Trivia: Della Reese is one of the few performers to move easily between the religious community and the mainstream entertainment industry. Born in Detroit, MI, Reese started singing in gospel choirs at a very young age. In 1945, she joined a touring choir with legendary gospel singer Mahalia Jackson. As a student at Wayne State University, Reese former her own singing group called the Meditation Singers. After a regular gig at Detroit's Flame Showbar, she went on to sing with Erskine Hawkins & His Orchestra. During the '50s and '60s, she recorded pop vocal albums for Jubilee and RCA Victor, leading to several pop singles on the Billboard charts. She was also nominated for a Grammy award and is remembered as one of the first gospel singers to have a popular stage show in Las Vegas.Her television career started in 1969 as the guest host of The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. She then made television history as the first black woman with her own prime-time variety show, Della. After singing on the nightclub circuit and making television guest appearances as herself, she joined the cast of Chico and the Man from 1976 to 1978. Despite her battle with illness in the early '80s, she continued acting steadily throughout the next few decades. Her other TV series appearances include Sanford and Son, It Takes Two, Charlie & Co., and The Royal Family. On the big screen, she played madam Vera in Eddie Murphy's Harlem Nights and Martin Lawrence's mother in A Thin Line Between Love and Hate. Her biggest television achievement is the CBS drama Touched By an Angel, which ran from 1994-2003. For her role of Tess, the wise guiding angel to Monica (Roma Downey), Reese won several Image Awards and Emmy nominations. Her other television work includes leading roles on the TV tearjerkers Miracle in the Woods, The Moving of Sylvia Myles, and Anya's Bell. She would appear in a number of projects in the years to come, like Expecting Mary and Me Again. An ordained minister, Reese helps to run the Los Angeles church association Understanding Foundation for Better Living.

Trivia: After toiling for a decade in low-grade films and a host of TV shows, Teri Polo finally earned a helping of recognition, topped off with a dollop of critical appreciation, for her portrayal of Ben Stiller's would-be fiancée in Jay Roach's 2000 autumn blockbuster Meet the Parents. The casting of Polo as the daughter of über-WASP suburban gentry (Robert De Niro and Blythe Danner) capitalized on her Pepsident-blond, all-American looks, and the film's success effectively provided the actress with the exposure that would allow her to move beyond the confines of weeknight television spots.The daughter of a stereo systems designer and a homemaker, Polo was born in Dover, DE, and raised there in the company of two older brothers. A ballet student from the age of five, she spent most of her childhood and adolescence in a dance studio, but after being rejected by a performing arts school at 17, Polo re-evaluated what she wanted to do with her life; her subsequent win in a Seventeen magazine modeling contest led to her decision to drop out of school and pursue an acting career in New York.Roles on TV shows ranging from the ABC soap opera Loving to Northern Exposure followed, as did starring work as the object of Ethan Hawke's affections in the thankless, straight-to-video comedy Mystery Date (1991). After moving to Los Angeles in 1995 to better pursue her career, Polo found more work on television, guest-starring on such shows as Felicity and Sports Night. With Meet the Parents in 2000, the actress' years of hard work seemed finally to have paid off, as she enjoyed mention in the national media and a crop of studio offers. She followed up that big success with Domestic Disturbance and Beyond Borders, but was back on board for the sequel Meet the Fockers in 2004. She was away from screens for three years after that, returning in Full of It, and the short-lived TV series The Wedding Bells. She appeared in The Hole, and in 2010 returned to her career defining role in Little Fockers.

Trivia: From battling mythical creatures of Greek legend to traveling the universe in an attempt to rebuild a fallen civilization, prolific television actor Kevin Sorbo has proven himself equally adept at thrilling audiences, transporting them to faraway lands, and even keeping them doubled over with laughter.It was his role as the all-powerful son of Zeus in 1994's Hercules and the Amazon Women that originally propelled the strapping Minnesota native into the spotlight, and after reprising the role in no less than four subsequent made-for-television movies, Sorbo settled into the role for a four-year run on Hercules: The Legendary Journeys in 1995. Though his heroic persona failed to translate to the big screen when the 1997 fantasy adventure Kull the Conqueror tanked at the box office, Sorbo continued to thrill television viewers by reprising his role as Hercules on two episodes of Xena: Warrior Princess. While occasional guest appearances in such popular sitcoms as Just Shoot Me, Dharma & Greg, and According to Jim proved that Sorbo wasn't just another pretty face but a surprisingly adept comedic talent as well, it was in a fantasy context that Sorbo truly shined, and in 2000 he set out for a five-year trip to the stars in Andromeda. After that series drew to a close in 2005, Sorbo could be seen in episodes of Two and a Half Men and The O.C. before swinging a stick at small-town injustice in Walking Tall 2 and 3. He went on to appear in the comedy An American Carol, Meet the Spartans, What If…, Soul Surfer, and 2012's FDR: American Badass.When he's not busy acting, Sorbo also acts as the spokesman for "A World Fit for Kids" -- a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping children at risk of dropping out of school, dealing drugs, and joining street gangs.

Trivia: Identical twin Tamera Mowry starred as Tamera Campbell, opposite her sibling Tia, on the popular sitcom Sister, Sister -- both in its original ABC Friday-night run and later during its four-year stint on the WB network. This stardom arrived at the tail end of several one-shot prime-time series appearances and commercial appearances that began during the actress' preteen years. During the Sister, Sister period and for years afterward, the Mowrys broke the mold of standard twin and triplet actors by appearing together in films and television programs, in lieu of forking off into different paths. They co-headlined the family-oriented comedy Seventeen Again (2000), the teen movie The Hot Chick (2002), and the 2005 Disney Channel telemovie Twitches (a kind of rehash of the Sister, Sister premise with an occult twist, which spawned a sequel in 2007), but also essayed individual roles from time to time. Circa 2000, Tamera struck out on her own, starring in the Billy Graham-produced Christian telemovie Something to Sing About, alongside Graham, Darius McCrary, Kirk Franklin, and Irma P. Hall. She also joined the cast of the popular Lifetime medical drama Strong Medicine during that show's fifth and sixth seasons, as Kayla Thornton, a young physician from a rural area who arrives as a first-year resident at Philadelphia's Rittenhouse Women's Health Clinic following the traumatizing death of her brother, with the intention of pursuing a medical career. In later years, Mowry branched out more into reality TV, including a show with her sister Tia (cleverly titled Tia & Tamera), but still occasionally returned to acting.