Law & Order: SVU hit the ground running in the new year when Captain Olivia Benson was targeted outside her building in Manhattan by a gang out of the Bronx. The BX9 gang made it extremely personal for her when they attacked her in front of Noah, and Benson wasn’t about to just let it go. She was ready to find a way to join the investigation in the Bronx even as a captain of Manhattan’s Special Victims Unit, but according to actor Maurice Compte, there’s fresh danger for her.
Maurice Compte debuted in SVU back in the fall as Captain Duarte out of the Bronx gangs unit, and quickly came into conflict with Benson when he followed a case onto their turf and tried to use BX9 rapists as informants rather than put them behind bars. When the actor spoke with CinemaBlend about everything from his character’s attraction to Benson to the perks of working with Mariska Hargitay, he also weighed in on how the situation is different with Benson on Duarte’s turf this time, saying:
The way that it is different is that we move out of the world of Manhattan, by and large, into the world of the Bronx. There are some amazing and beautiful areas in the Bronx, but I think that the Bronx areas that we're dealing with tend to be a little bit on the lower spectrum of what the crime scale is. So there's a bit more danger in that world.
There are some amazing places in the Bronx, but those places aren’t the ones in SVU where Olivia Benson will evidently have to chase her leads. According to Maurice Compte, she’s facing "more danger" (and a different kind). Of course, she has been in plenty of danger and survived a lot to get to where she is as a captain in Manhattan’s SVU, so she knows how to handle herself even under the worst circumstances.
While Benson had some very unfortunate reasons for joining the investigation into BX9 taking place in the Bronx, the SVU actors had some much better experiences when they got the chance to film there. When I asked Compte (previously known for his work on shows like Narcos, Power, and Mayans M.C.) about his experience filming on location for the show, he immediately said “I love it” and went on to tell a story of one particularly memorable night:
We were in the Bronx one night and we were filming. When you're in the Bronx, and you're very deep in somebody else's community, you're blocking off multiple streets, and people end up getting through in their cars. There would be carloads of dudes that would stop right in front of me, as we were rolling, and would be like, 'What are you from, man?' And he would look at me and I would just tell him one show, whether it was Power or Narcos. They would be like 'Oh my God!' and they would literally during the take, just take a picture with me. It was easier to have them take the picture with me than to just try to hustle them along.
It’s not every job where an actor can count on being recognized, and Compte went on to share that he would ask fans to stand outside of the shot and he would then go talk to them afterward. The actor credited an element fo New York City that stands out from other places, and circled back to why Benson leaving her usual turf could lead to more danger:
There's also that sense of community in New York, which is what makes it so fantastic. New York is very much a 'go with the flow' kind of place, and when you try to go against, it can be rough.
Maurice Compte also said that “New York is magical,” and it has certainly been the home of the Law & Order franchise for decades now, starting with the original series (which returned with a revival in 2022), continuing with Law & Order: SVU since 1999, and expanding back in 2021 with the Stabler spinoff Law & Order: Organized Crime. The actor clearly has enjoyed his time filming for SVU; will Duarte have such a good time in the current storyline?
I think it’s very safe to say that good times are going to be few and far between on SVU for the foreseeable future, so fans may want to look back fondly on good moments like Benson and Rollins having one last night of bonding and then the long-awaited Rollisi wedding back in the first half of Season 24. For now, we can just tune into new episodes of Law & Order: SVU on Thursdays at 9 p.m. ET on NBC and hope for the best for Benson.
I’m still crossing my fingers for a Stabler appearance that would be consistent with Organized Crime at some point in the 2023 TV schedule, but I can always just revisit the early seasons of SVU with Christopher Meloni! streaming with a Peacock Premium subscription!
