Maria Laura Rocca

{{short description|Italian actress and writer}} {{Use dmy dates|date=May 2016}} {{Infobox person | name = Maria Laura Rocca | image = File:Maria Laura Rocca (cropped).png | image_size = | caption = Rocca in ''Gold of Rome'', (1961) | birth_name = Maria Laura Gayno | birth_date = {{Birth date text|5 October 1917}} | birth_place = Pasian di Prato, Italy | death_date = {{Death date and age text|6 May 1999|5 October 1917}} | death_place = Rome, Italy | occupation = Actress | spouse = }} '''Maria Laura Rocca''' (5 October 1917 – 6 May 1999) was an Italian actress and writer.

== Life and career == Born '''Maria Laura Gayno''' in Pasian di Prato, Udine, Rocca spent her adolescence in Genoa, her mother's birthplace.<ref name=att>{{cite book|last=Enrico Lancia, Roberto Poppi|title=Le attrici|publisher=Gremese Editore, 2003|isbn=888440214X|pages=311–2}}</ref> After acting in some amateur dramatics, she studied drama under Teresa Franchini, with whom she also made her professional debut on stage at 30 years old.<ref name=att /> In films, she was mainly active in supporting roles in adventure and peplum genres, sometimes credited as '''Manuela Kent'''.<ref name=att /> She retired from acting in the mid-1960s.<ref name=att /> In 1959, she was the author of the book ''Cina senza muraglia'', and in 1969, she wrote the film ''Mr. Superinvisible'', being credited as Mary Eller.<ref name=att />

=== Personal life === In 1939, Rocca married Giuseppe Bisazza, and they had a son, Oreste.<ref name=att /> In 1948 she remarried to Communist politician Umberto Terracini.<ref name=att />

Rocca died in a clinic in Rome, following a long illness, in 1999, at 81 years old.<ref>AA.VV. ''Territorio, costumi e civiltà contadina a Cartosio''. Impressioni Grafiche, 2010. p. 155. {{ISBN|9788861950498}}.</ref>

== Selected filmography == * ''Attention! Bandits!'' (1951) * ''Article 519, Penal Code'' (1952) * ''At the Edge of the City'' (1953) * ''For You I Have Sinned'' (1953) * ''Love Song'' (1954) * ''Love in Rome'' (1960) * ''Gold of Rome'' (1961) * ''The Fury of Achilles'' (1962) * ''Imperial Venus'' (1962) * ''The Fall of Rome'' (1963) * ''Secret of the Sphinx'' (1964) * ''Messalina vs. the Son of Hercules'' (1964) * ''Lo scippo'' (1965) * ''Captain from Toledo'' (1965)

== References == {{Reflist}}

== External links == * {{IMDb name|0448800}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rocca, Maria Laura}} Category:1917 births Category:1999 deaths Category:Italian film actresses Category:Italian stage actresses Category:20th-century Italian actresses Category:People from the Province of Udine Category:Actresses from Friuli-Venezia Giulia Category:20th-century Italian women writers