Photo: Gordon Correll / CC BY-SA 2.0 (source: Wikimedia Commons)
My Take
Maria Bello strikes me as the kind of actress directors call when a film needs a spine. In A History of Violence or The Cooler she did the hardest thing in screen acting — making ordinary people feel dangerous and fragile at once. She is rarely the marquee name, yet I struggle to recall a film she didn't improve. Her later move into producing feels like a natural extension of that instinct: she has always been invested in the whole story, not just her own scenes. For my money she belongs in any honest conversation about the most reliable American actors of her generation.
Overview
Maria Bello (born April 18, 1967) is an American actress and producer. Her first major film role was in 1998's Permanent Midnight. She followed this with a range of supporting and leading parts in films such as Payback (1999), Coyote Ugly (2000), The Cooler (2003), Secret Window (2004), Assault on Precinct 13, A History of Violence, Thank You for Smoking (all 2005), World Trade Center (2006), The Jane Austen Book Clu…
Summary adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
1. Profile
- Name (English)
- Maria Bello
- Name (Japanese)
- マリア・ベロ
- Reading
- まりあ・べろ
- Born
- April 18, 1967 (age 59)
- Zodiac / Chinese zodiac
- Aries / Goat
- Origin
- Norristown, Pennsylvania, United States
- Blood type
- Private
- Height
- Private
- Agency
- Private
- Occupation
- actor / film actor / television actor / film producer
2. Background
- Elementary school
- Private
- Junior high
- Private
- High school
- Archbishop John Carroll High School
- University
- Villanova University
Awards & achievements
- 2006 Max Mara Face of the Future Award
3. Relationships
- Spouse
- Private
- Children
- Private
- Parents
- Private
- Siblings
- Private
4. Personality
Motto
Private
6. Links
Actor — see all → · Film actor — see all → · More people from United States →
7. About this entry
Tags
- Last updated
- 2026-06-11
Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public items are marked "Private / Unknown". English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.