Overview
- On August 4, speaking on NBC’s Today show, Rapp said she would love to play Captain Olivia Benson’s gay lover caught up in an undercover drug-empire mission.
- Rapp’s comment comes as she pauses her acting career to focus on her sophomore album Bite Me and follows her public coming-out as a lesbian on SNL in January 2024.
- The idea revives long-running fan speculation after SVU’s season 11 “gay vibe” tease and a near-kiss between Benson and Elliot Stabler was cut in season 24.
- Mariska Hargitay has suggested a Benson–Stabler romance might not unfold until the series finale, and Christopher Meloni has acknowledged he’s “f—ing trying” to deliver an on-screen kiss.
- Rapp’s proposal underscores broader calls for explicit LGBTQ+ representation on the 26-season NBC procedural.