Trivia: Angela Lansbury received an Oscar nomination for her first film, Gaslight, in 1944, and has been winning acting awards and audience favor ever since. Born in London to a family that included both politicians and performers, Lansbury came to the U.S. during World War II. She made notable early film appearances as the snooty sister in National Velvet (1944); the pathetic singer in The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), which garnered her another Academy nomination; and the madam-with-a-heart-of-gold saloon singer in The Harvey Girls (1946). She turned evil as the manipulative publisher in State of the Union (1948), but was just as convincing as the good queen in The Three Musketeers (1948) and the petulant daughter in The Court Jester (1956). She received another Oscar nomination for her chilling performance as Laurence Harvey's scheming mother in The Manchurian Candidate (1962) and appeared as the addled witch in Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971), among other later films. On Broadway, she won Tony awards for the musicals Mame (1966), Dear World (1969), the revival of Gypsy (1975), Sweeney Todd (1979) and, at age 82, for the play Blithe Spirit (2009). Despite a season in the '50s on the game show Pantomime Quiz, she came to series television late, starring in 1984-1996 as Jessica Fletcher in Murder, She Wrote; she took over as producer of the show in the '90s. She returned to the Disney studios to record the voice of Mrs. Potts in Beauty and the Beast (1991) and to sing the title song and later reprised the role in the direct-to-video sequel, The Enchanted Christmas (1997). Lansbury is the sister of TV producer Bruce Lansbury.

Trivia: Born Suzanne Burce, she began singing on radio while still a child, then entered films in musical roles at age 15; she soon became popular for her appealing screen persona and coloratura soprana voice. Powell played leads in a number of films, usually portraying sweet maidens in the midst of a first love. She peaked around 1954, then as she grew older she was unable to find suitable roles. She retired from the screen in 1958 but appeared in stock, nightclubs, and on TV. In 1973 she starred in the Broadway revival of the musical Irene. Married several times, her husbands have included writer-producer David Parlour and former child star Dickie Moore. She authored an autobiography, The Girl Next Door ... And How She Grew (1988).

Trivia: American actress Eileen Brennan was the daughter of Jean Manahan, a moderately successful silent screen actress. Brennan studied at both Georgetown University and the American Academy of Dramatic Art before making her mark as star of the 1959 off-Broadway musical Little Mary Sunshine. Brennan was among the first-season stars of TV's Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In, essentially doing hilarious variations of her simpering "Mary Sunshine" persona. With her 1970s film appearances in The Last Picture Show (1971), The Sting (1972) and Hustle (1974) came the world-weary, hard-bitten characterizations with which she built her movie following. She was nominated for an Oscar for her expert interpretation of an army sergeant in Goldie Hawn's Private Benjamin (1980), then recreated the role for the 1981 TV sitcom version of this film (which won her an Emmy). While filming the TV Benjamin, Brennan was seriously injured in a car accident. The recovery was long and painful, but by 1985 she was back at work, as caustic as ever in recent films as Clue (1985), White Palace (1991) and the Last Picture Show sequel Texasville (1990). She continued to work steadily in a variety of projects including Murder So Sweet and 1995's Freaky Friday. She also made guest appearances on various T shows including Murder, She Wrote, E/R, Mad About You, and Touched By an Angel. In the 21st century she could be seen in Jeepers Creepers and Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous. Brennan passed away in 2013. She was 80 years old.

Trivia: Muscular leading man Ed Nelson started out as a member of quickie-filmmaker Roger Corman's stock company, appearing in such drive-in fodder as Hot Rod Girl (1956), Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957) and Cry Baby Killer. In these and other low-budgeters of the late 1950s, Nelson not only starred, but doubled on the technical crew: he was one of several production assistants portraying the title crustacean in The Attack of the Crab Monsters (1956), and designed and operated the parasite props in 1958's The Brain Eaters, which he also produced. Eventually outgrowing such things, Nelson rose to TV stardom as Dr. Michael Rossi on the prime time soap opera Peyton Place, which ran from 1964 through 1969. He later starred as Ward Fuller on The Silent Force (1970) and as Dr. Michael Wise in Doctor's Private Lives (1979). In 1969, Nelson hosted a daily, syndicated talk show, which he was ultimately forced to give up when he decided to enter politics ("conflict of interests" and "equal time" were still considerations back then). He played President Truman several times, including the 1980 TV movie Enola Gay: The Men, the Mission, the Atomic Bomb, in the 1992 Brooke Shields flick Brenda Starr and onstage in Give 'Em Hell, Harry. Nelson died in 2014 at age 85.

Trivia: A holder of an economics degree from Philadelphia's Temple University, Philly-born actor Robert Prosky kicked off his career by winning a televised talent contest. With his sharp-edged voice and mashed-potato features, Prosky rose to prominence as a character actor, spending 23 years with Washington, D.C.'s prestigious Arena Stage. In 1983, he was cast in the original Broadway production of Glengarry Glen Ross, winning a Tony award for his performance; he later received excellent notices for his performance as an aging Soviet bureaucrat in A Walk in the Woods. Prosky's first film role was as the backstabbing mob boss in 1981's Thief. Since that time, he has graced several films in a variety of roles -- few more likable than the wistful, washed-up horror show host in Gremlins 2 (1988), the TV station manager in Mrs. Doubtfire, and the enigmatic projectionist in Last Action Hero (1993). Among Robert Prosky's many TV assignments was the regular role of Sgt. Stan Jablonski, who in 1984 took over the morning roll call from the late Sgt. Phil Esterhaus (Michael Conrad) in Hill Street Blues.

Trivia: While growing up in Chicago, Tom Bosley dreamed of becoming the star left-fielder for the Cubs. As it turned out, the closest Bosley got to organized athletics was a sportscasting class at DePauw University. After additional training at the Radio Institute of Chicago and two years' practical experience in various dramatic radio programs and stock companies, he left for New York in 1950. Five years of odd jobs and summer-theater stints later, he landed his first off-Broadway role, playing Dupont-Dufort in Jean Anouilh's Thieves' Carnival. Steadier work followed at the Arena Theatre in Washington, D.C.; then in 1959, Bosley landed the starring role in the Broadway musical Fiorello!, picking up a Tony Award, an ANTA Award, and the New York Drama Critics Award in the bargain. In 1963, he made his film bow as Natalie Wood's "safe and secure" suitor Anthony Colombo in Love With the Proper Stranger. Occasionally cast as two-bit criminals or pathetic losers (he sold his eyes to blind millionairess Joan Crawford in the Spielberg-directed Night Gallery TV movie), Bosley was most often seen as a harried suburban father. After recurring roles on such TV series as That Was the Week That Was, The Debbie Reynolds Show, and The Sandy Duncan Show, Bosley was hired by Hanna-Barbera to provide the voice of flustered patriarch Howard Boyle on the animated sitcom Wait Til Your Father Gets Home (1972-1973). This served as a dry run of sorts for his most famous series-TV assignment: Howard Cunningham, aka "Mr. C," on the immensely popular Happy Days (1974-1983). The warm, familial ambience of the Happy Days set enabled Bosley to weather the tragic death of his first wife, former dancer Jean Elliot, in 1978. In addition to his Happy Days duties, Bosley was narrator of the syndicated documentary That's Hollywood (1977-1981). From 1989 to 1991, he starred on the weekly series The Father Dowling Mysteries, and thereafter was seen on an occasional basis as down-to-earth Cabot Cove sheriff Amos Tupper on Murder, She Wrote. Reportedly as kind, generous, and giving as his Happy Days character, Tom Bosley has over the last 20 years received numerous honors for his many civic and charitable activities.

Trivia: Actor Clu Gulager started out as the latest in a long line of Brando/Dean "method" types in the late 1950s. Gulager's searing interpretation of Mad Dog Coll on a 1959 episode of The Untouchables, coupled with his multi-faceted portrayal of Billy the Kid on the TV western series The Tall Man (1960-62) gained him a brief fan following. He was also quite impressive as Lee Marvin's fellow hit man in The Killers (1964), which would have been the very first made-for-TV movie had not its excessive violence necessitated a theatrical release. Turning prematurely gray in the late 1960s, Gulager went on to play flinty authority figures on such weekly series as The Survivors (1969), San Francisco International Airport (1971) and The MacKenzies of Paradise Cove (1979). He was also seen in numerous miniseries, most prominently as Lt. Merrick in Once an Eagle (1976) and General Sheridan in North and South II (1986). One of his better big-screen roles was Abilene in Peter Bogdanovich's The Last Picture Show (1971). Briefly entertaining notions of becoming a film director, Clu Gulager helmed the obscure 1969 short subject A Day with the Boys.

Trivia: Ex-nightclub chorine Evelyn Keyes was 18 when she was put under contract by Hollywood producer/director Cecil B. DeMille. Keyes played passive roles in DeMille's The Buccaneer (1938) and Union Pacific (1939) and a handful of Paramount "B"s. Her best opportunity came from outside the DeMille fold, when she was cast as the eternally jilted Suellen O'Hara in Gone With the Wind (1939). In 1940, she signed with Columbia, where she was featured in a handful of interesting "B"s like Boris Karlof's Before I Hang (1940) and Peter Lorre's Face Behind the Mask (1941, in which Keyes was terrific in a brief role as a blind girl). She was promoted to "A" leads with Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941), and with 1947's Mating of Millie she finally got a film vehicle all her own. She also played the Ruby Keeler counterpart (named Julie Benson) in Columbia's The Jolson Story (1946). Like many 1940s leading ladies, Keyes found the going rough in the 1950s, save for a few worthwhile (if fleeting) parts such as Tom Ewell's vacationing wife in The Seven Year Itch (1955). She retired in 1956, making an unexpected return before the cameras in a brace of late-1980s Gothic melodramas. In sum total, Keyes' screen career was dwarfed by her colorful private life. Her four husbands included directors Charles Vidor and John Huston, and bandleader Artie Shaw. In 1971 she turned to writing. Her first book was a novel, I Am as Billboard; she followed this with two very candid autobiographies, Scarlet O'Hara's Younger Sister (1977) and I'll Think About That Tomorrow (1991). Keyes died in July 2008 of uterine cancer

Trivia: Lead actor, onscreen from the early '80s.

Trivia: An actress since high school, Audrey Totter was by 1939 a well-established radio performer. Signed to an MGM contract in 1945, Totter played brittle, no-nonsense leading ladies and femme fatales in such films as The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946) and Lady in the Lake (1946). During her MGM years, Totter starred in the radio sitcom Meet Millie, but was contractually prevented from appearing in the TV version (she was replaced by Eleana Verdugo). As her film career waned, Totter agreed to sign on as a regular on the 1958 TV Western Cimarron City. In 1962, Audrey Totter co-starred with Stanley Holloway in the weekly sitcom Our Man Higgins; ten years later, she came out of retirement to play a recurring role on still another TV series, Medical Center. Her final acting role was on a 1987 episode of Murder, She Wrote. Totter died in 2013, just days before her 96th birthday.