Trivia: In an industry of prima donnas, actress Barbara Stanwyck was universally recognized as a consummate professional; a supremely versatile performer, her strong screen presence established her as a favorite of directors, including Cecil B. De Mille, Fritz Lang, and Frank Capra. Born Ruby Stevens July 16, 1907, in Brooklyn, NY, she was left orphaned at the age of four and raised by her showgirl sister. Upon quitting school a decade later, she began dancing in local speakeasies and at the age of 15 became a Ziegfeld chorus girl. In 1926, Stanwyck made her Broadway debut in The Noose, becoming a major stage star in her next production, Burlesque. MGM requested a screen test, but she rejected the offer. She did, however, agree to a supporting role in 1927's Broadway Nights, and after completing her stage run in 1929 appeared in the drama The Locked Door. With her husband, comedian Frank Fay, Stanwyck traveled to Hollywood. After unsuccessfully testing at Warner Bros., she appeared in Columbia's low-budget Mexicali Rose, followed in 1930 by Capra's Ladies of Leisure, the picture which shot her to stardom. A long-term Columbia contract was the result, and the studio soon loaned Stanwyck to Warners for 1931's Illicit. It was a hit, as was the follow-up Ten Cents a Dance. Reviewers were quite taken with her, and with a series of successful pictures under her belt, she sued Columbia for a bigger salary; a deal was struck to share her with Warners, and she split her time between the two studios for pictures including Miracle Woman, Night Nurse, and Forbidden, a major hit which established her among the most popular actresses in Hollywood. Over the course of films like 1932's Shopworn, Ladies They Talk About, and Baby Face, Stanwyck developed an image as a working girl, tough-minded and often amoral, rarely meeting a happy ending; melodramas including 1934's Gambling Lady and the following year's The Woman in Red further established the persona, and in Red Salute she even appeared as a student flirting with communism. Signing with RKO, Stanwyck starred as Annie Oakley; however, her contract with the studio was non-exclusive, and she also entered into a series of multi-picture deals with the likes of Fox (1936's A Message to Garcia) and MGM (His Brother's Wife, co-starring Robert Taylor, whom she later married).For 1937's Stella Dallas, Stanwyck scored the first of four Academy Award nominations. Refusing to be typecast, she then starred in a screwball comedy, Breakfast for Two, followed respectively by the downcast 1938 drama Always Goodbye and the caper comedy The Mad Miss Manton. After the 1939 De Mille Western Union Pacific, she co-starred with William Holden in Golden Boy, and with Henry Fonda she starred in Preston Sturges' outstanding The Lady Eve. For the 1941 Howard Hawks comedy Ball of Fire, Stanwyck earned her second Oscar nomination. Another superior film, Capra's Meet John Doe, completed a very successful year. Drama was the order of the day for the next few years, as she starred in pictures like The Gay Sisters and The Great Man's Lady. In 1944, she delivered perhaps her most stunning performance in Billy Wilder's classic noir Double Indemnity. Stanwyck's stunning turn as a femme fatale secured her a third Oscar bid and helped make her, according to the IRS, the highest-paid woman in America. It also won her roles in several of the decade's other great film noirs, including 1946's The Strange Love of Martha Ivers and 1949's The File on Thelma Jordon. In between, Stanwyck also starred in the 1948 thriller Sorry, Wrong Number, her final Academy Award-nominated performance. The 1950s, however, were far less kind, and strong roles came her way with increasing rarity. With Anthony Mann she made The Furies and with Lang she appeared opposite Marilyn Monroe in 1952's Clash by Night, but much of her material found her typecast -- in 1953's All I Desire, she portrayed a heartbroken mother not far removed from the far superior Stella Dallas, while in 1954's Blowing Wild she was yet another tough-as-nails, independent woman. Outside of the all-star Executive Suite, Stanwyck did not appear in another major hit; she let her hair go gray, further reducing her chances of winning plum parts, and found herself cast in a series of low-budget Westerns. Only Samuel Fuller's 1957 picture Forty Guns, a film much revered by the Cahiers du Cinema staff, was of any particular notice. It was also her last film for five years. In 1960, she turned to television to host The Barbara Stanwyck Show, winning an Emmy for her work.Stanwyck returned to cinemas in 1962, portraying a lesbian madam in the controversial Walk on the Wild Side. Two years later, she co-starred with Elvis Presley in Roustabout. That same year, she appeared in the thriller The Night Walker, and with that, her feature career was over. After rejecting a role in Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte, she returned to television to star in the long-running Western series The Big Valley, earning another Emmy for her performance as the matriarch of a frontier family. Upon the show's conclusion, Stanwyck made a TV movie, The House That Would Not Die. She then appeared in two more, 1971's A Taste of Evil and 1973's The Letters, before vanishing from the public eye for the remainder of the decade. In 1981, she was awarded an honorary Oscar; two years later, she was also the recipient of a Lincoln Center Life Achievement Award. Also in 1983, Stanwyck returned to television to co-star in the popular miniseries The Thorn Birds. Two years later, she headlined The Colbys, a spin-off of the hugely successful nighttime soap opera Dynasty. It was her last project before retiring. Stanwyck died January 20, 1990.

Trivia: The son of an Oklahoma dentist, Van Heflin moved to California after his parents separated. Drawn to a life on the sea, Heflin shipped out on a tramp steamer upon graduating from high school, returning after a year to attend the University of Oklahoma in pursuit of a law degree. Two years into his studies, Heflin was back on the ocean. Having entertained thoughts of a theatrical career since childhood, Heflin made his Broadway bow in Channing Pollock's Mister Moneypenny; when the play folded after 61 performances, Heflin once more retreated to the sea, sailing up and down the Pacific for nearly three years. He revitalized his acting career in 1931, appearing in one short-lived production after another until landing a long-running assignment in S. N. Behrmann's 1936 Broadway offering End of Summer. This led to his film bow in Katharine Hepburn's A Woman Rebels (1936), as well as a brief contract with RKO Radio. Katharine Hepburn requested Heflin's services once more for her Broadway play The Philadelphia Story, and while the 1940 MGM film version of that play cast James Stewart in Heflin's role, the studio thought enough of Heflin to sign him to a contract. One of his MGM roles, that of the alcoholic, Shakespeare-spouting best friend of Robert Taylor in Johnny Eager (1942), won Heflin a "Best Supporting Actor" Oscar. After serving in various Army film units in World War II, Heflin resumed his film career, and also for a short while was heard on radio as Raymond Chandler's philosophical private eye Philip Marlowe. He worked in both Hollywood and Europe throughout the 1950s. In 1963, he was engaged to narrate the prestigious TV anthology The Great Adventure. He was forced to pull out of this assignment when cast as the Louis Nizer character in the Broadway play A Case of Libel. Heflin's final film appearance was in the made-for-TV speculative drama The Last Child; he died of a heart attack at the age of 61. Van Heflin was married twice, first to silent film star Esther Ralston, then to RKO contract player Frances Neal (who should not be confused with Heflin's actress sister Frances Heflin).

Trivia: Born into the Czech ghetto in Scranton, Pennsylvania, Lizabeth Scott attended the Alvienne School of Drama in New York and began her career in stock. Scott's first break came when she was cast as Tallulah Bankhead's understudy in Broadway's The Skin of Our Teeth (1942); meanwhile, she also worked as a fashion model. Starmaker Hal Wallis spotted her, and she did well in a screen test, leading to her film debut in 1945. She went on to play alluring leads in a number of films throughout the next decade, hyped by her studio as another Lauren Bacall or Veronica Lake. There was speculation that Scott would marry Wallis, but this never occurred, and he dropped her option in 1957, effectively ending her movie career. In 1955 she sued Confidential magazine over its allegations concerning her sexual preferences. She appeared in her last film, Pulp (1972), with Michael Caine. Scott died in 2015, at age 92.

Trivia: Once quoted as saying "I've made a career of playing sons of bitches," Kirk Douglas is considered by many to be the epitome of the Hollywood hard man. In addition to acting in countless films over the course of his long career, Douglas has served as a director and producer, and will forever be associated with his role in helping to put an end to the infamous Hollywood black list.Douglas (born Issur Danielovitch) was the son Russian Jewish immigrant parents in Amsterdam, NY, on December 9, 1916. He waited tables to finance his education at St. Lawrence University, where he was a top-notch wrestler. While there, he also did a little work in the theater, something that soon gave way to his desire to pursue acting as a career. After some work as a professional wrestler, Douglas held various odd jobs, including a stint as a bellhop, to put himself through the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. In 1941, he debuted on Broadway, but had only two small roles before he enlisting in the Navy and serving in World War II. Following his discharge, Douglas returned to Broadway in 1945, where he began getting more substantial roles; he also did some work on radio. After being spotted and invited to Hollywood by producer Hal Wallis, Douglas debuted onscreen in The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946), but he did not emerge as a full-fledged star until he portrayed an unscrupulously ambitious boxer in Champion (1949); with this role (for which he earned his first Oscar nomination), he defined one of his principle character types: a cocky, selfish, intense, and powerful man. Douglas fully established his screen persona during the '50s thanks to strong roles in such classics as Billy Wilder's Ace in the Hole (1951), William Wyler's Detective Story (1951), and John Sturges' Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957). He earned Oscar nominations for his work in The Bad and the Beautiful (1952) and Lust for Life (1956), both of which were directed by Vincente Minnelli. In 1955, the actor formed his own company, Bryna Productions, through which he produced both his own films and those of others, including Stanley Kubrick's Paths of Glory (1957) and Spartacus (1960); both of these movies would prove to be two of the most popular and acclaimed of Douglas' career. In 1963, he appeared on Broadway in Ken Kesey's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, but was never able to interest Hollywood in a film version of the work; he passed it along to his son Michael Douglas (a popular actor/filmmaker in his own right), who eventually brought it to the screen to great success.During the '60s, Douglas continued to star in such films as John Huston's The List of Adrian Messenger (1963) and John Frankenheimer's Seven Days in May (1964), both of which he also produced. He began directing some of his films in the early '70s, scoring his greatest success as the director, star, and producer for Posse (1975), a Western in which he played a U.S. marshal eager for political gain. Though he continued to appear in films, by the '80s Douglas began volunteering much of his time to civic duties. Since 1963, he had worked as a Goodwill Ambassador for the State Department and the USIA, and, in 1981, his many contributions earned him the highest civilian award given in the U.S., the Presidential Medal of Freedom. For his public service, Douglas was also given the Jefferson Award in 1983. Two years later, the French government dubbed him Chevalier of the Legion of Honor for his artistic contributions. Other awards included the American Cinema Award (1987), the German Golden Kamera Award (1988), and the National Board of Review's Career Achievement Award (1989). In 1995, the same year he suffered a debilitating stroke, Douglas was presented with an honorary Oscar by the Academy; four years later, he was the recipient of the American Film Institute's Lifetime Achievement Award, an honor that was accompanied by a screening of 16 of his films. In addition to his film work, Douglas has also written two novels: Dance with the Devil (1990) and The Secret (1992). He published his autobiography, The Ragman's Son, in 1988.In March of 2009, Douglas starred Before I Forget, a one man show that took place at the Center Theater Group's Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City, California. All four performances of the show were filmed and later made into a documentary that eventually screened in 2010. The following year, Douglas presented the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress at the 83rd Academy Awards.

Trivia: Australian-born Dame Judith Anderson (she was knighted in 1960) was for nearly 70 years one of the foremost Shakespearian actresses of the stage, playing everything from Lady MacBeth to Portia to Hamlet (yes, Hamlet). In films, she was Cruella DeVil--over and over again. Perhaps this is an oversimplification, but it is true that movies seldom took full advantage of Anderson's versatility and rich speaking voice, opting instead to confine her to unsympathetic roles on the basis of her hard, cruel facial features. She made her first film appearance as an incongrously sexy temptress in 1933's Blood Money; seven years later, she essayed her most famous screen role, the obsessed housekeeper Mrs. Danvers in Rebecca (1940). For the rest of her career, she was apparently regarded by Hollywood as an alternate for Gale Sondergaard in roles calling for refined truculence. She played the New York society dragon who "keeps" weak-willed Vincent Price in Laura (1944), the sinister wife of tormented farmer Edward G. Robinson in The Red House (1948), the imperious Queen Herodias in Salome (1953) and the wicked stepmother of Jerry Lewis in Cinderfella (1960). Some of Judith Anderson's later film roles allowed her a modicum of audience empathy, notably the aged Sioux Indian matriarch in A Man Called Horse (1970) and the High Priestess of the Vulcans in Star Trek IV: The Search for Spock (1984).

Trivia: Roman Bohnen studied at the prestigious Munich Business School, then completed his education in his home state at the University of Minnesota. Rechannelled into an acting career, Bohnen worked in many a Broadway and Theatre Guild production before being brought to films by producer Walter Wanger in 1938. Generally cast as rheumy-eyed, defeated old men, Bohnen was brilliant as the pathetic Candy in Of Mice and Men (1939) and the disastrously well-intentioned prison warden in Brute Force (1947). His other screen roles included the title character's father in Song of Bernadette (1943), Captain Ernst Roehm in The Hitler Gang (1944) and Pat Denny in The Best Years of Our Lives. A co-founder of the politically controversial Actors Lab, Roman Bohnen died on stage while appearing in the Lab's production Distant Isle.

Trivia: Actor Darryl Hickman was discovered at age three by kiddie-troupe entrepreneur Ethel Meglin, to whom Hickman's insurance salesman father had sold a policy. Whenever young Hickman would ask his ambitious mother exactly why he was trodding the boards with Meglin's Kiddies, she would reply, "But, dear, it's what you've always wanted." Hickman's first movie was a minor role in If I Were King (1938), followed by a better, critically lauded role in Bing Crosby's The Star Maker (1939). After free-lancing for several seasons, Hickman signed a five-year MGM contract, which he later considered a mixed blessing in that, while his roles were good ones, he grew up much too quickly for his tastes. During the 1940s, Hickman often played the film's leading adult character as a child: young Ira Gershwin in Rhapsody in Blue (1945), young Eddie Rickenbacker in Captain Eddie (1945), and so on. Hickman's first mature role, for which he garnered a passel of excellent reviews, was as Clark Gable's son in 1949's Any Number Can Play. Weary of the Hollywood game in 1951, Hickman entered a monastery, but quit this austere existence after 18 months to enroll in Loyola University. Some of Hickman's better adult roles after his Army service included a meaty part in 1956's Tea and Sympathy and a starring part on the 1961 Civil War-based TV series The Americans. In the late 1950s, Hickman found that his fame had been eclipsed by his younger brother Dwayne, who co-starred on TV's Bob Cummings Show and played the lead in the weekly sitcom Dobie Gillis. Like Dwayne, Darryl eventually went into the production side of the business as a CBS executive, though he was still willing to take a part if the project interested him (as 1976's Network obviously did). Darryl Hickman was married to actress Pamela Lincoln, whom he met on the set of The Tingler (1959).

Trivia: Janis Wilson was a juvenile actress who appeared in several movies during the 1940s.

Trivia: A sadly neglected supporting actress, Ann Doran played everything from Charley Chase's foil in Columbia two-reelers of the late '30s to James Dean's mother in Rebel Without a Cause (1955) and also guest starred in such television shows as Superman, Petticoat Junction, Bewitched, and The A Team. A former child model and the daughter of silent screen actress Rose Allen (1885-1977), Doran made her screen bow in Douglas Fairbanks' Robin Hood (1922) but then spent the next 12 years or so getting herself an education. She returned to films in 1934 and joined the Columbia short subject department two years later. While with Columbia, Doran worked on all of Frank Capra's films save Lost Horizon (1937) and she later toiled for both Paramount and Warner Bros., often receiving fine reviews but always missing out on the one role that may have made her a star. Appearing in more than 500 films and television shows (her own count), Doran worked well into the 1980s, often unbilled but always a noticeable presence.

Trivia: Moonfaced American actor Frank Orth came to films from vaudeville, where he was usually co-billed with wife Ann Codee. Orth and Codee continued appearing together in a series of two-reel comedies in the early '30s, before he graduated to features with 1935's The Unwelcome Stranger. From that point until his retirement in 1959, Orth usually found himself behind a counter in his film appearances, playing scores of pharmacists, grocery clerks and bartenders. He had a semi-recurring role as Mike Ryan in MGM's Dr. Kildare series, and was featured as a long-suffering small town cop in Warners' Nancy Drew films. Orth was an apparent favorite of the casting department at 20th Century-Fox, where he received many of his credited screen roles. From 1951 through 1953, Frank Orth was costarred as Lieutenant Farraday on the Boston Blackie TV series.

Trivia: American actor James Flavin was groomed as a leading man when he first arrived in Hollywood in 1932, but he balked at the glamour treatment and was demonstrably resistant to being buried under tons of makeup. Though Flavin would occasionally enjoy a leading role--notably in the 1932 serial The Airmail Mystery, co-starring Flavin's wife Lucille Browne--the actor would devote most of his film career to bit parts. If a film featured a cop, process server, Marine sergeant, circus roustabout, deckhand or political stooge, chances are Jimmy Flavin was playing the role. His distinctive sarcastic line delivery and chiselled Irish features made him instantly recognizable, even if he missed being listed in the cast credits. Larger roles came Flavin's way in King Kong (1933) as Second Mate Briggs; Nightmare Alley (1947), as the circus owner who hires Tyrone Power; and Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff (1949), as a long-suffering homicide detective. Since he worked with practically everyone, James Flavin was invaluable in later years as a source of on-set anecdotes for film historians; and because he evidently never stopped working, Flavin and his wife Lucille were able to spend their retirement years in comfort in their lavish, sprawling Hollywood homestead.

Trivia: With two solid decades of stage experience to his credit, Charles D. Brown made his talking-picture bow in 1929's The Dance of Life. At first, Brown's bland features and flat voice made him difficult to cast, but by the time he'd reached his fifties, he was very much in demand for authoritative roles. Brown was frequently cast as a detective, though his unruffled demeanor made him a valuable "surprise" killer in more than one murder mystery. Charles D. Brown died in 1948, not long after completing his role in RKO's Follow Me Quietly (1950).

Trivia: Actor Matt McHugh was born into a show business family, joining his parents, his brother Frank, and his sister Kitty in the family stock company as soon as he learned to talk. Matt came to Hollywood to repeat his stage role in the 1931 film adaptation of Elmer Rice's Broadway hit Street Scene. He continued to have sizeable film assignments for the next few years (notably the bourgeois Italian bridegroom Francesco in Laurel and Hardy's The Devil's Brother [1933]) before settling into bits and minor roles. A dead ringer for his more famous brother Frank McHugh, Matt projected an abrasive, sardonic screen image; as such, he was utilized in such rough-edged roles as cab drivers, bartenders and mechanics. Matt McHugh's best screen opportunities in the '40s came with his supporting roles in the 2-reel comedy output of Columbia Pictures; he appeared in the short comedies of Andy Clyde, Hugh Herbert, Walter Catlett, The Three Stooges and many others, most often cast as a lazy or caustic brother-in-law.

Trivia: A beautiful brunette starlet of the 1940s, Catherine Craig (born Feltus) retired from the screen in 1949 to devote herself to being Mrs. Robert Preston. They had met while studying at the famous Pasadena Playhouse and both were awarded contracts with Paramount shortly after their 1940 wedding. But while Preston quickly established himself as a dependable second lead and, later, a star in his own right, Craig languished in typical starlet assignments. She is perhaps best-remembered for playing one of Rita Hayworth's many sisters in the 1942 musical You Were Never Lovelier (1942) and as John Calvert's leading lady in the ersatz Falcon whodunit Appointment With Murder (1948). She should not be confused with earlier silent era Catherine Craig (aka Katherine Craig).

Trivia: Muscle-bound Mexican-born character actor Max Wagner kept busy in films from 1931 to 1957. Seldom given a line to speak, Wagner showed up in innumerable small roles as thugs, sailors, bodyguards, cabbies, and moving men. In one of his better-known assignments, he played an actor pretending to be the gangster character played by Barton MacLaine in the film-within-a-film segment in Bullets or Ballots (1936). Max Wagner's thick Latino accent served him well in such brief roles as the bull-farm attendant in Laurel and Hardy's The Bullfighters (1945).

Trivia: Lanky character actor Tom Fadden first trod the boards when he joined an Omaha stock company in 1915. Fadden went on to tour in top vaudeville with his actress wife Genevieve. From 1932 to 1939, he was seen on Broadway in such productions as Nocturne and Our Town. He made his first film in 1939. Fadden's better-known screen roles include the tollhouse keeper in It's a Wonderful Life (1946)--which led to choice appearances in subsequent Frank Capra productions--and "possessed" townman Ira in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). In 1958, he was seen on a weekly basis as Silas Perry on TV's Cimarron City. Tom Fadden's cinematic swan song was 1977's Empire of the Ants.

Trivia: Mountainous American actor Bert Roach reportedly launched his film career at the Keystone Studios in 1914. The porcine Mr. Roach remained in comedy during his years of comparative prominence in the '20s, providing jovial support to the romantic leads in such films as Tin Hats (1927). In talkies, Roach occasionally enjoyed a substantial role, notably as Leon Waycoff's whining roomate in Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932). In general, Bert Roach's talkie career consisted of featured and bit parts, often as a sentimental inebriate (e.g. 1932's Night World and 1934's The Thin Man).

Trivia: Actor Robert Emmett Homans seemingly had the map of Ireland stamped on his craggy face. As a result, Homans spent the better part of his film career playing law enforcement officers of all varieties, from humble patrolmen to detective chiefs. After a lengthy stage career, Homans entered films in 1923. A break from his usual microscopic film assignments occured in Public Enemy (1931), where Homans is given an opportunity to deliver reams of exposition (with a pronounced brogue) during a funeral sequence. And in the 1942 Universal horror programmer Night Monster, Robert Emmett Homans is alotted a sizeable role as the ulcerated detective investigating the supernatural goings-on at the home of seemingly helpless invalid Ralph Morgan.

Trivia: After stock experience in New England and a starring role in a Broadway flop, American actor John Kellogg was selected to play the lead in the road company of the long-running service comedy Brother Rat. He continued working steadily on stage until interrupted by World War II service. After a smattering of movie exposure at other studios, Kellogg signed a Columbia contract in 1946. Good-looking and dependable enough for secondary roles but not quite star material, Kellogg was seen in such films as Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1943), A Walk in the Sun (1945), Johnny O'Clock (1947) and 12 O'Clock High (1949).

Trivia: Her dignity usually in shambles by the end of the first reel, imposing-looking comedienne Kay Deslys hailed from a family of music hall entertainers. Reportedly on stage from the age of five, Deslys -- who presumably took her professional moniker in honor of musical comedy star Gaby Deslys (her real name was Kathleen Herbert) -- later appeared in vaudeville in both Canada and the U.S., and was for a time a member of the Gus Edwards troupe. She entered pictures in 1923 and later earned her modicum of fame as a foil for the team of Laurel & Hardy in such two-reelers as We Faw Down ([1928] as one of the floozies) and Should Married Men Go Home? ([1928] as Hardy's wife). Married to actor/theater owner Jack Baxley (1884-1950), Deslys appeared in literally hundreds of bit parts until her retirement in 1952. She later worked as a saleswoman at Mandel's, a Los Angeles shoe retailer.

Trivia: Character actor Bob Perry made his film debut as Tuxedo George in 1928's Me Gangster. For the rest of his Hollywood career, Perry popped up in brief roles as bartenders, croupiers, referees, guards, and the like. Many of his characters were on the wrong side of the law, and few of them spoke when shooting or slugging would do. Bob Perry kept busy in films until 1949, when he retired at the reported age of 70.

Trivia: The younger brother of actress Jobyna Howland, Olin Howland established himself on Broadway in musical comedy. The actor made his film debut in 1918, but didn't really launch his Hollywood career until the talkie era. Generally cast as rustic characters, Howland could be sly or slow-witted, depending on the demands of the role. He showed up in scores of Warner Bros. films in the 1930s and 1940s, most amusingly as the remonstrative Dr. Croker (sic) in The Case of the Lucky Legs (1934). A favorite of producer David O. Selznick, Howland played the laconic baggage man in Nothing Sacred (1937), the grim, hickory-stick wielding schoolmaster in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1938) and an expansive Yankee businessman in Gone with the Wind (1939). During the 1940s, he could often as not be found at Republic, appearing in that studio's westerns and hillbilly musicals. One of his best screen assignments of the 1950s was the old derelict who kept shouting "Make me sergeant in charge of booze!" in the classic sci-fier Them (1954). Howland made several TV guest appearances in the 1950s, and played the recurring role of Swifty on the weekly Circus Boy (1956). In the latter stages of his career, Olin Howland billed himself as Olin Howlin; he made his final appearance in 1958, as the first victim of The Blob.

Trivia: American filmmaker Blake Edwards was the grandson of J. Gordon Edwards, director of such silent film epics as The Queen of Sheba (1922). Blake started his own film career as an actor in 1943; he played bits in A-movies and leads in B-movies, paying his dues in such trivialities as Gangs of the Waterfront and Strangler of the Swamp (both 1945). He turned to writing radio scripts, distinguishing himself on the above-average Dick Powell detective series Richard Diamond. As a screenwriter and staff producer at Columbia, Edwards was frequently teamed with director Richard Quine for such lightweight entertainment as Sound Off (1952), Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder (1953), and Cruisin' Down the River (1953). He also served as associate producer on the popular syndicated Rod Cameron TV vehicle City Detective the same year. Given his first chance to direct a movie in 1955, Edwards turned out a Richard Quine-like musical, Bring Your Smile Along; ironically, as Edwards' prestige grew, his style would be imitated by Quine. A felicitous contract at Universal led Edwards to his first big box-office successes, including the Tony Curtis film Mister Cory (1957) and Cary Grant's Operation Petticoat (1959).In 1958, Edwards produced, directed, and occasionally wrote for a hip TV detective series, Peter Gunn, which was distinguished by its film noir camerawork and driving jazz score by Henry Mancini. A second series, Mr. Lucky (1959), contained many of the elements that made Peter Gunn popular, but suffered from a bad time slot and network interference. (Lucky was a gambler, a profession frowned upon by the more sanctimonious CBS executives.) The show did, however, introduce Edwards to actor Ross Martin, who later appeared as an asthmatic criminal in Edwards' film Experiment in Terror (1962). Continuing to turn out box-office bonanzas like Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961) and Days of Wine and Roses (1962), Edwards briefly jumped on the comedy bandwagon of the mid-'60s with the slapstick epic The Great Race (1965), which the director dedicated to his idols, "Mr. Laurel and Mr. Hardy." (Edwards' next homage to the duo was the far less successful 1986 comedy A Fine Mess). In 1964, Edwards introduced the bumbling Inspector Clouseau to an unsuspecting world in The Pink Panther, leading to a string of money-spinning Clouseau films starring Peter Sellers; actually, The Pink Panther was Edwards' second Clouseau movie, since A Shot in the Dark, although released after Panther, was filmed first. Despite the carefree spirit and great success of his comedies, Edwards hit a snag with Darling Lili (1969), a World War I musical starring Edwards' wife Julie Andrews. The film was a questionable piece to begin with (audiences were asked to sympathize with a German spy who cheerfully sent young British pilots to their deaths), but was made incomprehensible by Paramount's ruthless editing. Darling Lili sent Edwards career into decline, although he came back with the 1979 comedy hit 10 and the scabrous satirical film S.O.B. (1981). Edwards' track record in the 1980s and '90s was uneven, with such films as Blind Date (1987), Sunset (1988), and Switch (1991). The director was also unsuccessful in his attempts to revive the Pink Panther comedies minus the services of Sellers (who had died in 1980) as Clouseau. Still, Edwards always seemed able to find someone to bankroll his projects. And he left something of a legacy to Hollywood through his actress daughter Jennifer Edwards and screenwriter son Geoffrey Edwards.In 2004, just when the world began to think it might never again hear from Edwards, the filmmaker gave a slapsticky acceptance speech in response to an honorary Academy Award. He died six years later, of complications from pneumonia, at the age of 88.

Trivia: Kernan Cripps was recruited from the Broadway stage to play Trask in the early talkie melodrama Alibi (1929). This proved to be Cripps' most extensive screen role; thereafter, he was consigned to bits and minor roles, usually as muscle-bound cops, bodyguards and bartenders. Looking quite comfortable in uniform, he essayed such roles as the umpire in the baseball comedy Ladies Day (1943) and the train conductor in the noir classic Double Indemnity (1944). Kernan Cripps also proved to be a handy man to have around in such action-packed fare as the Republic serial Federal Operator 99.

Trivia: An elderly character actor from Belfast, Northern Ireland, white-haired, distracted-looking Thomas Louden began popping up in Hollywood movies in the late '30s, playing the priest in Prison Break (1938), Madeleine Carroll's butler in Honeymoon in Bali (1939), Mr. Verger in Mrs. Miniver (1942), Old Tom in The Corn Is Green (1946), and Barbara Stanwyck's butler in The Strange Case of Martha Ivers (1946). He died of a stroke in his Hollywood home.

Trivia: Bespectacled American actor Walter Baldwin was already a venerable stage performer at the time he appeared in his first picture, 1940's Angels over Broadway. With a pinched Midwestern countenance that enabled him to portray taciturn farmers, obsequious grocery store clerks and the occasional sniveling coward, Baldwin was a familiar (if often unbilled) presence in Hollywood films for three decades. Possibly Baldwin's most recognizable role was as Mr. Parrish in Sam Goldwyn's multi-Oscar winning The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), for which the actor received thirteenth billing. He also had a prime opportunity to quiver and sweat as a delivery man whose truck is commandeered by homicidal prison escapee Robert Middleton in The Desperate Hours (1955). Seemingly ageless, Walter Baldwin made his last film appearance three years before his death in 1969's Hail Hero.