Law & Order: SUV gets a three-year renewal expanding its historic run on television to 24 seasons

Law & Order: Special Victims Unit became the longest-running primetime live-action series in television history when it kicked-off its current 21st season.

Now the Dick Wolf created crime-drama that stars Mariska Hargitay stands to set new milestones in the foreseeable future with a new three-year deal in place that will take it through the 2023-24.

The historic renewal is part of a five-year deal between NBC’s parent, Universal Television, and Wolf Entertainment, which also includes three-year pickups of Wolf’s Chicago Fire, Chicago P.D and Chicago Med.

‘I’m gratified and excited that Universal will remain our home for five more years,’ Wolf said in a statement as reported by TV Insider.

‘This new term deal complements our recently concluded agreement to make Peacock one of the primary destinations for both the L&O and Chicago brands, as well as our extraordinary three-year NBC broadcast pickups on all four current series.’ 

The acclaimed producer added, ‘We are now supercharged to expand our business on new platforms, both domestically and internationally, while continuing to produce our current and future series for broadcasting and streaming networks.’

Law & Order: SUV premiered back in September 1999 as the second series in Wolf’s mega-successful Law & Order franchise. 

It was just this past September, when it set the new mark for longest running US live-action series on television, surpassing the previous record of 20 seasons set by its mothership series Law & Order (1990-2010) and Gunsmoke (1955-1975).

This 21st season also makes Hargitay’s Lieutenant Olivia Benson the longest-running character in a primetime live-action series, according to Deadline.

The series follows Lieutenant Benson, who, along with Odafin Tutuola (Ice-T), Amanda Rollins (Kelli Giddish) and Dominick Carisi, Jr. (Peter Scanavino) as they investigate sexually-related crimes in New York City. 

Throughout her two-decade run, Hargitay has earned eight Emmy Award nominations for Lead Actress in a Drama Series, winning her first Emmy in 2006. 

With no let-up in sight, SUV is still a preeminent show across a number of demographics that includes most-watched series in 2018-2019 with more than 150 billion minutes viewed across NBC, Ion and USA, and the number one spot during the 2019-2020 season in its Thursday 10-11 p.m. timeslot.