Mariska Hargitay has won one Primetime Emmy Award for playing Olivia Benson. She won Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series at the 58th Primetime Emmy Awards in 2006 for Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
The winning performance came from the episode “911,” in which Benson works to locate a child whose emergency call is difficult to interpret. The episode gave Hargitay a particularly demanding showcase and helped distinguish her performance from the show’s ensemble crime-solving format.
Hargitay had already received multiple Emmy nominations for playing Benson, and she continued to be nominated several times after her victory. However, nominations are not additional wins, which is why the correct total remains one. Her other honors, including a Golden Globe and a News and Documentary Emmy connected to producing, are separate from her Primetime Emmy total for the acting role.
The award belongs to Hargitay’s performance as Benson, not to the fictional detective herself. Benson has remained the series’ central character since the show premiered in 1999.