Christopher Meloni ‘surprised’ by close relationship with Ellen Burstyn on ‘Law & Order: Organized Crime’

Elliot Stabler loves his mom.

Christopher Meloni, the actor behind the righteously retributive detective at the center of Law & Order: Organized Crime, has shared scenes with Oscar-winner Ellen Burstyn for years, since she first appeared as Stabler’s mother on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit in 2008. That performance won her an Emmy, and proved so revelatory of Stabler’s character that Burstyn has been brought back as a regular guest star on Organized Crime. But for Meloni, the winning dynamic he has with his on-screen mom extends offscreen, too.

“On a personal note, when I act with Ellen, there is such a deep affection, I think on both our parts,” Meloni told Entertainment Weekly ahead of the spinoff series’ fifth season premiere in April. “I’ve expressed to her what she means to me, and it has kind of surprised me how much she has meant to me on a personal level, because that doesn’t happen too often. So whatever you see is deep, true affection.”

Burstyn first appeared on an episode of the 10th season of Special Victims Unit, titled “Swing.” For the previous two seasons, Stabler’s daughter Kathleen (Isabel Gillies) had been acting with increasing recklessness and unpredictability, and when confronted, she grew quick to anger. After she was arrested for burglary, Stabler reluctantly visited his estranged mother Bernadette to gain some insight. It’s revealed that Bernadette has lived with bipolar disorder for years, and is prone to similarly explosive episodes, including one that nearly took Stabler’s life as a child.

The response to not just Burstyn’s performance on the episode, but her electric dynamic with Meloni, left fans clamoring for more. But she wouldn’t return to the Law & Order-verse until Organized Crime kicked off in 2021. “I just think she’s such a spirited and strong actor, and that the camera is drawn towards her,” Meloni says.

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Meloni continues that Burstyn’s “role is always in there, even if she’s not the focal point.” But Bernadette has served as the focal point of several critical episodes of Organized Crime, including one in season 2 in which she’s kidnapped, which throws Stabler into a protective rage that finally leads to the capture of one of the series’ main antagonists, Richard Wheatley (Dylan McDermott).

But Burstyn’s main arc on Organized Crime concerns her mental health. In her first appearance in season 1, Bernadette wanders through a park, confusing a little boy for Stabler and eventually slapping him when she believes he’s stepped out of line. It becomes clear that in the years between her appearances on the series, she’s begun showing signs of what may be dementia or Alzheimer’s.

Stabler and his son Eli (Nicky Torchia) take Bernadette in at the beginning of season 2, and by the end of season 4, she plays an active role in helping Stabler parent Eli, process his emotions, and navigate his relationships with his two brothers, Randall (Dean Norris) and Joey (Michael Trotter). “The relationship this season is a little bit, ‘What do we do with her?’ The worry about where she is mentally,” Meloni explains. “I think we play off whatever complications the writers put in. She and I talk about it and we make it work.”

Meloni told EW ahead of the season 5 premiere that Bernadette isn’t the only Stabler we can expect to see more of in the episodes ahead. He believes that the Organized Crime creative team has “seen the value and the response that people have for the expanded Stabler herd. Eli’s in it a lot with his new girlfriend, obviously, Dean Norris as my brother, and Mike Trotter,” whose continued storyline from the dramatic season 4 finale “leads to certain ramifications, which are pretty intense.”

Law & Order: Organized Crime will premiere the first two episodes of season 5 April 17 on Peacock, with new episodes streaming weekly.