Rock, Edward Anthony (Mrs)

fl.1776

1793

When still Miss Essex, this actress made her first appearance at the Haymarket Theatre on 12 June 1776 as Maria in "The Contract". She played several other roles there that summer, when a Miss J. Essex, probably her sister, was also in the company. Though on the Drury Lane pay list for the 1776-77 season, she made only one known appearance at that theatre, as Silvia in "The Old Bachelor" on 19 November 1776. That night the prompter wrote in his "Diary", ‘a small mean Figure and a shocking Actress, so bad she is to do the Part no more.’ She did manage to obtain an engagement at the China Hall, Rotherhithe, in the summer of 1777. Perhaps some seasoning in the provinces made her eligible for an engagement at Covent Garden Theatre beginning in 1787-88. By then she had married the actor Edward Anthony Rock (q.v.). She remained at Covent Garden through 1792-93, acting a line of secondary roles, including chambermaids and vocal parts in pantomimes and musical pieces. After a summer at the Edinburgh Theatre Royal in 1793, Mrs Rock seems to have retired or died. Her husband continued to act and co-manage at Edinburgh and Dublin until his death in 1815. Though she was an actress of inconsequential importance, De Wilde depicted her as Viletta (G0724, a role she did not act in London) for "Bell’s British Theatre". (BDA)