Trivia: American actor Robert Conrad was a graduate of Northwestern University, spending his first few years out of school supporting himself and his family by driving a milk truck and singing in a Chicago cabaret. Conrad befriended up-and-coming actor Nick Adams during this period, and it was Adams who helped Conrad get his first Hollywood work in 1957. A few movie bit parts later, Conrad was signed for a comparative pittance by Warner Bros. studios, and in 1959 was cast as detective Tom Lopaka on the weekly adventure series Hawaiian Eye. Upon the 1963 cancellation of this series, Conrad made a handful of Spanish and American films and toured with a nightclub act in Australia and Mexico City. Cast as frontier secret agent James West in The Wild Wild West in 1965, Conrad brought home $5000 a week during the series' first season and enjoyed increasing remunerations as West remained on the air until 1969. There are those who insist that Wild Wild West would have been colorless without the co-starring presence of Ross Martin, an opinion with which Conrad has always agreed. The actor's bid to star in a 1970 series based on the venerable Nick Carter pulp stories got no further than a pilot episode, while the Jack Webb-produced 1971 Robert Conrad series The D.A. was cancelled after 13 episodes. When Roy Scheider pulled out of the 1972 adventure weekly Assignment: Vienna, Conrad stepped in--and was out, along with the rest of Assignment: Vienna, by June of 1973. Conrad had better luck with 1976's Baa Baa Black Sheep, aka Black Sheep Squadron, a popular series based on the World War II exploits of Major "Pappy" Boyington. Cast as a nurse on this series was Conrad's daughter Nancy, setting a precedent for nepotism that the actor practiced as late as his tenth TV series, 1989's Jesse Hawkes, wherein Conrad co-starred with his sons Christian and Shane. Though few of his series have survived past season one, Conrad has enjoyed success as a commercial spokesman and in the role of G. Gordon Liddy (whom the actor admired) in the 1982 TV movie Will, G. Gordon Liddy. As can be gathered from the Liddy assignment, Conrad's politics veered towards conservatism; in 1981, he and Charlton Heston were instrumental in toppling Ed Asner and his liberal contingent from power in the Screen Actors Guild. As virile and athletic as ever in the 1990s, Robert Conrad has continued to appear in action roles both on TV and in films; he has also maintained strong ties with his hometown of Chicago, and can be counted upon to show up at a moment's notice as a guest on the various all-night programs of Chicago radio personality Eddie Schwartz.

Trivia: Born in Grodek, Poland, the erudite actor received an M.A. in psychometrics and a law degree before he turned to performing as half of a comedy team known as Ross & West. On film, he was notable and frightening in Experiment in Terror (1962). Following an undistinguished but busy TV career in the '50s, Martin became one of television's most brilliant chararacter actors. As a regular on the charades-like game shows The Ad-Libbers (1951), Pantomime Quiz (1950-1963), and Stump the Stars (1962-63), he had the chance to show off his lightning mind and acting facility. After playing a supporting role on The Sheriff of Cochise (1956-1960), he costarred as Andamo on Mr. Lucky (1959-60). Martin finally found his niche as TV's "man of a thousand faces" -- Secret Service agent Artemus Gordon -- on the humorous cult spy spoof/western/science fiction series The Wild, Wild West (1965-1969) with Robert Conrad as James West. The show gave him an opportunity to display his acting virtuosity, as he used multiple disguises and accents in almost every episode. Sidelined by a major heart attack near the end of the series and replaced by look-alike Charles Aidman, Martin did mostly guest shots and cartoon voiceovers thereafter. His directing credits include Here's Lucy (1968-74).

Trivia: The son of a Buffalo physician, Sorrell Booke was encouraged from an early age to entertain his relatives with jokes, songs, and imitations. An inveterate radio fan, young Booke would send away to the major networks for copies of scripts, then act out all the parts -- a different voice for each character -- in the privacy of his room. He turned his hobby into a vocation after high school, appearing with frequency in locally produced dramatic radio programs. While attending Columbia and Yale, Booke spent his summers playing old men in various stock companies, then appeared with the Provincetown Playhouse in Massachusetts. During the Korean War, Booke spent two years in counterintelligence, where his mastery of five languages came in handy. After making his Broadway debut in 1955, Booke understudied Tom Bosley in Fiorello! and created the role of bombastic white supremacist Ol' Captain Cotchipee in Ossie Davis' Purlie Victorious, repeating the latter assignment in the 1963 film version. For all his greyed-up character parts, Booke's most fondly remembered role of the early '60s was the mentally retarded brother of Martin Balsam in an episode of TV's Dr. Kildare. Likewise essayed with unexpected subtlety and sensitivity were his characters in the theatrical features Bye Bye Braverman (1968) and Up the Down Staircase (1970). But neither subtlety nor sensitivity were required for Booke's signature role: the lovably larcenous Jefferson Davis "Boss" Hogg on the weekly adventure series The Dukes of Hazzard (1979-1985). Sorrell Booke's last film assignment was a typically blustery voice-over in the animated feature Rock-a-Doodle; he died of cancer in 1994, just one month after his 64th birthday.

Trivia: Dynamic African American leading man and character actor William Marshall trained in both grand opera and Shakespeare. In films from 1952, the NYU-educated Marshall didn't really hit it big until the "blaxploitation" era of the 1970s. He starred in the better-than-you'd-think contemporary vampire melodrama Blacula (1972) and its just-as-bad-as-it-sounds sequel, Scream Blacula Scream (1973). From 1987 to 1989, William Marshall was seen as the King of Cartoons on the Saturday morning TV kiddie show Pee-wee's Playhouse, a job he accepted on behalf of his grandchildren, who weren't yet permitted to see the Blacula flicks.