditioning together.[1] [5] Hargitay, who had to move from Los Angeles to New York when she got the role, said she was able to do so in the short term because she was already planning to move to New York to pursue a career on Broadway. The role of the squad commander was taken over by Dann Florek, who had portrayed Captain Don Cragen in the first three seasons of Law & Order and later reprised his role in Exiled: A Law & Order Movie.[6] He joined the cast on the condition that he not be asked to audition. Richard Belzer was cast as Detective John Munch and continued his role in the series Homicide: Life on the Street.[1] In Belzer`s words, he was chosen because “Dick Wolf and Tom Fontana get drunk at a party.” In the middle of the season, Richard Belzer repeated his role as Munch in Homicide: The Movie, which briefly shows his character in a case in its CSR context in New York City.[7] At Belzer`s insistence, his character was reunited with Brian Cassidy, who was portrayed by Dean Winters. However, Winters` contractual commitment to the HBO series Oz forced him to leave the season halfway through the season. Michelle Hurd, who played Detective Monique Jeffries, filled Winters` void for the rest of the season and was added to the main credits at that time.
Meanwhile, Elliot deals with family issues throughout the affair in the stable household. In a previous episode, Elliot`s daughter, Kathleen, told the family at the dinner table that one of her friends got pregnant on the football team. Visibly annoyed, Kathleen quickly left the dining table. Finally, Elliot has an awkward conversation with her as she practices playing goalkeeper next door, about how she always has to “keep her goal” because many players have tricks and will try to get them. Kathleen whispers, “Oh boy,” before telling her father she`s a virgin, then kicks the football in front of a stunned and motionless stable. Stabler and his wife Kathy are spending time alone on the couch at night when Stabler expresses his concerns for Maureen and her boyfriend to his wife. They wonder how and if they will ever know when their daughters have finally lost their virginity. Finally, a worried-looking stable watched his daughter and her date come home while his wife proudly took a few pictures. Reiko Aylesworth was one of the actresses who originally auditioned for the role of Olivia Benson. Instead, she was cast as Assistant District Attorney Erica Alden, whom she played in the final three episodes of the season.[5] In the penultimate episode of the season, “Nocturne,” Kent Broadhurst played Lawrence Holt, a piano teacher who bullies his students. Wilson Jermaine Heredia played Evan, Holt`s student and victim, who knows more about Holt`s crimes than he admits. Two detectives from the NYPD`s Special Victims Unit, Olivia Benson and Elliot Stabler, investigate the stabbing and sterilization of a taxi driver, only to learn that the victim had purchased a fake hacking license from an occupant (Matt Skollar) on Rikers Island.
Further investigation reveals that the dead man was a Serb soldier named Stefan Tanzic, who had been accused of ethnic cleansing. Benson, himself a child of rape, struggles to separate himself from the case after realizing the victim was a rapist. Stabler tries to stop her from crossing the line to protect suspects she deems justified. Some of the first revelations about Detective Benson`s personal life can be found in “Stalked.” In this episode, Bruce Kirkpatrick plays a rapist who decides to intimidate the detectives as soon as he learns that he is under investigation.