Jamie Lee Curtis and Mariska Hargitay Met as Children When Their Parents Lived Next Door to Each Other

Christopher EdwardsTue, June 16, 2026 at 4:07 PM UTC

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Mariska Hargitay and Jamie Lee Curtis in June 2025.Credit: Udo Salters/Patrick McMullan via Getty -

Jamie Lee Curtis and Mariska Hargitay reconnected as adults after learning their families had lived next door to each other at one point

The two bonded over their unique upbringings as children of famous actors and formed a close friendship

Hargitay discovered her biological father was Italian actor Nelson Sardelli while making a documentary about her mother

Jamie Lee Curtis and Mariska Hargitay have a lot in common.

Not only are they both the children of famous actors, their parents also lived next door to each other in Los Angeles.

The Law & Order: SVU and Halloween stars teamed up on Monday, June 15 for Variety's Actors on Actors series, opening up about their close friendship, and revealing a surprising detail about their Hollywood upbringings.

Jamie, the daughter of actors Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh, and Mariska, the daughter of actors Jayne Mansfield and Mickey Hargitay, once met as children, but only became friends years later.

"Nobody knows this. You grew up in a house that was pink on the corner of Sunset Boulevard and Carolwood. And the house next door, which was owned by Sonny [Bono] and Cher was purchased by Tony Curtis, and Tony Curtis moved into that house with his second wife," said Jamie, 67.

"We met, but we don't know that we met. Because there is a photograph, I've told you I've looked for it and I can't find it, and my sister hasn't found it yet, of us all standing in the driveway of Tony's house, and it was after the accident. And your brother has his arm in a sling," said Jamie. "We're all just sort of standing, and clearly there was like a playdate made."

Decades later, the two were reintroduced as adults by their mutual friend, actress Amy Landecker, who told Jamie she should meet Mariska.

Mariska Hargitay and Jamie Lee Curtis in May 2026.Credit: Heidi Gutman/NBCUniversal via Getty

"This was fate, for us to meet," said Mariska, 62. "We were sisters from another mother, or sisters from another father."

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While speaking on the phone before meeting, the two felt an instant connection.

"It was like a missing piece of my life, and that first phone call was so emotional because when we have histories like ours, we are in such a unique and singular position that people just can't understand it unless they've lived it," said Mariska.

Though Jamie and Mariska have become close, Jamie said it's challenging for them to see each other often, because they live on different coasts.

"We're not going to get that kind of time together. We're not going to get that kind of girlfriend time. So we've taken advantage of it in a very intimate, quick way, and we've become fast friends," said Jamie.

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The pair became friends as Mariska was making her 2025 documentary My Mom Jane, which examines the life of her mother Jayne Mansfield, who died in a 1967 car accident when Hargitay was 3 years old. The doc also revealed that Mariska's biological father was actually Italian actor Nelson Sardelli, a secret she discovered and kept from the public for 30 years.

In a May 2026 cover story with PEOPLE, Mariska opened up about sharing intimate details of her family's story in her documentary.

"The only way to heal is to be in a community and in the present and not live in the past, and making my film was cathartic," Mariska said. "It gave me a lot of internal space back. I think it changed my nervous system and I did feel so relieved and so free, and so it felt like a natural progression."

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Source: “AOL Entertainment”