Trivia: Raised in New Orleans' French Quarter, Ray Walston relocated to Houston, where he first set foot on stage in a community production of High Tor. Walston went on to spend six years at the Houston Civic Theater then three more at the Cleveland Playhouse. Moving to New York, he worked as linotype operator at the New York Times before landing small parts in theatrical productions ranging from Maurice Evans' G.I. Hamlet to The Insect Comedy. He won Theater World's "Most Promising Newcomer" award for his portrayal of Mr. Kramer in the original 1948 production of Summer and Smoke. In 1950, he was cast as "big dealer" Luther Billis in the touring and London companies of South Pacific, and it was this that led to a major role in Rodgers & Hammerstein's 1953 Broadway musical Me and Juliet. Two years later, he was cast in his breakthrough role: the puckish Mr. Applegate, aka The Devil, in the Adler-Ross musical smash Damn Yankees. He won a Tony Award for his performance, as well as the opportunity to repeat the role of Applegate in the 1958 film version of Yankees; prior to this triumph, he'd made his film debut in Kiss Them for Me (1957) and recreated Luther Billis in the 1958 filmization of South Pacific. A favorite of director Billy Wilder, Walston was cast as philandering executive Dobisch in The Apartment (1960) and replaced an ailing Peter Sellers as would-be songwriter Orville J. Spooner in Kiss Me, Stupid (1960). Having first appeared on television in 1950, Walston resisted all entreaties to star in a weekly series until he was offered the title role in My Favorite Martian (1963-1966). While he was gratified at the adulation he received for his work on this series (he was particularly pleased by the response from his kiddie fans), Walston later insisted that Martian had "ruined" him in Hollywood, forever typecasting him as an erudite eccentric. By the 1970s, however, Walston was popping up in a wide variety of roles in films like The Sting (1974) and Silver Streak (1977). For the past two decades or so, he has been one of moviedom's favorite curmudgeons, playing such roles as Poopdeck Pappy in Popeye (1980) and officious high school teacher Mr. Hand, who reacts with smoldering rage as his class is interrupted by a pizza delivery in Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982). He would re-create this last-named role in the weekly sitcom Fast Times (1985), one of several TV assignments of the 1970s and 1980s. In 1995, Ray Walston reacted with schoolboy enthusiasm upon winning an Emmy award for his portrayal of irascible Wisconsin judge Henry Bone on the cult-fave TVer Picket Fences.

Trivia: Prior to his first TV appearance on a 1961 episode of Dobie Gillis, Bill Bixby had been a college student (he dropped out of UC Berkeley in his senior year), a lifeguard, a male model, and a regional stock-company actor. Bixby went on to play small roles in films like Lonely Are the Brave and Irma La Douce, and was featured in the Broadway comedy Under the Yum Yum Tree. In 1963, he graduated to TV stardom with the role of Tim O'Hara on the popular sci-fi sitcom My Favorite Martian. Anxious to change his "wholesome" image after Martian ended its three-year run in 1966, Bixby accepted a small but flashy role as a cowardly villain in the big-screen Western Ride Beyond Vengeance (1966). Like it or not, however, Bixby's future lay in sympathetic parts on episodic television. In each of his subsequent starring series -- The Courtship of Eddie's Father (1969-1972), The Magician (1973), The Incredible Hulk (1978-1982), True Confessions (1984), and Goodnight Beantown (1983) -- Bixby frequently did double-duty as actor and director. He also directed such made-for-TV movies as Barbary Coast (1974), Another Pair of Aces: Three of a Kind (1991), and the Roseanne/Tom Arnold vehicle The Woman Who Loved Elvis (1993). Long one of Hollywood's most eligible bachelors, Bixby finally took the marital plunge with actress Brenda Benet; the union ended tragically when Benet, distraught over the death of her son, Christopher, committed suicide. Bixby's second wife was Judith Kliban, daughter of magazine cartoonist B. Kliban. At the time of his death from prostate cancer, Bill Bixby was principal director of the TV series Blossom.

Trivia: General purpose actor Harry Lauter began showing up in films around 1948. Long associated with Columbia Pictures, Lauter appeared in featured roles in such major releases as The Big Heat (1953), Hellcats of the Navy (1957) and The Last Hurrah (1958). He also acted in the studio's "B"-western and horror product. Making occasional visits to Republic, Lauter starred in three serials: Canadian Mounties vs. the Atomic Invaders (1953), Trader Tom of the China Seas (1954) and King of the Carnival (1956), Republic's final chapter play. On TV, he co-starred with Preston Foster in Waterfront (1954) and was second-billed as Ranger Clay Morgan in Tales of the Texas Rangers (1955-59). After appearing in Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971), Harry Lauter retired from acting to concentrate on painting and managing his art and antique gallery.

Trivia: Supporting actress Britton usually played sweet, ditzy blondes.

Trivia: Straight out of Dartmouth College, Alan Hewitt made his Broadway bow in the 1935 Lunt/Fontanne production of Taming of the Shrew (which featured another newcomer, Cameron Mitchell). The wiry, sneering-voiced Hewitt appeared in several Theatre Guild productions of the 1930s and 1940s and later supported Ethel Merman in the 1950 musical Call Me Madam. He also served for many years as an official of the Actor's Union Council. During the 1960s, Hewitt became one of the Disney Studios' favorite actors, playing stereotypical self-important officials in such comedies as The Absent-Minded Professor (1960), Son of Flubber (1963) and The Misadventures of Merlin Jones (1967). Fans of 1960s sitcoms will remember Alan Hewitt as the ever-suspicious detective Bill Brennan on My Favorite Martian.