Trivia: Following World War II, California native Jack Webb planned to renew the art studies that he'd abandoned for the military. Instead, he turned to acting, appearing on various San Francisco-based radio programs. He briefly hosted his own satirical comedy series before finding his true metier in detective melodramas. In collaboration with future Oscar-winning screenwriter Richard L. Breen (who remained a Webb associate until his death in 1967), Webb concocted a hard-boiled private eye show entitled Pat Novak for Hire. The popularity he gained from this effort enabled Webb to secure small film roles -- one of these was as a police lab technician in the 1948 film noir He Walked by Night (1948). Intrigued by the police procedure he'd learned while preparing for the role, Webb immersed himself in the subject until he felt ready to launch what many observers still consider the first realistic radio cop show: Dragnet, which premiered June 3, 1949. Webb carried over his terse characterization of L.A. police sergeant Joe Friday into the Dragnet TV series (which he also directed) beginning in 1952. Armed with a bottomless reserve of police terminology and a colorful repertoire of catchphrases, the laconic, ferret-faced Webb became one of the most successful -- and most widely imitated -- TV personalities of the 1950s; almost always in the Top Ten, Dragnet, produced by Webb's own Mark VII Productions, ran until 1959. Webb's newfound industry clout permitted him to direct for the big screen as well -- his 1950s movie credits (outside of such pre-star efforts as The Men, Sunset Boulevard, and Halls of Montezuma) include the 1954 feature version of Dragnet, 1955's Pete Kelly's Blues (based on another of Webb's radio series), 1957's The D.I., and 1959's 30. In addition, Webb's Mark VII produced such TV series as Noah's Ark, The D.A.'s Man, and the video version of Pete Kelly's Blues. Webb kicked off the 1960s with a rare attempt at directing comedy, The Last Time I Saw Archie (1961). From 1962 through 1964, he was in charge of Warner Bros.' television division, an assignment which came to an end as a result of several failed TV ventures. A 1966 TV-movie version of Dragnet kicked off Webb's second career. He went on to star in a successful weekly Dragnet revival, which ran from 1967 through 1970, while his Mark VII outfit was responsible for a score of TV series, the most successful of which were Emergency and Adam 12. Regarded as something of a relic by the "hipper" viewers, Jack Webb nonetheless remained profitably active in television until the late '70s; he might have continued into the 1980s had not his drinking and smoking habits accelerated his death at the age of 62. Married three times, Jack Webb's first wife was singing star Julie London, whom he'd first met when he was 21 and she was 15.

Trivia: Until his death at 74 from a heart attack, Liam Sullivan was a very busy actor on television and in theater, and in the former medium, he made a career specializing almost exclusively in erudite villains (or, at least, luckless ambitious men). A native of Jacksonville, IL, Sullivan was descended from W.E. Sullivan, the founder of the renowned Eli Bridge Company; the latter conpany became famous for popularizing the Ferris wheel, and a century later remains a mainstay of the amusement ride industry. Liam Sullivan, however, decided to go into a different end of the entertainment field, acting in local theater while attending Illinois College and later studying drama at Harvard University. His patrician good looks and dashing persona, coupled with a good range, enabled him to take a large variety of parts: playboys, rogues, heroes. In his younger days, he'd have made a perfect Rupert of Hentzau in The Prisoner of Zenda. Sullivan's Broadway credits included The Constant Wife with Katherine Cornell, and Love's Labours Lost, both in the early 1950s; and, in the 1960s, Mike Nichols' production of The Little Foxes. Though he also did theatrical work in Los Angeles, Sullivan didn't make too many movie appearances: Disney's That Darn Cat (as Agent Sullivan, no less) and Bert I. Gordon's The Magic Sword were probably his two most widely seen films.His television career, however, which began at the start of the 1950s on live shows such as Lights Out, afforded Sullivan a busy career across four decades. He was on the soap opera General Hospital, but was also a familiar figure in prime-time series, including westerns such as Have Gun Will Travel, The Virginian, Bonanza, and The Monroes (a series in which he had a regular role as a villain); but also in science fiction (Lost In Space), crime dramas (The Fugitive, Dragnet), and comedies (Gomer Pyle, USMC). On Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, in the episode "Leviathan," he plays an ambitious scientist whose undersea discovery results in his undergoing a hideous transformation and a horrible fate; in the Star Trek episode "Plato's Stepchildren," he made a memorable impression as a humanoid alien (working opposite Barbara Babcock in a sadistic role), glib-tongued, erudite, and perfectly at ease manipulating and attempting to kill people with his telekinetic power. He also starred in one of the more widely remembered Twilight Zone shows, "The Silence," playing a man who accepts a bet from a social rival that he can go for a year without uttering a single word. Sullivan's best performance, however, was in the 1968 Dragnet episode "The Big Prophet," as William Bentley, an academic-turned-guru (obviously inspired by Timothy Leary) whose public espousal of drug use results in a confrontation with the police. Sullivan was at his most waspish (in a manner reminiscent of Clifton Webb's Waldo Lydecker from Laura) in the three-man drama, made up entirely of his verbal sparring with series stars Jack Webb and Harry Morgan. He was still working regularly in the 1990s, right up to the time of his death, a month before his 75th birthday.