Trivia: With soulful, saucer-like eyes and a coy smile that hints at playfulness, Oscar-nominated actress Emily Watson burst onto the scene with her shattering performance in Lars von Trier's Breaking the Waves, a role that almost went to period-piece queen Helena Bonham Carter. Born the daughter of an architect and an English professor in Islington, a borough of London, England, in January 1967, a sheltered upbringing initially led Watson to seek studies in English Literature. After studying in Bristol for three years, Watson made her first bid for drama school only to face disheartening rejection. After three years of working as a waitress and a secretary, she was eventually accepted into the London Drama Studio. It was during this early phase in her career that Watson would meet future husband Jack Waters.Launching her career upon joining the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1992, Watson soon set her sights on film. Fate intervened when actress Helena Bonham Carter pulled out of director Lars von Trier's Breaking the Waves at the last minute due to the film's explicit sexuality. Despite her lack of big-screen experience, Watson landed the female lead in the film after only one brief screen test. Playing a spiritually driven woman whose oil-rig worker husband (Stellan Saarsgaard) becomes paralized, she exhibited a brash, religiously transcendent sexuality, stunning art-house audiences and recieving an Oscar nomination in the process. Though the subsequent marriage dramedy Metroland proved to be a nostalgia trip by comparison, Watson's honest performance again earned accolades. Watson's reputation continued to grow with her intimate, conflicted portrayal of the Multiple Sclerosis-stricken concert cellist Jacqueline Du Pre in Hilary and Jackie (1998), for which she was again Oscar-nominated, as well as when she played the love interest of an eccentric chess champion in The Luzhin Defence (2000).After joining the talented ensemble of Robert Altman's acclaimed comedy-mystery Gosford Park, Watson made serious inroads into Hollywood, first in 2002 as the love interest of a temperamental (to say the least) small-business owner played by Adam Sandler in Paul Thomas Anderson's Punch-Drunk Love. That same fall also saw her playing the love interest of a murderous psychopath in Brett Ratner's Hannibal prequel Red Dragon, and re-teaming with Metroland co-star Christian Bale in the little-seen sci-fi action vehicle Equilibrium. After doing voice work for Tim Burton's animated gothic Corpse Bride -- alongside the very woman she replaced in Breaking the Waves, Helena Bonham-Carter -- she returned to the British art-house scene with strong performances in such films as Separate Lives and director Richard E. Grant's autobiographical Wah-Wah.She appeared in the biopic Miss Potter, and the family fantasy film The Water Horse. In 2008 she was part of Charlie Kaufman's directorial debut Synecdoche, New York. Three years later she played the mother of a boy devoted to his beloved equine mate in Steven Spielberg's adaptation of War Horse, and in 2012 she appeared in Joe Wright's adaptation of Anna Karenina. The following year, she appeared in the film adaptation of the popular book The Book Thief. In 2014, she played Jane Hawking's mother in The Theory of Everything.

Trivia: Actor Dominic Monaghan played cheeky rabble-rousers in British theater and television long before he was cast as a comical hobbit in New Line Cinema's epic The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Born in Berlin, Germany, on December 8, 1976, Monaghan is the younger of two boys. His schoolteacher father and nurse mother spoke English at home and, when Monaghan was 12 years old, moved the family back to their native Manchester. Growing up, Monaghan worked several odd jobs -- as a mail sorter, a stock boy, a sauté chef -- but he always wanted to be an actor. He enrolled at Aquinas College, a Catholic sixth form school in England, where he studied English literature, drama, and geography. By his second year, Monaghan was a regular fixture in school plays. He performed in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, played the Artful Dodger in Dickens' Oliver Twist, and even portrayed American gangster Bugsy Malone. Monaghan soon started acting outside of school and joined the Manchester Youth Theatre. His work with the troupe caught the attention of a talent agent, who sent him to an open casting call for the television show Hetty Wainthrop Investigates, starring veteran actress Patricia Routledge. Monaghan, then only 18, made his television debut as amateur detective Routledge's underage sidekick, Geoffrey Shawcross. The actor appeared on Hetty Wainthrop Investigates for four seasons, building a fan base and honing his craft. In the next few years, Monaghan made his feature-film debut as a Russian sailor in Hostile Waters with Rutger Hauer and taped the docudrama This Is Personal: The Hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper, in which he portrays the boyfriend of a girl attacked by the Ripper. He also recorded his first BBC radio show, "Stockport...So Good They Named It Once," a family sitcom that features Monaghan as a witty, lovelorn 15 year old. Monaghan was performing in a play in London when casting directors scouted him for The Lord of the Rings. As a child, he had read all three volumes of J.R.R. Tolkien's trilogy; the books were his father's favorite. After a formal audition for The Lord of the Rings, Monaghan left England to film the WWII miniseries Monsignor Renard (1999) in France, in which he plays a droll layabout whose life dramatically changes during the German occupation. Six months into shooting, Monaghan's agent warned him to be prepared to immediately leave for Los Angeles or New Zealand to meet with Peter Jackson, The Lord of the Rings' director. The actor packed, but the meeting never occurred: Within days, he was called with an offer to play hobbit Meriadoc "Merry" Brandybuck, a major character in all three films.The Lord of the Rings' three installments -- The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), The Two Towers (2002), and The Return of the King (2003) -- were taped simultaneously in New Zealand and kept Monaghan occupied for almost two years. Their yearly releases ensured Monaghan's continuing popularity, and their popularity brought him hoards of jobs offers. After returning to England, besides sifting through piles of potential scripts, Monaghan also completed his own comedy screenplay with fellow hobbit Billy Boyd. He would soon move on to find success on the small screen with a pivotal role on the popular series Lost, followed by a number of other TV projects, like FlashForward, Goodnight Burbank, and The Unknown.

Trivia: British actress Joan Collins, daughter of a London theatrical booking agent, made her showbiz bow in a production of The Doll's House -- in a male role. She was 9 years old then, and it would be the last time there would be any doubt as to her gender. With the sort of glamorous countenance that prompted people to ask "why aren't you in movies?", Collins first appeared before the cameras in a small role as a beauty contestant in Lady Godiva Rides Again (1953). She made an auspicious American debut as an Egyptian temptress in Land of the Pharoahs (1955). This assignment led to a contract with 20th Century-Fox, where despite a few good dramatic parts (Girl on the Red Velvet Swing [1955] in particular) and an adroit comic characterization in Rally Round the Flag, Boys (1958), she was written off by critics as decorative but nothing more. She was perilously close to "perennial starlet" status in the 1960s, and by the 1970s was the uncrowned queen of "B" pictures. Offscreen she cut quite a swath through the tabloid headlines; if her autobiography, Past Imperfect is to be believed, she dallied with virtually every male actor in Hollywood except Wile E. Coyote. Her maturation from mere personality to superstar came about when she was cast in 1981 as glamorous and predatory Alexis Carrington on Dynasty, the role giving her arguably the greatest exposure of his career. Though she continued to work steadily up until 2003, she never landed in a project as embraced as Dynasty but highlights include 1995's comedy In the Bleak Midwinter and 2000's The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas. In 2015, she was cast as a modern Grand Duchess in E! first scripted series, The Royals, playing Elizabeth Hurley's mother.Despite professional and personal setbacks, Collins has managed to survive in an industry that swallows up lesser starlets on an average of ten per hour. Nor is Joan the only Collins with talent and charisma; her sister Jackie Collins is a highly successful romance novelist, whose books The Bitch and The Stud were turned into films, both starring sibling Joan.

Trivia: Wanted to be a ballerina, but was rejected from the Royal Ballet; as a result, she suffered from anorexia and spent three months in psychiatric hospital as part of her recovery. Made her stage debut at age 16 as a chorus girl at a theatre in Colchester, England. Discovered on the BBC series Who Do You Think You Are that one of her ancestors was imprisoned in the infamous Tower of London, and another was accused of plotting to kill King Charles II. Released her debut novel, Not Quite Nice, in 2015.

Trivia: A member of director Mike Leigh's hardworking repertory cast, British actress Lesley Manville started acting in U.K. television dramas during the early '80s. After her debut feature in 1985 for the crime drama Dance With a Stranger, she found her place in comedy-dramas with Clare Peploe's High Season. The next year, she began her longtime collaboration with Mike Leigh for the comedy High Hopes, followed by Secrets and Lies and Topsy-Turvy. She married actor Gary Oldman and had a son, but the couple divorced soon after they both appeared in the made-for-TV movie The Firm in 1988. She continued to work in British miniseries, TV movies, and short films throughout the '90s, including an appearance as Mrs. Micawber in a TNT version of David Copperfield. Manville finally gained a lead role in Leigh's All or Nothing in 2002, as Penny, a grocery store clerk married to taxi cab driver Phil (frequent Leigh leading man Timothy Spall).

Trivia: Studied quantum physics at Cambridge University, England. Started studying for his PhD but abandoned it to follow a career in comedy. Spent four years doing gigs in pubs with friend Alexander Armstrong. Performed at the Edinburgh Fringe festival for the first time with Armstrong in 1994. Released a book about physics called It's Not Rocket Science.

Trivia: A British actress who is probably best known to American audiences for her turn as a lusty society girl-turned-vampire in Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula and her former real-life role as the wife of Jude Law, Sadie Frost has resisted the pull of Hollywood in favor of a career in small British films. A number of these films have been the product of Natural Nylon, a production company that Frost founded with then-husband Law and actors Jonny Lee Miller, Ewan McGregor, and Sean Pertwee. Born into a large bohemian family in London in 1967, Frost had her acting debut at the age of three in a Jelly Tots commercial. She studied acting at the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts when she was 11, and then ran away to Liverpool to become a punk. At the age of 19, Frost joined the Manchester Exchange Theatre, and that same year married Spandau Ballet frontman-cum-actor Gary Kemp, with whom she later co-starred in The Krays (1990) and the Polish arthouse film Papierowe Malzenstwo (1992). The marriage, which ended in 1997, produced one son. Frost got her biggest break when she was cast in Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992); although the film received very mixed reviews, many critics praised the actress' work as Winona Ryder's blood-sucking best friend. Frost resisted the lure of Hollywood, however, preferring to remain in her native country. In 1994, she starred in Shopping, a nihilistic urban drama that cast her as an Irish punk who, in the company of her boyfriend, enjoys adrenaline-fueled crime sprees. The film provided Frost with an introduction to Jude Law, who played her boyfriend. The two married in 1997 and had three children (two sons and a daughter) before they divorced in 2003.Frost subsequently appeared largely in such art films as Rancid Aluminum (2000), in which she starred with Rhys Ifans, Tara Fitzgerald, and Joseph Fiennes. She also took part in such Natural Nylon productions as The Final Cut (1998), a drama about people doing nasty things, and Love, Honour and Obey (1999), a drama about a group of East London gangsters. In addition to her film work, Frost co-owns the fashion label Frost French with her close friend Jemima French. Throughout the 2010's, Frost would appear in films like Shoot on Sight and The Heavy.

Trivia: Began acting at the age of five in drama classes. Studied at the Sylvia Young Theatre School between 2010 and 2016. Made her professional debut in a 2011 performance of Kin at the Royal Court Theatre. In 2016, founded online hat and artwork shop Stare Society. Has played the role of Chloe Voyle in Ackley Bridge from 2017.

Trivia: Moved around a lot as a child due to his father's job with the Royal Air Force. Received the Stage Scholarship from the Academy Drama School. Played the lead role in the Patrick Wilde's play What Wrong With Angry? in 1993.

Trivia: Acclaimed as one of Britain's funniest standup comedians, Omid Djalili also retained the distinction of being the country's sole Iranian standup act. Following the smashing success in the 1995 Edinburgh Festival and such satirical U.K. efforts as Small Potatoes (2001) and Between Iraq and a Hard Place (2003), Djalili seemed poised to take the U.S. by storm with his supporting role in the new Whoopi Goldberg sitcom Whoopi. Born to an Iranian journalist and photographer who had settled in London in 1957, Djalili's father was both a contributor to Iran's top newspapers and a translator for the Iranian embassy. Severing his ties with the Iranian government following the 1979 Iranian revolution, the elder Djalili opened a medical hostile for Iranian immigrants, and it was there that young Omid witnessed his father's unique ability to entertain and began to get a true sense of the cultural differences between native-born Londoners and their Iranian immigrant counterparts. His enrollment in London's multi-cultural Holland Park school also served to provide young Djalili with a strong catalog of various foreign accents that would later prove key to his success as a standup act. Djalili graduated from the University of Ulster with a degree in English and theater arts in 1988, and embarked on a series of odd jobs after returning to London and being rejected from 16 different drama schools. Gradually working his way from the outskirts of the theater scene to small roles on stage and screen, it wasn't long before Djalili met his future wife, Annabel Knight, at a friends wedding and the two began collaborating on various projects. After working themselves into the experimental theater scene in the Czech Republic via a cultural exchange program, the couple was preparing to have their first child when Mrs. Knight decided to pen a one man play for her husband to star in. An introspective, humorous, and honest depiction of the struggle for truth in the face of religious prosecution, A Strange Bit of History proved an enormous hit after debuting in Edinburgh to capacity crowds. His crossover appeal in part the result of his ability to relate to numerous foreign cultures, Djalili took home the coveted LWT Stand Up Award in 1997 and has since gone on to numerous film and television roles. Djalili endeared himself to U.K. television audiences in the late '90s, and after making his film debut in the 1999 Hollywood blockbuster The Mummy, it seemed as if his appeal had made the sometimes difficult translation from the U.K. to the U.S. Alternating between work in Europe and America into the new millennium, Djalili received stateside exposure with roles in such high-profile releases as The World is Not Enough (1999) and Spy Game (2001) while maintaining U.K. credibility with supporting performances in Mean Machine (2001) and The Calcium Kid (2003). Following the premiere of Whoopi, Djalili began preparation for his role as Pablo Picasso in the feature Modigliani (2004). Over the next several years, Djalili would continue to remain a force on screen, appearing in films like Casanova and The Infadel, as well as TV series like The Paul Reiser Show.