In Law & Order Season 24 Episode 12, ADA Maroun (Odelya Halevi) fights hard for someone who, if you don’t know the full story, might be the opposite of the type of person she wants to support. Michelle Burns (guest star Abigail Spencer) is on trial because she’s failed her daughter. In fact, her decision to tell her husband her daughter was going to expose him as an abuser can be argued as contributing to her murder. Michelle even went out of her way to provide an alibi for Ron on the night of the murder. Not to mention, she had a “Duty to Report” (as the episode title says) the abuse once she knew about it…and, uh, clearly didn’t. So, yeah. It might seem like an odd idea for an ADA to support someone like this. But as we learn, and Samantha instantly believes, Michelle is also a victim.
Notably, Sam doesn’t even have to talk to Michelle directly to believe her. During our interview with Halevi, we asked what makes Maroun certain enough to start looking for proof. “Well, I think she sees her sister, who went through abuse and was murdered by her boyfriend,” she told us, “I think she sees herself. I think she comes from that background. And sometimes…when we go through things in life and we look at another person…it’s sort of like a mirror, and there doesn’t need to be any interaction to know that that person has experienced what maybe you’ve experienced, your family member has experienced.”
So, when she hears about Michelle’s experiences, “Maroun sees that Michelle, played by Abigail Spencer…needs help [but] she doesn’t know how to ask for it. And [Sam] takes it upon herself to find out the truth, and to help Michelle, and through that to…hopefully heal her own trauma.” Of course, that leads to a pretty intense argument with fellow ADA Nolan Price. Certainly, these two colleagues have argued before — often, even. But this time around, an “agree to disagree” is not going to cut it. Maroun puts her foot down, telling Price if he’s not going to respect her on this issue, then she doesn’t know what she’s even doing here.
Odelya Halevi on Maroun and Price’s big moments in Law & Order Season 24 Episode 12
As Halevi put it, most of Sam’s arguments with Nolan are “based on her passion and her emotional involvement. And this time, it’s not just that. This argument is based on the knowledge and credentials that she has. I mean, she is studying the impact of trauma — psychological impact of trauma. She has counseled victims. So, she has a lot more experience than Nolan has when it comes to this issue. And so, she wants to be taken seriously, and she wants to be respected, and she’s not going to let that go.”
But does that mean Sam would actually walk away if Nolan didn’t listen to her? Possibly. “I think her confidence is really, really strong here. I mean, she believes her work and opinion is valuable and is necessary for this office, and if she doesn’t get the respect that she deserves in this office, she is going to go work elsewhere,” Halevi told us. Besides, “how could you wake up in the morning and go to work, when your partner doesn’t take you seriously when it comes to your knowledge and credentials?” While we’re at it, “how are you going to grow alongside each other, and how are you going to help each other, if your opinion is going to be ignored?”
Thankfully, though, Nolan does respect Sam and does hear her out. Even though she isn’t there when it happens, Price even tells DA Baxter that “maybe it’s time for us to start listening to her instead of…telling her why she’s wrong.” Sure, Michelle still faces some consequences for her actions. But Price cuts her a deal that sees her spending only a year in prison (plus some supervision) instead of the possible 15 years.
What does everything that went down in this episode mean for the partners, though? “I think they’re going to grow stronger because he heard [what she had to say], and he took it seriously,” Halevi told us. “It’s kind of like when you have an argument with the love of your life, [or] with your partner in real life, and you have a choice. You can leave, or you can stay. And if you choose to stay and work on it, the relationship will end up being stronger and deeper.”
So, when Sam thanks Nolan at the end of the episode, she really means it. In fact, that thank you isn’t just about going easy on this one suspect. It’s “thank you for hearing me. Thank you for being open to changing your mind. And [thank you for] seeing me.”
“We don’t have to completely understand someone else to respect and not judge.”
What message should we take away from an episode like Law & Order Season 24 Episode 12, with a prominent feminist filmmaker having gone through this and allowed so much to happen to her own daughter? For Odelya Halevi, “I think we really do judge a book by its cover.” Yes, the Michelle character is “a successful filmmaker, has probably won awards, and we see how she’s just so smart. And we would never think that she’s a victim.” But she is one, and that doesn’t take away from anything she’s accomplished. Nor should any of her accomplishments, or even her major failure with her daughter, mean what happened to her didn’t actually happen.
Halevi brought up the moment in “Duty to Report” when DA Baxter points out that Michelle’s an adult who “should have known better, when he compares her to her daughter, who’s a teenager, and just needed help. But we have to understand that there’s just so many people who can be successful and smart, but their psychological state and their mental state — their emotional state — is a state of a victim who just needs help and doesn’t know to ask for it. And Michelle’s character went from being an abused kid to being in an abusive relationship.” Which means that, for her, “the line between pain and love and, you know, wrong from right…it’s all a big blur.”
So, no matter what we see on the outside, a lot more could be happening underneath. “She could be successful. She could be strong. But on the inside, she’s just a little kid and a…victim that needs help.” And at least with this fictional victim, we do see some of that on the outside, too. Halevi told us she “really loved Abigail Spencer’s performance because you could see that [her character] was like a little child.” The same little child who was abused all those years sago and never had a chance to heal.
On hopes for Maroun’s future
To wrap up, we asked Odelya Halevi if there was anything interesting coming up for Sam. Referencing the previous episode, she told us she really loved Law & Order Season 24 Episode 11 because “we introduced the character of Nolan’s brother, played by Justin Chatwin, and I loved that [he] and Maroun had a little moment where you didn’t know where it was going to go. And it was different. It showed a different side of Maroun, and a different side of Nolan and how he’s perceived in his personal life. And that’s something we haven’t seen before. And I’m just really hoping for more fun, little moments like that, outside of the courtroom, that are more personal.”
As for whether or not it’s possible to fit those personal moments into a series like this one, Halevi told us, “I trust our writers.” Oh, and there’s this: “Maybe Maroun will go on a date one day.”
Hm. Now, that would be interesting.
You can catch Odelya Halevi in Law & Order, airing Thursdays at 8/7c on NBC and streaming on Peacock the next day.
