Mariska Hargitay Gets Emmy-Hosting Advice From Jimmy Kimmel

Mariska Hargitay, coming off her own double Emmy win last weekend, is gearing up to host the Primetime Emmys on Monday, and there’s none better than Jimmy Kimmel, a three-time host himself, for some advice.

Hargitay sat down with Kimmel Wednesday night on Jimmy Kimmel Live! to talk about her documentary , My Mom Jayne, for which she won the Emmy for Outstanding Documentary and Directing for a Documentary/Nonfiction Program for her feature directorial debut.

After being in “utter shock” that she had been asked to host the big event, Hargitay shared that she initially got advice on hosting from Kimmel’s wife Molly, who has served as a producer and writer for the Primetime Emmy Awards and Oscars when Kimmel has hosted. Kimmel then followed with his own advice of knowing how to pronounce everybody’s names, a topic that’s important to Hargitay, who brought a cap with her first name ma-RISH-ka imprinted on it. She explained that her name, which is Hungarian, is written Mariska, but pronounced Ma-RISH-ka, however people still get it wrong.

Now comes the test. Kimmel held up cards, first one is Ayo Edebiri, who’s nominated in the lead actress in a comedy series category, for The Bear, followed by Lucia Aniello, nominated in the directing comedy category for Hacks, then Rhea Seehorn, nommed for lead actress in a drama series for Pluribus (that one was a easy because Hargitay revealed that Rhea is her friend).

It was a slam dunk! Hargitay aced them all and she’s ready to go.

The 78th Emmy Awards, with Hargitay as host, will air live coast-to-coast on NBC, Monday, September 14 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT from the Peacock Theater at L.A. Live in Los Angeles. It also will stream live and on demand on Peacock.

You can watch Hargitay’s entire interview with Kimmel below.