Trivia: Robert Fuller spent his first decade in show business trying his best to avoid performing. After his film debut in 1952's Above and Beyond, Fuller studied acting with Sanford Meisner at New York's Neighborhood Playhouse but never exhibited any real dedication. He tried to become a dancer but gave that up as well, determining that dancing was "sissified." Fuller rose to nominal stardom fairly rapidly in the role of Jess Harper on the popular TV western Laramie (1959-63). Once he found his niche in cowboy attire, he stuck at it in another series, Wagon Train, turning down virtually all offers for "contemporary" roles. When westerns began dying out on television in the late 1960s, Fuller worked as a voiceover actor in commercials, earning some $65,000 per year (a tidy sum in 1969). On the strength of his performance in the Burt Topper-directed motorcycle flick The Hard Ride, Fuller was cast by producer Jack Webb as chief paramedic Kelly Brackett on the weekly TVer Emergency, which ran from 1972 through 1977. In 1994, Robert Fuller was one of several former TV western stars who showed up in cameo roles in the Mel Gibson movie vehicle Maverick.

Trivia: Sultry blues vocalist Julie London began her film career long before she achieved fame as a recording artist. In 1945, 18-year-old London was selected to play a bargain-basement jungle princess, appearing opposite a gorilla in the PRC cheapie Nabonga. She was pretty bad, but no worse than the film itself. By the time she was cast as a sexy teenager in The Red House (1947), her acting had improved immensely, and by the time she played the female lead in the 1951 programmer The Fat Man, it looked as though she actually had a future in films. Still, London's greatest claim to fame was her long string of hit records ("Cry Me a River" et. al.) of the 1950s; many male admirers bought her albums simply to gaze upon her come-hither countenance on the dust jacket. Her status as every red-blooded American boy's wish dream was gently lampooned in Frank Tashlin's The Girl Can't Help It (1956), in which she appears as a spectral vision who transfixes a wistful Tom Ewell. Her best dramatic film appearances of this period include her leading-lady gigs in Voice in the Mirror (1958) and Man of the West (1958). From 1945 through 1955, Julie London was the wife of actor/producer Jack Webb; years after the divorce, London played Nurse Dixie McCall on the popular Jack Webb-produced TV series Emergency, in which she co-starred with her second husband, actor/jazz musician Bobby Troup.

Trivia: Wide-shouldered American actor Michael Lerner has become a Rod Steiger for the '90s, specializing in portraying brusque bullies with above-average intelligence. For many years a professor of literature at San Francisco State College, Lerner turned to acting in the late '60s, making his film bow with 1970's Alex in Wonderland. He alternated his movie work with stage appearances at the American Conservatory Theatre. Michael Lerner's more notable film roles include Arnold Rothstein in Eight Men Out (1988) and a Louis Mayer-clone movie producer (for which he was Oscar nominated) in Barton Fink (1991).

Trivia: Cheryl Miller -- also sometimes billed as Cheryl Lynn Miller -- was a popular ingenue of the mid-1960's, in movies and on television. She was born in Sherman Oaks, California in 1943 (some sources say 1944), and made her screen debut as an infint in the movie Casanova Brown (1944). She studied at the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music, taking occasional acting roles, on series such as Leave It To Beaver and Perry Mason, and photo modeling spots. The year 1965 marked her breakthrough -- first, though she didn't realize its importance at the time, a guest spot on Flipper brought her to the attention of producer Ivan Tors, who cast her in the feature film Clarence, The Cross-Eyed Lion (1965), which became the pilot for a proposed series called Daktari. And she was discovered by Walt Disney, who signed her to a contract and put her into a prominent supporting role in The Monkey's Uncle (1965). And in November of that year, she was named one of dozen actresses designated as Hollywood Deb Stars of 1966, a group that also included Melody Patterson, Edy Williams, Peggy Lipton, and Sally Field, and led to her appearance on a television special early the following year. Daktari was sold as a series and in January of 1966 Miller and the rest of the cast, headed by Marshall Thompson, headed for Africa to begin filming. For the next four years, Miller was seen as Paula Tracy, the daughter of veterinarian Marsh Tracy, on the series. Following the cancellation of the series in early 1969, she was cast in the short-lived daytime drama Bright Promise. By that time, her wholesome good looks were no longer in fashion. Her public support for Richard Nixon in the 1968 presidential race -- alongside such marginal pop-culture figures as Burt Ward (Robin on Batman) -- reflected how out-of-touch she was, in terms of image. Miller continued to work regularly, mostly in television, and also ventured into a singing career for a time -- and got onto The Tonight Show -- and by the 1970s her days of co-starring roles were behind her. Miller's last recorded small-screen appearance was in an episode of The Misadventures of Sheriff Lobo.

Trivia: Actor Joe E. Tata is probably best known as Nat, the congenial owner of the Peach Pit on TV's Beverly Hills 90210, but the veteran performer's career actually began 25 years earlier. In the mid-'60s, Tata began appearing on popular television shows like Hogan's Heroes and Mission: Impossible, which led to recurring roles on series like The F.B.I. and Lost in Space. He continued to make appearances on television shows and in movies until he was cast in the famous role of Nat on 90210 in 1990. His easygoing manner in the role struck a chord with viewers, and he stayed with the show for the next ten years.