Trivia: With his rugged good looks and icon status, Clint Eastwood was long one of the few actors whose name on a movie marquee could guarantee a hit. Less well-known for a long time (at least until he won the Academy Award as Best Director for Unforgiven), was the fact that Eastwood was also a producer/director, with an enviable record of successes. Born May 31, 1930, in San Francisco, Eastwood worked as a logger and gas-station attendant, among other things, before coming to Hollywood in the mid-'50s. After his arrival, he played small roles in several Universal features (he's the pilot of the plane that napalms the giant spider at the end of Tarantula [1955]) before achieving some limited star status on the television series Rawhide. Thanks to the success of three Italian-made Sergio Leone Westerns -- A Fistful of Dollars (1964), For a Few Dollars More (1965), and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966) -- Eastwood soon exchanged this limited status for bona fide international stardom.Upon his return to the U.S., Eastwood set up his own production company, Malpaso, which had a hit right out of the box with the revenge Western Hang 'Em High (1968). He expanded his relatively limited acting range in a succession of roles -- most notably with the hit Dirty Harry (1971) -- during the late '60s and early '70s, and directed several of his most popular movies, including 1971's Play Misty for Me (a forerunner to Fatal Attraction), High Plains Drifter (1973, which took as its inspiration the tragic NYC murder of Kitty Genovese), and The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976). Though Eastwood became known for his violent roles, the gentler side of his persona came through in pictures such as Bronco Billy (1980), a romantic comedy that he directed and starred in. As a filmmaker, Eastwood learned his lessons from the best of his previous directors, Don Siegel and Sergio Leone, who knew just when to add some stylistic or visual flourish to an otherwise straightforward scene, and also understood the effect of small nuances on the big screen. Their approaches perfectly suited Eastwood's restrained acting style, and he integrated them into his filmmaking technique with startling results, culminating in 1993 with his Best Director Oscar for Unforgiven (1992). Also in 1993, Eastwood had another hit on his hands with In the Line of Fire. In 1995, he scored yet again with his film adaptation of the best-selling novel The Bridges of Madison County, in which he starred opposite Meryl Streep; in addition to serving as one of the film's stars, he also acted as its director and producer.Aside from producing the critical and financial misstep The Stars Fell on Henrietta in 1995, Eastwood has proven to be largely successful in his subsequent efforts. In 1997, he produced and directed the film adaptation of John Berendt's tale of Southern murder and mayhem, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, and he followed that as the director, producer, and star of the same year's Absolute Power, 1999's True Crime, and 2000's Space Cowboys. With Eastwood's next movie, Blood Work (2002), many fans pondered whether the longtime actor/director still had what it took to craft a compelling film. Though some saw the mystery thriller as a fair notch in Eastwood's belt, many complained that the film was simply too routine, and the elegiac movie quickly faded at the box office. If any had voiced doubt as to Eastwood's abilities as a filmmaker in the wake of Blood Work, they were in for quite a surprise when his adaptation of the popular novel Mystic River hit screens in late 2003. Featuring a stellar cast that included Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, and Kevin Bacon, Mystic River was a film that many critics and audiences cited as one of the director's finest. A downbeat meditation on violence and the nature of revenge, the film benefited not only from Eastwood's assured eye as a director, but also from a screenplay (by Brian Helgeland) that remained fairly faithful to Dennis Lehane's novel and from severely affecting performances by its three stars -- two of whom (Penn and Robbins) took home Oscars for their efforts. With Eastwood's reputation as a quality director now cemented well in place thanks to Mystic River's success, his remarkable ability to craft a compelling film was nearly beginning to eclipse his legendary status as an actor in the eyes of many. Indeed, few modern directors could exercise the efficiency and restraint that have highlighted Eastwood's career behind the camera, as so beautifully demonstrated in his 2004 follow-up, Million Dollar Baby. It would have been easy to layer the affecting tale of a young female boxer's rise from obscurity with the kind of pseudo-sentimental slop that seems to define such underdog-themed films, but it was precisely his refusal to do so that ultimately found the film taking home four of the six Oscars for which it was nominated at the 77th Annual Academy Awards -- including Best Director and Best Picture. Eastwood subsequently helmed two interrelated 2006 features that told the story of the Battle of Iwo Jima from different angles. The English-language Flags of Our Fathers relayed the incident from the American end, while the Japanese-language Letters from Iwo Jima conveyed the event from a Japanese angle. Both films opened to strong reviews and were lauded with numerous critics and industry awards, with Letters capturing the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language film before being nominated for a Best Picture Academy Award. Nowhere near slowing down, Eastwood would direct and star in the critically acclaimed Gran Torino, as well as helming critical favorites like Invictus, the Changeling, Hereafter, and J. Edgar, racking up numerous awards and nominations. In 2014, he helmed the film adaptation of the Broadway musical Jersey Boys, to mixed reviews, and the biographical adaptation American Sniper.A prolific jazz pianist who occasionally shows up to play piano at his Carmel, CA restaurant, The Hog's Breath Inn, Eastwood has also contributed songs and scores to several of his films, including The Bridges of Madison County and Mystic River. Many saw his critically championed 1988 film Bird, starring Forest Whitaker (on the life of Charlie "Bird" Parker), as the direct product of this interest. Eastwood also served as the mayor of Carmel, CA, from 1986 until 1988.

Trivia: The product of a profoundly unhappy home life, Eric Fleming ran away at age 11 to live the life of a Depression-era hobo. Making his way from California to New York, he worked at a series of dead-end jobs, at one point sweeping the floors of a whorehouse. After a stint with the Merchant Marine, he joined the Seabees at the outbreak of WWII. While lifting a 200-pound iron block, he miscalculated and the block fell directly on his face. Forced to undergo extensive plastic surgery, Fleming left the hospital with the craggy, weathered facial features that would ensure him steady if not always lucrative employment as an actor. Making his debut in a 1944 training film, he did stage work in Chicago and New York, and in 1951 starred on a DuMont TV network kiddie series Major Dell Conway of the Flying Tigers. While his Hollywood film roles were largely confined to standard he-man heroics in such sci-fiers as Conquest of Space (1955) and Queen of Outer Space (1956), he was afforded a wider acting range on stage, exhibiting his singing and dancing skills in the 1955 Broadway musical Plain and Fancy. In 1959 he was cast as trail boss Gil Favor on Rawhide, one of the most popular TV Western series of the era. Feeling that he was being upstaged by younger co-star Clint Eastwood, Fleming left Rawhide in 1966 to seek out film work. After playing a secondary role in the Doris Day comedy The Glass Bottom Beat, he headed to Peru to film the pilot episode of a TV adventure series, High Jungle. While filming a canoeing scene in the turbulent Hullaga River, Eric Fleming fell into the surging rapids and drowned; his mutilated body was not recovered until four days later.

Trivia: Described by one film historian as a "hand-wringing 'Oh-Jed-don't-go'" type actress, Coleen Gray did, in all fairness, have a few roles requiring more than sidelines suffering. After graduating with honors from the drama department of Hamline University, Gray was signed by 20th Century-Fox in 1945. There she enjoyed some of her best roles, including the female lead in Kiss and Death (1947) and the dumb-but-honest girlfriend of smart-but-shifty Tyrone Power in Nightmare Alley (1947). Free-lancing in the 1950s, Gray appeared in several westerns, getting the opportunity to play an adventuress of sorts in Tennessee's Partner (1955). Always willing to give her all for her art, Gray even managed to bring some artistry to such Grade-Z efforts as The Leech Woman (1960). In 1961, Coleen Gray played Miss Wycliffe on the short-lived Robert Young TV "dramedy" Window on Main Street.

Trivia: Twice in his career, once in the late '30s and again at the end of the 1940s, it seemed as though Tod Andrews was poised for a major career, first in movies and later on Broadway. Somehow, however, he never realized the promise that was shown at those two points in his life. There is much that is mysterious about the early career of this actor who, at one time, bid fair to become another Henry Fonda; beyond the two different names that he worked under in movies, there were multiple years of birth reported, anywhere from 1914 to 1920, different places of birth, and original names ranging from John Buchanan to Ted Anderson. He was definitely raised in California, and initially took up acting (along with journalism) at Washington State College to overcome a neurotic shyness. He later joined the Pasadena Playhouse, specializing in male ingenue roles, and was seen there in the play Masque of Kings by author Maxwell Anderson, who encouraged him to continue in his acting career. He made it to New York and it was in a production of My Sister Eileen, in the role of one of the "six future admirals" from Brazil, that he was spotted by Jack L. Warner, the head of Warner Bros., and offered a screen test. He passed it, was duly signed up, and first began working in movies under the name Michael Ames. He played uncredited parts in such big-budget features as Dive Bomber and They Died With Their Boots On, and got his first screen credit in a small role in the feature International Squadron, which seemed to bode well for his future. His subsequent vehicles, however, were mostly in the B-movie category, including the Warner Bros. crime drama I Was Framed (which seemed like a warmed-over rewrite of the John Garfield vehicle Dust Be My Destiny) and Truck Busters, a cheap remake of a James Cagney vehicle that was more than a decade old. He was cast as Don Ameche's son in the big-budget 20th Century Fox fantasy-comedy Heaven Can Wait but then turned up in a pair of ultra-cheap horror thrillers, Voodoo Man and Return of the Ape Man, playing the callow male heroes in both. By this time, he was using both his Tod Andrews and Michael Ames personae, depending upon the prominence of the production, but after 1944 Michael Ames disappeared entirely. Dispirited by his first experience of Hollywood, Andrews headed for New York, where he was fortunate enough to join the Margo Jones Company, through which, in 1948, he was cast as the lead in the new Tennessee Williams play Summer and Smoke. His career on Broadway seemed headed in directions that Hollywood never afforded him; having outgrown his youthful callowness, he retained a touch of vulnerability and sensitivity that projected well on the stage. Andrews was seen during the run of the Williams play by producer/director Joshua Logan, who made note of the actor's qualities. He returned to Hollywood briefly in 1950 to play a lead role in Ida Lupino's drama Outrage and then Broadway beckoned again, with one of the best parts of the period -- Henry Fonda was set to leave the title role in the stage production of Mr. Roberts. The director, Joshua Logan, remembered Andrews, who inherited the role for the remainder of its Broadway run and the national tour that followed. Six good years followed, in which the actor enjoyed his good fortune on the stage and was never out of work. He also returned to Hollywood once more, for work in the excellent wartime drama Between Heaven and Hell for Fox. And then something bizarre happened in his career -- what it was may never be known, because all of the principals involved are gone -- Andrews, established Broadway and theatrical star, subject of columnists and feature writers, suddenly turned up the following year in the cheap Allied Artists B-horror film From Hell It Came, playing the hero-scientist battling a killer tree stump on a radioactive South Pacific island. He did well enough in the part, but this was not the sort of film -- the whole production budget was smaller than the outlay on film stock alone for Between Heaven and Hell -- that was going to enhance the professional standing of anyone with an actual career. Andrews next turned up on television, playing Colonel John Singleton Mosby in the syndicated adventure series The Gray Ghost, before returning to the theater. He seemed to be doing well enough until 1961, when, days before the opening of a new play appropriately entitled A Whiff of Melancholy, he attempted suicide. He later said that it was a result of stress over the role. He resumed his career after a convalescence and next turned up in movies in 1965, as Captain Tuthill in Otto Preminger's World War II action blockbuster In Harm's Way. He later made a small but impressive appearance as a defense attorney in Ted Post's Hang 'Em High and had an excellent scene in Post's Beneath the Planet of the Apes, as James Franciscus's stricken commanding officer. Andrews' final screen appearances were as the President of the United States in the political thriller The President's Plane Is Missing (1973), and as a doctor in the chiller The Baby, released a year later.

Trivia: Before his motion picture career DeCorsia was a radio actor ("March of Time," "That Hammer Guy," "The Shadow"). He made his film debut in 1948 with The Lady from Shanghai. DeCorsia generally played lead villain roles (Enforcer, Naked City, Slightly Scarlet) or he occasionally parodied those villainous types (Kettles in the Ozarks, Dance With Me Henry).