After playing Aggie in The Great Dictator and participating in several other films, Francesca Santoro grew up in Los Angeles, went to Holland to study voice at the Amsterdam Conservatory of Music, and married Freddy L'hoir with whom she had five children: Alwyn, René Paul, Robin, Emile, and Aaron. In 1970, she went back to school as an undergraduate, attending the University of California (Irvine and Berkeley). In 1981, she won a Fulbright Scholarship to Rome, where she lived for seven years. In 1988, she earned her PhD in Ancient History and Classical Languages. The author of two published academic books on Roman Historiography, Francesca won the Rome Prize and was elected as a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome, 1997. Still teaching in California, she reserves her acting for the classroom.