Trivia: Actress Daphne Zuniga achieved nationwide fame through her weekly appearances on Fox's Melrose Place in 1994; despite her comparative unfamiliarity, she was certainly no overnight success. The daughter of a Guatemalan-born philosophy professor, Zuniga attended U.C.L.A. while her dad was teaching at California State. Stardom beckoned when she was cast as John Cusack's recalcitrant traveling companion in The Sure Thing (1985). For reasons that defy explanation, this engaging performance did not immediately elevate her to the top ranks, and Zuniga would have to mark time in unmemorable films like Last Rites (1988) and Prey of the Chameleon (1991) before Melrose Place secured her popularity. After that show ended she continued to work regularly on both the small and big screen in projects such as Pandora's Clark, Enemies of Laughter, Christmas Do-Over, and the short-lived Spaceballs animated series. In 2007 she co-directed the documentary The Future We Will Create: Inside the World of TED.

Trivia: Lead actor Greg Evigan first appeared onscreen in the '70s.

Trivia: A dancer from childhood, Buddy Ebsen headlined in vaudeville in an act with his sister Velma. In 1935, Ebsen was signed by MGM as a specialty performer in The Broadway Melody of 1936, wherein he was shown to good advantage in several solos. He worked in a number of subsequent musicals, including Shirley Temple's Captain January (1936), teaming with Shirley for the delightful number "At the Codfish Ball." MGM assigned Ebsen to the role of the Scarecrow in 1939's The Wizard of Oz, but Ray Bolger, who'd been cast as the Tin Man, talked Ebsen into switching roles. The move proved to be Ebsen's undoing; he found that he was allergic to the silver makeup required for the Tin Man, fell ill, and was forced to bow out of the film, to be replaced by Jack Haley (however, Ebsen's voice can still be heard in the reprises of "We're Off to See the Wizard").Ebsen then returned to the stage, taking time out to provide the dancing model for a electronically operated wooden marionette which later was used at Disneyland. In 1950 Ebsen returned to films as comical sidekick to Rex Allen, gradually working his way into good character parts in "A" pictures like Night People (1955). Walt Disney, who'd remembered Ebsen from the dancing marionette, offered the actor the lead in his 1954 three-part TV production of Davy Crockett, but at the last moment engaged Fess Parker as Davy and recast Buddy as Crockett's pal George Russel. Ebsen continued to pop up in films like 1961's Breakfast at Tiffany's (as Audrey Hepburn's abandoned hometown husband), and in TV westerns, where he often cast his image to the winds by playing cold-blooded murderers. Comfortably wealthy in 1962 thanks to his film work and wise business investments, Ebsen added to his riches by signing on to play Jed Clampett in the TV sitcom The Beverly Hillbillies, which ran for nine years to excellent ratings. A millionaire several times over, Ebsen planned to ease off after Hillbillies, but in 1972 he was back in TV in the title role of Barnaby Jones. Few observers gave this easygoing detective series much of a chance, but they weren't counting on Ebsen's built-in popularity; Barnaby Jones lasted until 1980. The actor now confined himself to special events appearances and occasional guest-star roles, though he did play the recurring part of Lee Horsley's uncle in the final season of the TV mystery show Matt Houston (1983-85). One of Buddy Ebsen's final roles was in the 1993 theatrical film version of The Beverly Hillbillies -- not as Jed Clampett but in a cameo as Barnaby Jones!

Trivia: Of Hungarian-Philippine heritage, Barbara Luna was a stage actress from childhood. In 1949, Luna was cast as one of Ezio Pinza's children in South Pacific; she can be heard on the original cast album, singing the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical's opening number "Dites Moi, Pourquoi?" She went on to appear in such Broadway productions as The King and I, Teahouse of the August Moon and A Chorus Line. In films from 1958, Luna has usually been seen in exotic ethnic roles in films like The Devil at Four O'Clock (1961) and Five Weeks in a Balloon (1961). Star Trek fans still send her complimentary letters for her performance as Marlene Moreau in the 1967 ST installment "Mirror Mirror." Her most recent film credit was 1992's Lady Against the Odds. Barbara Luna has been married to actors Doug McClure and Alan Arkin.

Trivia: Cleveland-born Keir Dullea found himself in the thick of Manhattan's intellectual scene when his parents took over the management of a Greenwich Village bookstore. Dullea attended Rutgers and San Francisco State, then launched his acting career in regional theater. He made a spectacular film debut in The Hoodlum Priest (1961), playing a born-to-hang juvenile delinquent. He was more sympathetic but no less emotionally disturbed in 1962's David and Lisa; as late as 1965, he was still playing mentally unstable youths in films like Bunny Lake is Missing. The biggest film hit with which Dullea was associated was 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) in which he played the time-and-space-travelling astronaut Bowman. He repeated this characterization (and answered several of the questions posed by 2001) in the 1984 sequel 2010. Though he'd been active on the New York stage in the 1950s, Keir Dullea did not appear on Broadway until 1970, when the 34-year-old actor portrayed a twentysomething blind man in Butterflies are Free.

Trivia: A Utah girl born and bred, actress Marie Windsor attended Brigham Young University and represented her state as Miss Utah in the Miss America pageant. She studied acting under Russian stage and screen luminary Maria Ouspenskaya, supporting herself as a telephone operator between performing assignments. After several years of radio appearances and movie bits, Windsor was moved up to feature-film roles in 1947's Song of the Thin Man. She was groomed to be a leading lady, but her height precluded her co-starring with many of Hollywood's sensitive, slightly built leading men. (She later noted with amusement that at least one major male star had a mark on his dressing room door at the 5'6" level; if an actress was any taller than that, she was out.) Persevering, Windsor found steady work in second-lead roles as dance hall queens, gun molls, floozies, and exotic villainesses. She is affectionately remembered by disciples of director Stanley Kubrick for her portrayal of Elisha Cook's cold-blooded, castrating wife in The Killing (1956). Curtailing her screen work in the late '80s, Windsor, who is far more agreeable in person than onscreen, began devoting the greater portion of her time to her sizeable family. Because of her many appearances in Westerns (she was an expert horsewoman), Windsor has become a welcome and highly sought-after presence on the nostalgia convention circuit.

Trivia: Oates first acted in a student play while attending the University of Louisville. He moved to New York in 1954, hoping to find work on the stage or TV; instead he had a series of odd jobs. Eventually he appeared in a few live TV dramas, and when this work slowed down he moved to Hollywood; there he became a stock villain in many TV and film Westerns. Over the years he gained respect as an excellent character actor; by the early '70s he was appearing in both unusual, unglamorous leads and significant supporting roles. His breakthrough role was in In the Heat of the Night (1967). He played the title role in Dillinger (1973).

Trivia: The very feminine Lois Nettleton made her first stage appearance as "The Father" in a grade-school production of Hansel and Gretel. After studying at the Goodman Theatre and the Actors' Studio, 20-year-old Lois made her Broadway boy in 1949's The Biggest Thief in Town, very briefly adopting the stage name of Lydia Scott (she found her given name too plain and "schoolmarmy"). She understudied Barbara Bel Geddes as Maggie the Cat in the original 1955 production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, occasionally getting to play the role herself. For her work in the stage play God and Kate Murphy, Lois won the Clarence Derwent Award. While her official film debut was 1962's Period Adjustment, she previously played a minor role in director Elia Kazan's A Face in the Crowd (1957). Lois' film work, while extensive, has not been as rewarding as her stage and TV endeavors. Bypassing her co-starring stints in the short-term sitcom Accidental Family (1967) and You Can't Take It With You (1987), Lois Nettleton was seen as a regular on the NBC soap opera Brighter Day (1954), enjoyed a healthy two-season run as Joann St. John on the weekly TV version of In the Heat of the Night, and has won two Emmies, the first for the 1977 daytime special The American Woman: Profiles in Courage, and the second for "A Gun for Mandy," a 1983 episode of the syndicated religious anthology Insight. She died of lung cancer at age 80 in January 2008.