Trivia: One of the most iconic action stars of all time, Kurt Russell (born March 17th, 1951) is among the few to make the successful transition from child star to successful adult actor. As a youth, Russell aspired to follow the footsteps of his father, Bing Russell, who, in addition to being a big league baseball player, was also an actor (he was perhaps best known for his role as the sheriff on the TV Western Bonanza). That his heroes Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris did the same thing only strengthened Russell's resolve to have both a baseball and acting career.He first broke into acting on television, starring in the series The Travels of Jamie McPheeters, and he made his film debut playing the boy who kicks Elvis in the 1963 Elvis Presley vehicle It Happened at the World's Fair. After signing a ten-year contract with Disney, Russell got his big break as a juvenile actor in 1966, starring opposite Fred MacMurray in Disney's live-action feature Follow Me Boys! His association with the studio lasted through 1975, and produced such comedic family movies as The Horse in the Gray Flannel Suit (1968), The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes (1969), The Barefoot Executive (1971), and The Strongest Man in the World (1975). The last film marked Russell's final collaboration with Disney, aside from his voicing the character of Copper in the studio's The Fox and the Hound (1981). Still an avid baseball enthusiast during those years, Russell nurtured his dreams of becoming a professional ball player until a shoulder injury permanently changed his plans.After ending his association with Disney, Russell disappeared from features for a few years. He appeared in a few television movies, most notably playing the title role in Elvis, John Carpenter's made-for-television biopic. His next role as a sleazy used car salesman in Robert Zemeckis' hilariously caustic Used Cars (1980) allowed him to counter his wholesome, all-American nice guy image, and prove that he was an actor of untapped range. Director Carpenter recognized this and cast Russell as ruthless mercenary Snake Plissken in his brooding sci-fi/action film Escape From New York (1981). The role would prove to be one of legendary status, and one that would cement Russell as a cult hero for generations to come. Carpenter also cast Russell as a scientist stranded in the Antarctic in his chilling 1982 remake of The Thing. Realizing that his characters were larger than life, Russell typically played them with a subtle tongue- in-cheek quality. He also used this comic intuition in comedies like 1987's Overboard, in which he starred alongside his long-time life-partner and mother of his child Golide Hawn.In 1983, Russell moved to serious drama, playing opposite Cher and Meryl Streep in Silkwood. The success of that film helped him break into a more mainstream arena, and he was later able to win praise for his dramatic work in such films as Swing Shift (1984), Tequila Sunrise (1988), and Winter People (1989). However, it is with his performances in action films that Russell remains most widely associated. He has appeared in a number of such films, all of disparate quality. Some of Russell's more memorable projects include Big Trouble in Little China (1986), Tango and Cash (1989), Backdraft (1991), Tombstone (1993), and Executive Decision (1996). In 1996, he reprised his Snake Plissken character for Carpenter's Escape From L.A. The following year, he starred opposite Kathleen Quinlan in the revenge thriller Breakdown before returning to the sci-fi/action realm with Soldier in 1998. It would be two years before movie-going audiences would again catch a glimpse of Russell, though with his roles in 2000 Miles to Graceland (again carrying on the Elvis associations that have haunted his career) and Cameron Crowe's Vanilla Sky, the versatile actor proved that he was still very much on the scene. Is some of Russell's later day roles had stressed the action angle a bit more than the more dramatic aspects of the stories, the release of Dark Blue in 2003 combined both with Russell cast as a volitile police officer tracking a killer against the backdrop of the 1992 L.A. riots. In 2005, Russell played a frustrated father and horse-man in Dreamer: Inspired by a True Story, showing audiences that for all his on-screen bombast, he still had a sensitive side. He quickly leapt back into the action-packed saddle, however, with a leading role in 2006's remake of The Poseidon Adventure, Poseidon. Soon afterward, he accepted a role that took a decidedly self-aware perspective on his own fame as an over-the-top action star as he signed on for the leading role in Death Proof, Quinten Tarantino's half of the double-feature Grindhouse. A tribute to the fantastically violent B-exploitation films of its title, Grindhouse would cast Russell as Stuntman Mike, a literal lady-killer with a car that can be crashed and smashed without ever allowing the driver to be hurt.

Trivia: Following a wartime tour with the Navy, New Jersey-born Lee Van Cleef supported himself as an accountant. Like fellow accountant-turned-actor Jack Elam, Van Cleef was advised by his clients that he had just the right satanic facial features to thrive as a movie villain. With such rare exceptions as The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (1954), Van Cleef spent most of his early screen career on the wrong side of the law, menacing everyone from Gary Cooper (High Noon) to the Bowery Boys (Private Eyes) with his cold, shark-eyed stare. Van Cleef left Hollywood in the '60s to appear in European spaghetti Westerns, initially as a secondary actor; he was, for example, the "Bad" in Clint Eastwood's The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966). Within a few years, Van Cleef was starring in blood-spattered action films with such titles as Day of Anger (1967), El Condor (1970), and Mean Frank and Crazy Tony (1975). The actor was, for many years, one of the international film scene's biggest box-office draws. Returning to Hollywood in the late '70s, He starred in a very short-lived martial arts TV series The Master (1984), the pilot episodes of which were pieced together into an ersatz feature film for video rental. Van Cleef died of a heart attack in 1989.

Trivia: Born Ermes Effron Borgnino in Hamden, CT, to Italian immigrants, Ernest Borgnine spent five years of his early childhood in Milan before returning to the States for his education. Following a long stint in the Navy that ended after WWII, Borgnine enrolled in the Randall School of Dramatic Art in Hartford. Between 1946 and 1950, he worked with a theater troupe in Virginia and afterward appeared a few times on television before his 1951 film debut in China Corsair. Borgnine's stout build and tough face led him to spend the next few years playing villains. In 1953, he won considerable acclaim for his memorable portrayal of a ruthless, cruel sergeant in From Here to Eternity. He was also praised for his performance in the Western Bad Day at Black Rock. Borgnine could easily have been forever typecast as the heavy, but in 1955, he proved his versatility and showed a sensitive side in the film version of Paddy Chayefsky's acclaimed television play Marty. Borgnine's moving portrayal of a weak-willed, lonely, middle-aged butcher attempting to find love in the face of a crushingly dull life earned him an Oscar, a British Academy award, a Cannes Festival award, and an award from both the New York Film Critics and the National Board of Review. After that, he seldom played bad guys and instead was primarily cast in "regular Joe" roles, with the notable exception of The Vikings in which he played the leader of the Viking warriors. In 1962, he was cast in the role that most baby boomers best remember him for, the anarchic, entrepreneurial Quentin McHale in the sitcom McHale's Navy. During the '60s and '70s, Borgnine's popularity was at its peak and he appeared in many films, including a theatrical version of his show in 1964, The Dirty Dozen (1966), Ice Station Zebra (1968) and The Wild Bunch (1969). Following the demise of McHale's Navy in 1965, Borgnine did not regularly appear in series television for several years. However, he did continue his busy film career and also performed in television miniseries and movies. Notable features include The Poseidon Adventure (1972) and Law and Disorder (1974). Some of his best television performances can be seen in Jesus of Nazareth (1977), Ghost on Flight 401 (1978), and a remake of Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front (1979). In 1984, Borgnine returned to series television starring opposite Jan Michael Vincent in the action-adventure series Airwolf. That series ended in 1986; Borgnine's career continued to steam along albeit in much smaller roles. Between 1995 and 1997, he was a regular on the television sitcom The Single Guy. In 1997, he also made a cameo appearance in Tom Arnold's remake of Borgnine's hit series McHale's Navy.At age 80 he continued to work steadily in a variety of projects such as the comedy BASEketball, the sci-fi film Gattaca, and as the subject of the 1997 documentary Ernest Borgnine on the Bus. He kept on acting right up to the end of his life, tackling one of his final roles in the 2010 action comedy RED. Borgnine died in 2012 at age 95.

Trivia: Balding, deceptively bland-looking British actor Donald Pleasence was first seen on the London stage in a 1939 production of Wuthering Heights. He then served in the RAF, spending the last years of World War II in a German POW camp. Resuming his career after the war, Pleasence eventually came to New York in the company of Laurence Olivier in 1950, appearing in Caesar and Cleopatra. And although he began appearing in films in 1954, Pleasence's British fame during the '50s was the result of his television work, notably a recurring role as Prince John in The Adventures of Robin Hood from 1955-1958. He also co-starred in TV productions of The Millionairess, Man in a Moon, and Call Me Daddy. Voted British television actor of the year in 1958, Pleasence produced and hosted the 1960 series Armchair Mystery Theatre, before creating the stage role for which he was best remembered: Davies, the menacing tramp in Harold Pinter's The Caretaker. The actor revived the character throughout his career, appearing as Davies for the last time in 1991. Pleasence was fortunate enough to be associated with the success of The Great Escape in 1963, which led to a wealth of American film offers. Four years later, the actor portrayed arch criminal Ernst Blofeld in the James Bond film You Only Live Twice -- the first time that the scarred face of the secretive character was seen onscreen in the Bond series. Firmly established as a villain, Pleasence gradually eased into horror films such as Halloween (1978), The Devonsville Terror (1979), and Buried Alive (1990); commenting on this phase of his career, Pleasence once mused "I only appear in odd films." One of his few "mainstream" appearances during this period was virtually invisible. Pleasence is seen and prominently billed as a rabbi in Carl Reiner's Oh, God! (1977), but the role was deemed dispensable and all the actor's lines were cut. Pleasence continued to work steadily in the 1980s and early '90s -- making 17 pictures alone in 1987-1989 -- before undergoing heart surgery in 1994; he died from complications two months later. Married four times, the actor was the father of six daughters, among them actress Angela Pleasence.

Trivia: A major figure in American soul music, Isaac Hayes also enjoyed a long and memorable career as an actor and film composer. His score for the motion picture Shaft made him the first African-American to win an Academy Award for music, and was one of the first examples of a pop-based film score that developed a life of its own in the marketplace. Isaac Hayes was born in Covington, TN, on August 20, 1942. Born to a family of sharecroppers, Hayes was raised by his grandparents, and developed an interest in music early in life, joining the church choir at the age of five. By the time he was a teenager, Hayes had also learned how to play piano, organ, and saxophone, but he was forced to drop out of school after the family had moved to Memphis when his grandfather developed a disability. Hayes began performing with a variety of local R&B groups in Memphis, including the Teen Tones, Sir Calvin and His Swinging Cats, and Sir Isaac and the Doo-Dads, as well as working a variety of day jobs. In time, Hayes began attending night school, and received his high-school diploma at the age of 21.In 1962, Hayes cut his first record for a local label, and in 1964 he'd worked his way up to playing keyboards with the house band at Stax Records, just then establishing themselves as one of the South's premier soul music labels. At Stax, Hayes began writing songs with David Porter, and together they penned a long string of hits for Sam & Dave, including "Soul Man," "Hold On, I'm Coming," and "When Something Is Wrong With My Baby," as well as hits for Johnnie Taylor and Carla Thomas. Having established himself as a songwriter, Hayes began to step into the spotlight as a recording artist in 1967 with his first solo album, Presenting Isaac Hayes. While the album was reasonably well received, it was Hayes' second effort, Hot Buttered Soul, that established him as a unique talent in soul music, with its lush, lengthy, and languidly funky interpretations of such songs as "Walk on By" and "By the Time I Get to Phoenix" (the latter clocking in at an epic 18 minutes). Several more successful albums followed, and in 1970, Hayes was approached to write his first film score by, of all people, Norman Mailer; Mailer went through a brief fling as an experimental filmmaker, and he hired Hayes to provide music for his third cinéma vérité feature, Maidstone.In 1971, Hayes would write his second film score, which would make a much greater impact. Shaft, directed by famed photojournalist Gordon Parks, was a gritty tale of a tough private eye squaring off against both the cops and the mob in New York City, but with a primarily African-American cast, an unusual thing in 1971, and Hayes' score, which blended streetwise grooves with a brassy orchestral backing, became an instant sensation. Shaft's soundtrack album, as well as the single "Theme From Shaft," were major chart successes, and Hayes won an Academy Award for Best Musical Score.While Hayes was certainly proud of his achievements, at one point he'd shown an interest in playing the lead in Shaft as well as writing the music, and after displaying an estimable amount of screen charisma in several concert films (including Wattstax and Save the Children), he was cast alongside Fred Williamson and Lino Ventura in the Italian blaxploitation-style drama Uomini Duri (released in America as Three Tough Guys); Hayes also wrote music for the film. Later that same year, Hayes scored a solo starring role in Truck Turner, but just as his acting career began taking hold, the bottom began to fall out of the blaxploitation market, and Hayes went back to making music, not scoring another film role until Escape From New York in 1981.In the mid-'80s, Hayes returned to acting, and appeared in no fewer than 25 theatrical and television features between 1986 and 1996; most were low-budget genre fare, but several more notable films appeared on his resumé, including the blaxploitation parody/tribute I'm Gonna Git You Sucka!, Mel Brooks' Robin Hood: Men in Tights, Mario Van Peebles' African-American Western Posse, and Once Upon a Time...When We Were Colored, a evocative look at life in a small Southern town in the 1940s. Hayes' acting career got an unexpected boost in 1997, when he was asked to provide the voice of Chef on the animated television series South Park. Originally intended to appear in one episode, Chef went over so well that he became a regular character on the series, and remained with the show for nine years. Hayes also continued to land a number of higher profile film roles in films like Reindeer Games, the 2000 remake of Shaft, and the independent venture Hustle & Flow, for which he was nominated for a Screen Actors' Guild Award. When not busy with acting projects, Hayes continued to play concerts and record new material; he was also a literacy activist, a supporter of children's charities around the world, and operated a pair of successful restaurants in Chicago and Memphis. Hayes died on August 10, 2008.

Trivia: Actress Season Hubley came to films in 1973, after a few seasons in the role of nurse Candy Lowe on the CBS TV daytime drama Love of Life. The most intriguing of her early movie characterizations was Desdemona in rock singer Richie Havens' musical adaptation of Othello, 1974's Catch My Soul. Season then co-starred in the 1976 miniseries precursor to the TV weekly Family, returning to films in 1979 in a string of sexy roles. She managed to transcend the tawdriness of the 1982 crime flick Vice Squad, delivering a hauntingly convincing portrayal as Princess, the pathetic hooker victimized by psycho pimp Wings Hauser. A veteran of many made-for-television films, Season played Priscilla Presley in the top-rated 1979 TV biopic Elvis; co-starring as "the King" was Kurt Russell, who for several years was Hubley's husband. More recently --1994, to be exact -- Season Hubley co-starred as Annie Cobb on the TV series Blue Skies.

Trivia: A perpetually haggard character actor with hound-dog eyes and the rare ability to alternate between menace and earnest at a moment's notice, Harry Dean Stanton has proven one of the most enduring and endearing actors of his generation. From his early days riding the range in Gunsmoke and Rawhide to a poignant turn in David Lynch's uncharacteristically sentimental drama The Straight Story, Stanton can always be counted on to turn in a memorable performance no matter how small the role. A West Irvine, KY, native who served in World War II before returning stateside to attend the University of Kentucky, it was while appearing in a college production of Pygmalion that Stanton first began to realize his love for acting. Dropping out of school three years later to move to California and train at the Pasadena Playhouse, Stanton found himself in good company while training alongside such future greats as Gene Hackman and Robert Duvall. A stateside tour with the American Male Chorus and a stint in New York children's theater found Stanton continuing to hone his skills, and after packing his bags for Hollywood shortly thereafter, numerous television roles were quick to follow. Billed Dean Stanton in his early years and often carrying the weight of the screen baddie, Stanton gunned down the best of them in numerous early Westerns before a soulful turn in Cool Hand Luke showed that he was capable of much more. Though a role in The Godfather Part II offered momentary cinematic redemption, it wasn't long before Stanton was back to his old antics in the 1976 Marlon Brando Western The Missouri Breaks. After once again utilizing his musical talents as a country & western singer in The Rose (1979) and meeting a gruesome demise in the sci-fi classic Alien, roles in such popular early '80s efforts as Private Benjamin, Escape From New York, and Christine began to gain Stanton growing recognition among mainstream film audiences; and then a trio of career-defining roles in the mid-'80s proved the windfall that would propel the rest of Stanton's career. Cast as a veteran repo man opposite Emilio Estevez in director Alex Cox's cult classic Repo Man (1984), Stanton's hilarious, invigorated performance perfectly gelled with the offbeat sensibilities of the truly original tale involving punk-rockers, aliens, and a mysteriously omnipresent plate o' shrimp. After sending his sons off into the mountains to fight communists in the jingoistic actioner Red Dawn (also 1984) Stanton essayed what was perhaps his most dramatically demanding role to date in director Wim Wenders' Paris, Texas. Cast as a broken man whose brother attempts to help him remember why he walked out on his family years before, Stanton's devastating performance provided the emotional core to what was perhaps one of the essential films of the 1980s. A subsequent role as Molly Ringwald's character's perpetually unemployed father in 1986's Pretty in Pink, while perhaps not quite as emotionally draining, offered a tender characterization that would forever hold him a place in the hearts of those raised on 1980s cinema. In 1988 Stanton essayed the role of Paul the Apostle in director Martin Scorsese's controversial religious epic The Last Temptation of Christ. By the 1990s Stanton was a widely recognized icon of American cinema, and following memorably quirky roles as an eccentric patriarch in Twister and a desperate private detective in David Lynch's Wild at Heart (both 1990), he settled into memorable roles in such efforts as Against the Wall (1994), Never Talk to Strangers (1995), and the sentimental drama The Mighty (1998). In 1996, Stanton made news when he was pistol whipped by thieves who broke into his home and stole his car (which was eventually returned thanks to a tracking device). Having previously teamed with director Lynch earlier in the decade, fans were delighted at Stanton's poignant performance in 1999's The Straight Story. Still going strong into the new millennium, Stanton could be spotted in such efforts as The Pledge (2001; starring longtime friend and former roommate Jack Nicholson), Sonny (2002), and The Big Bounce (2004). In addition to his acting career, Stanton can often be spotted around Hollywood performing with his band, The Harry Dean Stanton Band.

Trivia: American actress Adrienne Barbeau was encouraged by her mother to take dancing and singing lessons. Adrienne was active in theatre both in high school and at Foothills Junior College; by age 19 she was touring Pacific military bases as a member of the San Jose Light Opera. After an unprepossessing job with a termite-control company, Adrienne set out for New York, paying the bills with a variety of jobs including go-go dancing in New Jersey nightclubs. In 1968 she was cast as Hodel in the long-running Broadway production Fiddler on the Roof, and three years later was featured in Grease, winning a Tony nomination through her rendition of "Look at Me, I'm Sandra Dee." From here, Adrienne was hired by Norman Lear to replace first-choice actress Marcia Rodd in the role of the divorced daughter on the controversial TV sitcom Maude. She played the role from 1972 through the series' cancellation in 1978, after which she began a whole new career as a successful horror-film star and sexy pin-up model. Adrienne married film director John Carpenter in 1979; most of her subsequent screen appearances were in such Carpenter-directed terrors as The Fog (1980), Escape from New York (1981) and Creepshow (1982). Perhaps Adrienne Barbeau's most enjoyable performance was as the Marlon Brando counterpart (!) in an uproarious distaff parody of Apocalypse Now, sublimely titled Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death (1989). Barbeau would continue to act over the coming decades, appearing on TV shows like The Drew Carey Show, Carnivale, and the soap General Hospital.

Trivia: Was an avid fan of horror films in his childhood days. Enlisted in the United States Navy before attending college. Was a member of the Gamma Phi Fraternity while attending Duquesne University. Got interested in acting when he was in his 20s. Primarily known for his work in horror and thriller films.

Trivia: Specializing in middle-aged characters even in his twenties, American actor Charles Cyphers has been a familiar face on the TV-movie landscape since the early '70s. Cyphers was particularly well served by director John Carpenter, who cast the actor in Assault on Precinct 13 (1975), Halloween (1978), The Fog (1980), and Escape From New York (1981). Carpenter also featured Cyphers as Sam Phillips in the made-for-TV Elvis (1979). Perhaps it's coincidence, or perhaps a private joke between actor and director: Whatever the case, Cyphers' character names in his Carpenter films are often lifted from real life. For example, he played Dan O'Bannon in The Fog (screenwriter O'Bannon is Carpenter's most frequent collaborator) and Leigh Brackett in Halloween (Brackett, a female screenwriter, worked on such films as Rio Bravo, which Carpenter remade as Assault on Precinct 13). On TV, Charles Cyphers was seen on The Betty White Show (1975), as Hugo Muncy, White's cross-dressing stunt double.

Trivia: African-American actor Bob Minor gained his cinematic entree as a stuntman. His earliest speaking roles came by way of the blaxploitation pictures of the '70s. Two of the more profitable examples of this genre were Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974), both of which starred Pam Grier and featured Minor in supporting roles. The actor occasionally surfaced in mainstream films designed for a more generic audience, notably The Deep (1978) (as Wiley), White Dog (1982) and Glory (1989) but even after attaining this filmic level he couldn't quite escape such exploitation flicks as Swinging Cheerleaders (1976). Bob Minor worked with regularity on television, just missing consistent weekly work in such never-purchased pilots as Friendly Persuasion (1975), Dr. Scorpion (1978) and Samurai (1979).

Trivia: On the New York theatrical scene, American actor John Diehl is best known for his work in a variety of avant-garde and experimental productions. Diehl's film characterizations are among the more traditional lines of petty thieves and psycho killers (vide 1984's Angel). After seeing Diehl portray an assortment of punks, wackos, and malcontents, it came as a surprise (and a bit of a relief) to see him cast as a normal suburban dad -- albeit an obnoxious one -- in Falling Down (1993). John Diehl may be most familiar to television viewers for his multi-season stint as laid-back Detective Larry Zito on TV's Miami Vice.

Trivia: Carolina-based actor/writer/producer George "Buck" Flower started out in "regionals"--non-Hollywood productions aimed at Southern neighborhood moviehouses and drive-ins. Flower also showed up in "four-wallers" for the family-matinee trade: he was seen as Boomer in all three Wilderness Family flicks of the late 1970s-early 1980s. Additional appearances include the Cook in John Carpenter's Starman (1984), the title character's father in Alan Parker's Birdy (1984), and "Nuke" LaLoosh's dad in Ron Shelton's Bull Durham (1988). The bulk of George "Buck" Flowers' work can be found in such low-budget esoterica as Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-o-Rama (1987).

Trivia: Was classmates in high school with Randy Hankins, who later became anchor Craig O'Neill.Worked at the Arkansas State University's campus radio station.Performed multiple duties (technical director, audio technician, cameraman, film processor and announcer) while working at Jonesboro's Raycom Media.Earned a minor in theater from the Arkansas State University.Served as writer, producer and performer in his comedy program Mid-Century Nonsense Festival Featuring Kumquat Theater.Moved to New York in 1977 to pursue a career in theater.