Biography

After her husband's death in 1950, she retired from film business. Her fate is unknown.

Leading lady of the silent cinema, born in what is present day Latvia. She was trained as a ballerina and performed on the stage in Warsaw before the onset of World War I. She was discovered for the screen by the director Friedrich Zelnik. He became her mentor and husband. In her film roles, she embodied at once naivety and sex appeal, often playing charming Viennese lasses. She essentially retired from acting in 1932.

With her celebrated sex appeal and her youthful lightness she soon belonged to the young savages who became a darling of the public.

When her husband Friedrich Zelnik died there was not a trace of Lya Mara, her scent disappeared.

Because Lya Mara had a good command of German since her childhood, she was able to continue her work. When finally newspaper articles and pictures of her appeared in several Berliner newspapers, she was spotted by the director Friedrich Zelnik, who summoned her to Berlin. After some screen tests she signed a contract which obligated her for a total of seven pictures with Zelnik.