Trivia: One of the great jazz tenor sax players, Dexter Gordon is best remembered by filmgoers for playing fictional sax player Dale Turner in Bertrand Tavernier's 'Round Midnight (1986). His realistic portrayal of a burned-out American jazz man who finds refuge in the cellar clubs of Paris earned Gordon an Oscar nomination -- making him the first instrumental musician to be so honored. Gordon made his film debut in the 1955 prison drama Unchained. His final film appearance was as a mental patient in the drama Awakenings (1990). The film was released after Gordon's death.

Trivia: One of the most prolific French actors of the 1980s and '90s, François Cluzet possesses an enviable versatility that makes him equally adept at both high comedy and straight drama. Cluzet, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Dustin Hoffman, began his screen career acting in the films of Diane Kurys. He became established over the years as one of his country's most dependable actors, as likely to play a bumbling petty criminal as a member of the May 1968 generation struggling with bourgeois ennui and moral dilemma.Born in Paris on September 21, 1955, Cluzet was first inspired to become an actor as a child, when his father would take him and his brother on weekly outings to the theatre and music hall. He quit school at the age of 17 to study drama with Jean Périmony. In 1976, he made his theatrical debut and spent the next few years working steadily on the stage. Cluzet began his film career in 1980 with a role in Diane Kurys' Cocktail Molotov, a drama set during the May 1968 protests which cast him as the best friend of one of the film's protagonists. That same year, he had a supporting part in Le Cheval d'Orgueil, the first of many films he would make with Claude Chabrol, and also broke into television. The latter medium would be one that Cluzet would return to constantly even as his film career took flight.1983 proved to be a breakthrough year for the actor, who earned two César nominations, one for his work in L'Été Meurtrier, a drama that cast him as the brother of a man in love with an unstable woman (Isabelle Adjani), and the other for his leading portrayal of a young Parisian reflecting on his Communist/anarchic upbringing in Vive la sociale! That same year, Cluzet again collaborated with Kurys in Coup de Foudre, a WWII marriage drama starring Isabelle Huppert and Miou-Miou as dissatisfied wives.In 1986, Cluzet starred in one of the most celebrated films of his career, 'Round Midnight. Bertrand Tavernier's story of a self-destructive American jazz musician (Dexter Gordon) who is befriended by a young Frenchman (Cluzet), it allowed the actor to carry a film (in tandem with the excellent Gordon) rather than merely support it. Cluzet subsequently stuck with dramas, doing strong work as ineffectual husbands in both Claire Denis's Chocolat and Claude Chabrol's Une Affaire de Femmes (both 1988), the latter of which saw him re-team with Coup de Foudre co-star Huppert. Indeed, during the early 1990s, much of the actor's energies seemed to be directed toward playing troubled husbands, as demonstrated by additional turns in Agneiszka Holland's Olivier, Olivier (1992) and Claude Chabrol's L'Enfer (1994).Cluzet has also been repeatedly cast as struggling authors in a number of films, his slightly tortured intellectual looks lending themselves well to such a profession. He did particularly notable work in this capacity in Les Apprentis (1995), in which he and Guillaume Depardieu co-starred as two losers struggling to pay the rent in Paris; Olivier Assayas' Fin août, début septembre (1998), an ensemble drama in which he played a terminally ill writer; and Dolce Far Niente (2000), which cast him as a young author dallying around the Italian countryside.

Trivia: From stage to screen to recording studios, Lonette McKee has worked as both an actress and vocalist. Although actors who also sing have been a dime a dozen since the earliest days of stage and cinema, McKee's groundbreaking performance as the first African-American actress to portray the character of Julie in a major American production of Show Boat would have earned her a place in entertainment history even if she hadn't gone on to earn Image Award nominations for her roles in To Dance With Olivia (1997) and As the World Turns. A Motor City native, McKee kicked off her career in the entertainment industry when she became a recording artist in her hometown as a young teen, releasing an album on the Detroit-based Sussex label before being drawn to the screen in the mid-'70s. Cast in a key role in the 1976 musical drama Sparkle, McKee made an impression as a drug-addicted singer in a Supremes-like band, and she quickly caught the eye of casting agents. Appearing in such features as The Cotton Club and Brewster's Millions during the '80s, it was also during this period that she essayed her Tony-nominated role in Show Boat. Spike Lee later cast her in three of his films during the '90s: Jungle Fever, Malcolm X, and He Got Game. After being voted one of People magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People in the World" in 1995, McKee began a two-year stint on the soap opera As the World Turns. She also returned to the studio in 1992 to record Natural Love, her first album in nearly 20 years. The actress alternated between film and television in the early 2000s with parts in Men of Honor (2001), Honey (2003), and a recurring role in the NBC series Third Watch. McKee is married to a New York social worker and is the sister of dancer/actress Kathrine McKee.

Trivia: French actress-turned-screenwriter, director and producer, Christine Pascal was much loved in her native country. Her most honored film was Le Petit Prince Dit/And the Little Prince Said (1992). Pascal made her film debut appearing in Michel Mitrani's Les Guichet des Louvres (1973). In her next film, L'Horloger de Saint Paul/The Clockmaker of Saint Paul (1973), Pascal began a fruitful professional association with film-critic-turned-director Bertrand Tavernier. Other Tavernier films in which she appeared include: L'Juge et l'Assassin/The Judge and the Assassin (1975) and the excellent Que La Fete Commence (1975). Other notable directors with whom she has worked include Pedro Almodovar and Diane Kurys. Pascal made her directorial debut with Le Garce (1980). She also wrote the film's screenplay. Previously, Pascal had co-scripted Tavernier's Des Enfants Gate in 1977. Her subsequent filmmaking efforts were met with interest and anticipation. Her final film was Adultere (un Mode de Emploi) (1995). Pascal apparently had mental problems and was staying in a Paris psychiatric hospital when she was found dead in her room on August 30, 1996. The death was ruled a suicide.

Trivia: Influential jazz pianist and composer Herbie Hancock has scored a number of feature films beginning with the music for Blow Up (1966). Hancock's best-known score was that for the jazz lover's delight 'Round Midnight, which won him an Oscar for Best Original Score. Hancock also appeared in the film as a piano player.

Trivia: A child actor in theater, Berry acted and directed with Orson Welles' Mercury Theatre in the late 1930s. He assisted Billy Wilder on Double Indemnity and began directing films in the mid '40s, including the musical Casbah and the crime film He Ran All the Way. Branded a communist before the House Un-American Activities Committee, Berry made the documentary The Hollywood Ten and then left for France. His first French film, C'Est Arrive A Paris, was signed by Henri Lavoral, but the films Berry went on to direct and co-script, such as Je Suis Un Sentimental and Don Juan (aka Pantaloons), have his name. His re-entry into the American film industry came in the mid 1960s with the adventure tale Maya, filmed in India. His subsequent American films include the romantic comedies Claudine and Thieves. After directing television films in the early '80s, he returned to France to helm Le Voyage A Paimpol and Maldonne.

Trivia: The most renowned filmmaker of his era, Martin Scorsese virtually defined the state of modern American cinema during the 1970s and '80s. A consummate storyteller and visual stylist who lived and breathed movies, he won fame translating his passion and energy into a brand of filmmaking that crackled with kinetic excitement. Working well outside of the mainstream, Scorsese nevertheless emerged in the 1970s as a towering figure throughout the industry, achieving the kind of fame and universal recognition typically reserved for more commercially successful talents. A tireless supporter of film preservation, Scorsese has worked to bridge the gap between cinema's history and future like no other director. Channeling the lessons of his inspirations -- primarily classic Hollywood, the French New Wave, and the New York underground movement of the early '60s -- into an extraordinarily personal and singular vision, he has remained perennially positioned at the vanguard of the medium, always pushing the envelope of the film experience with an intensity and courage unmatched by any of his contemporaries. Scorsese was born on November 17, 1942, in Flushing, NY. The second child of Charles and Catherine Scorsese -- both of whom frequently made cameo appearances in their son's films -- he suffered from severe asthma, and as a result was blocked from participating in sports and other common childhood activities. Consequently, Scorsese sought refuge in area movie houses, quickly becoming obsessed with the cinema, in particular the work of Michael Powell. Raised in a devoutly Catholic environment, he initially studied to become a priest. Ultimately, however, Scorsese opted out of the clergy to enroll in film school at New York University, helming his first student effort, What's a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This?, a nine-minute short subject, in 1963. He mounted his second student picture, the 15-minute It's Not Just You, Murray!, in 1964, the year of his graduation. His next effort was 1967's brief The Big Shave; finally, in 1969 he completed his feature-length debut, Who's That Knocking at My Door?, a drama starring actor Harvey Keitel, who went on to appear in many of the director's most successful films. The feature also marked the beginning of Scorsese's long collaboration with editor Thelma Schoonmaker, a pivotal component in the evolution of his distinct visual sensibility. After a tenure teaching film at N.Y.U. (where among his students were aspiring directors Oliver Stone and Jonathan Kaplan), Scorsese released Street Scenes, a documentary account of the May 1970 student demonstrations opposing the American military invasion of Cambodia. He soon left New York for Hollywood, working as an editor on films ranging from Woodstock to Medicine Ball Caravan to Elvis on Tour and earning himself the nickname "The Butcher." For Roger Corman's American International Pictures, Scorsese also directed his first film to receive any kind of widespread distribution, 1972's low-budget Boxcar Bertha, starring Barbara Hershey and David Carradine. With the same technical crew, he soon returned to New York to begin working on his first acknowledged masterpiece, the 1973 drama Mean Streets. A deeply autobiographical tale exploring the interpersonal and spiritual conflicts facing the same group of characters first glimpsed in Who's That Knocking at My Door?, Mean Streets established many of the thematic stylistic hallmarks of the Scorsese oeuvre: his use of outsider antiheroes, unusual camera and editing techniques, dueling obsessions with religion and gangster life, and the evocative use of popular music. It was this film that launched him to the forefront of a new generation of American cinematic talent. The film also established Scorsese's relationship with actor Robert De Niro, who quickly emerged as the central onscreen figure throughout the majority of his work. For his follow-up, Scorsese traveled to Arizona to begin shooting 1974's Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, a response to criticism that he couldn't direct a "women's film." The end result brought star Ellen Burstyn a Best Actress Oscar at that year's Academy Awards ceremony, as well as a Best Supporting Actress nomination for co-star Diane Ladd. Next up was 1974's Italianamerican, a film Scorsese often claimed as his personal favorite among his own work. A documentary look at the experience of Italian immigrants as well as life in New York's Little Italy, it starred the director's parents, and even included Catherine Scorsese's secret tomato sauce recipe. Upon his return to New York, Scorsese began work on the legendary Taxi Driver in the summer of 1974. Based on a screenplay by Paul Schrader, the film explored the nature of violence in modern American society, and starred De Niro as Travis Bickle, a cabbie thoroughly alienated from humanity who begins harboring delusions of assassinating a Presidential candidate and saving a young prostitute (Jodie Foster) from the grip of the streets. Lavishly acclaimed upon its initial release, Taxi Driver won the Palme d'Or at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival. Five years later, it became the subject of intense scrutiny when it was revealed that the movie was the inspiration behind the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan by John Hinckley, who had become obsessed with the film as well as Foster herself. Scorsese's next feature was New York, New York, an extravagant 1977 musical starring De Niro and Liza Minnelli. The first of his major films to receive less-than-glowing critical acclaim, it was widely considered a failure by the Hollywood establishment. Despite doubts about his artistry, Scorsese forged on and continued work on his documentary of the farewell performance of the Band, shot on Thanksgiving Day of 1976. Complete with guest appearances from luminaries ranging from Muddy Waters to Bob Dylan to Van Morrison, the concert film The Last Waltz bowed in 1978, and won raves on the festival circuit as well as from pop music fans. American Boy: A Profile of Steven Prince, a look at the raconteur who appeared as the gun salesman in Taxi Driver, followed later that same year. In April 1979, after years of preparation, Scorsese began work on Raging Bull, a film based on the autobiography of boxer Jake LaMotta. Filmed in black-and-white, the feature was his most ambitious work to date, and is widely regarded as the greatest movie of the 1980s. De Niro won the Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of LaMotta, while newcomer Cathy Moriarty won a Best Actress nomination for her work as LaMotta's second wife. (Additionally, Thelma Schoonmaker won an Academy Award for editing.) De Niro again reunited with Scorsese for the follow-up, 1983's The King of Comedy, a bitter satire exploring the nature of celebrity and fame. Since the age of ten, Scorsese had dreamed of mounting a filmed account of the life of Jesus; finally, in 1983 it appeared that his adaptation of Nikos Kazantzakis' novel The Last Temptation of Christ was about to come to fruition. Ultimately, just four weeks before shooting was scheduled to begin, funding for the project fell through. Scorsese was forced to enter a kind of work-for-hire survival period, accepting an offer to direct the 1985 downtown New York comedy After Hours. In the spring of 1986, he began filming The Color of Money, the long-awaited sequel to Robert Rossen's 1961 classic The Hustler. Star Paul Newman, reprising his role as pool shark "Fast" Eddie Felson, won his first Academy Award for his work, while co-star Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio scored a Best Supporting Actress nomination. The Color of Money was Scorsese's first true box-office hit; thanks to its success, he was finally able to film The Last Temptation of Christ. Starring Willem Dafoe in the title role, the feature appeared in 1988 to considerable controversy over what many considered to be a blasphemous portrayal of the life and crucifixion of Christ. Ironically, the protests helped win the film a greater foothold at the box office, while making its director a household name. After contributing (along with Francis Ford Coppola and Woody Allen) to the 1989 triptych New York Stories, Scorsese teamed with De Niro for the first time since The King of Comedy and began working on his next masterpiece, 1990's Goodfellas. Based on author Nicholas Pileggi's true crime account Wiseguy, the film dissected the New York criminal underworld in absorbing detail, helping actor Joe Pesci earn an Oscar for his supporting role as a crazed mob hitman.As part of the deal with Universal Pictures which allowed him to make Last Temptation, Scorsese had also agreed to direct a more "commercial" film. The result was 1991's Cape Fear, an update of the classic Hollywood thriller. The follow-up, 1993's The Age of Innocence, was a dramatic change of pace; based on the novel by Edith Wharton, the film looked at the New York social mores of the 1870s, and starred Daniel Day-Lewis and Michelle Pfeiffer. In 1995, Scorsese resurfaced with two new films. The first, Casino, documented the rise and decline of mob rule in the Las Vegas of the 1970s, while A Personal Journey With Martin Scorsese Through American Movies examined the evolution of the Hollywood filmmaking process. In 1997, he completed Kundun, a meditation on the formative years of the exiled Dalai Lama. That same year he received the American Film Institute's Lifetime Achievement honor. In 1998, he participated in the American Film Institute's AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies, once again doing his part to help bridge the films of the past with those of the future.Scorsese returned to the director's chair in 1999 with Bringing Out the Dead. A medical drama starring Nicolas Cage as an emotionally exhausted paramedic, it marked the director's return to New York's contemporary gritty milieu. Scorsese began the new century making his first film for Miramax. Gangs of New York, a drama about New York gangs set during the Civil War, had been on the auteur's mind for over a quarter century by the time it finally was released in December of 2002. The film garnered multiple Oscar nominations including Best Picture and another Best Director nod for Scorsese, but the film went home without any hardware. Gangs of New York was co-scripted by Kenneth Lonergan, leading to Scorsese acting as an executive producer on his directorial debut, You Can Count on Me. Scorsese followed up his historical epic with yet another period piece. The Aviator was a biopic of multi-millionaire Howard Hughes that focused on his younger days as a Hollywood mogul and playboy. Both Gangs and The Aviator found Scorsese casting Leonardo DiCaprio in the lead role after his most famous collaborator, Robert De Niro, recommended the Titanic star to the director. 2004 saw the release of Shark Tale, an animated film for which Scorsese voiced one of the characters.In 2005 Scorsese garnered outstanding reviews as the director of the Peabody Award-winning No Direction Home: Bob Dylan, a nearly four-hour documentary about Bob Dylan that charted his life and artistic development up through his historic U.K. concerts where the crowd revolted against his using electric instruments. The next year, Scorsese teamed with DiCaprio for a third time in The Departed, an adaptation of Infernal Affairs. The film, about an undercover cop, featured an impressive cast that included Jack Nicholson and Matt Damon. It opened to strong reviews, and went on to become one of the biggest box-office hits of Scorsese's career, earning the beloved director many industry and critics awards including the Golden Globe for Best Director and finally his long deserved Oscar for Best Director. In 2008 Scorsese returned to the rock doc genre, filming a Rolling Stones show in New York City and releasing the result, Shine a Light, the first of his films to play on IMAX screens. In 2010 Scorsese released his adaptation of Dennis Lahane's paranoid thriller Shutter Island, his fourth partnering with Leonardo DiCaprio.He continued helming documentaries about famous pop-culture figures including the witty Fran Liebowitz profile Public Speaking, the deeply personal homage to Elia Kazan A Letter to Elia, and 2011's George Harrison: Living in the Material World.For Hugo, his 2011 adaptation of Brian Selznick's award-winning children's book, Scorsese took on the technical challenge of working in 3D for the first time in his career, and the resulting film got more Oscar nominations than any other movie that year. The work garnered Scorsese a Best Director win from the Golden Globes, as well as Oscar, Directors Guild, and BAFTA nominations for that same award.