Trivia: Cloris Leachman seems capable of playing any kind of role, and she has consistently demonstrated her versatility in films and on TV since the 1950s. On the big screen, she can be seen in such films as Kiss Me Deadly (1955), Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), The Last Picture Show (1971), for which she won an Oscar; and Young Frankenstein (1974). On TV, she played the mother on Lassie from 1957-58, and Phyllis Lindstrom on both The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970-77) and her own series, Phyllis (1975-77). She was a staple on many of the dramatic shows of the '50s, and a regular on Charlie Wild, Private Detective (1950-52), and The Facts of Life. Leachman has won three Emmy Awards and continues to make TV, stage, and film appearances, including a turn as Granny in the film version of The Beverly Hillbillies (1993) and supplying her voice for the animated Beavis and Butt-Head Do America (1996) and The Iron Giant (1999). In 1999, she could be seen heading the supporting cast in Wes Craven's Music of the Heart.

Trivia: Stuart Whitman, with a rugged build and sensitive face, rose from bit player to competent lead actor, but never did make it as a popular star in film. The San Francisco-born Whitman served three years with the Army Corps of Engineers where he was a light heavyweight boxer in his spare time. He next went on to study drama at the Los Angeles City College where he joined a Chekhov stage group. He began his film career in the early '50s as a bit player. Although never a star, he did manage to quietly accumulate $100 million dollars through shrewd investments in securities, real estate, cattle, and Thoroughbreds. For his role as a sex offender attempting to change in the 1961 British film The Mark, Whitman was nominated for an Oscar. In addition to features, Whitman has also appeared extensively on television.

Trivia: Born Harriet Lake, the name under which she was billed until 1933, Sothern debuted onscreen in 1929 in a bit part, and went on to play small roles in several other films before leaving Hollywood for Broadway. She soon began landing leads, bringing another invitation from Hollywood. She signed a screen contract and changed her name, then began a very busy film career as the light-hearted heroine of B-movies. In 1939, Sothern switched studios and achieved greater popularity as the star of the "Maisie" comedy-adventure series; she appeared as the energetic, scatterbrained Maisie in ten films during the next eight years. She also appeared in musicals, in which her good voice and comedic talents were displayed. Never a major screen star, she became most popular after switching to TV; she starred in the TV series Private Secretary and The Ann Sothern Show. She went on to tour with stage musicals, then returned to the screen in occasional character roles after 1964. For her work in The Whales of August (1987), her most recent film to date, she received a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination. From 1936-42 she was married to actor Roger Pryor and from 1943-49 she was married to actor Robert Sterling. Her daughter is actress Tisha Sterling, with whom she appeared in Crazy Mama (1975) and The Whales of August (1987); in the latter, Sterling played Sothern's character as a young woman.

Trivia: Ohio-born actor Jim Backus's stage career began in summer stock, where, according to his then-roommate Keenan Wynn, he was as well known for his prowess with the ladies as he was for his on-stage versatility. Backus continued acting in New York, vaudeville, and especially radio in the 1930s and 1940s. He was a regular on radio's The Alan Young Show, portraying Eastern Seaboard snob Hubert Updike III, the prototype for his "Thurston Howell III" characterization on the 1960s TV sitcom Gilligan's Island. In 1949, Backus provided the voice of the nearsighted Mr. Magoo for the first time in the UPA cartoon Ragtime Bear; the actor later claimed that he based this character on his own businessman father. Also in 1949, Backus made his first film appearance in Easy Living, which starred his childhood friend Victor Mature. Backus' most famous screen role was as James Dean's weak-willed, vacillating father in Rebel without a Cause. On television, Backus co-starred with Joan Davis on the I Love Lucy-like 1950s sitcom I Married Joan, and played the leading role of fast-talking news service editor Mike O'Toole on the 1960 syndicated series Hot Off the Wire (aka The Jim Backus Show). In the 1960s, Backus continued to provide the voice of Mr. Magoo in several TV projects, and was seen on-camera in the aforementioned Gilligan's Island, as well as the 1968 TV version of Blondie, wherein Backus played Mr. Dithers. Co-starring as Mrs. Dithers was Backus' wife Henny, who also collaborated with her husband on several amusing volumes of memoirs. Jim and Henny Backus' last two books, Backus Strikes Back and Forgive Us Our Digressions, commented humorously on a deadly serious subject: Parkinson's Disease, the ailment which would eventually cost Backus his life at the age of 76.

Trivia: An actor forever associated with his portrayal of Ralph Malph, the wisecracking redheaded pal of Richie Cunningham (Ron Howard) and The Fonz (Henry Winkler) on Happy Days, Don Most (also occasionally credited as Donny Most) grew up in Brooklyn, as the son of a homemaker and an accountant. He bowed on-camera at the age of 16 in an advertisement for Chex cereal, then -- midway through his enrollment at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania -- impulsively dropped out and high-tailed it to Hollywood, where he promptly landed the role of Malph. Most, who harbored serious acting ambitions, remained with the program from 1974 through 1980, four years before it folded; he would later recall that the part (popular though it was) typecast him for decades and made it virtually impossible for him to score weighty dramatic roles. Though the actor certainly tried, he succeeded mainly in supporting himself via residuals from Days and modest parts on-stage and in television. He then turned to directing in the late '90s, with occasional feature efforts such as The Last Best Sunday (1999) and Moola (2006).

Trivia: Connecticut native Linda Purl grew up in Japan, where her father, a Union Carbide executive, had been transferred. Under the watchful eye of her mother, a former ballerina, Purl began acting professionally in Japanese stage and TV productions at the age of seven. Ten years later, she made her American film debut in Jory (1972). Never a conventional ingenue, she has played everything from mentally retarded teens to rape victims to psychotic killers, as well as a few real-life personalities like Alice Roosevelt Longworth and globetrotting journalist Nellie Bly. Purl has the distinction of playing two different recurring characters on the same television series. During the 1974-75 season of Happy Days, she was seen as Richie Cunningham's (Ron Howard) high-school girlfriend Gloria; she returned to the series in 1982 as Ashler Pfister, a divorced mother with whom Fonzie (Henry Winkler) was briefly involved romantically. Linda has also appeared regularly on such series as The Secret Storm and Beacon Hill; more recently, she played an assistant DA put in charge of a group of young ex-convicts on the syndicated weekly adventure series Robin's Hoods (1994). Linda Purl was at one time married to Desi Arnaz Jr..

Trivia: The son of producer George Englund and noted character actress Cloris Leachman, actor Bryan Englund appeared in two feature films, Crazy Mama (1975) and The Prowler (1981). He also appeared in a few television films between the mid-'70s through the early '80s.

Trivia: A former member of Andy Warhol's Factory and an active member in 1960s New York avant-garde theater, actress Sally Kirkland is best remembered in film for playing a famous Czech actress who is forced to lead a degrading life of anonymity in New York in Anna (1987). The daughter of a fashion editor of Life magazine and a wealthy scrap iron vendor, the tall, slender Kirkland started out as a Vogue model and then studied at the Actor's Studio with Lee Strassberg and Uta Hagen. She launched her acting career off-Broadway, but didn't make much impact until she appeared nude and tied to a chair for 45 minutes in the drama Sweet Eros. By 1964, Kirkland was deeply involved in the Big Apple's avant-garde movement and was also an active drug user until an attempted suicide frightened her into cleaning up her life through yoga and painting. As an actress, she next involved herself with Warhol's clique, appearing in several underground films, notably The Thirteen Most Beautiful Women. Though much of her subsequent film appearances have been in low-budget and exploitation films, Kirkland has had a few shining moments as a supporting actress in such movies as The Sting (1973) and Private Benjamin (1980). For her work in Anna, Kirkland received an Academy Award nomination. In addition to her acting career, Kirkland is a minister of the New Age Church of the Movement of Inner Spiritual Awareness.

Trivia: American actor Clinton Kimbrough spent the most distinguished part of his career on-stage appearing in plays written by such greats as Eugene O'Neill, Tenneseee Williams, and Thornton Wilder. In the late '50s, Kimbrough contracted with Hal Wallis and made his film debut in Daniel Mann's Hot Spell (I958). Kimbrough would not return to film until 1970 when he appeared in Roger Corman's Bloody Mama and Von Richthofen and Brown (both 1970). Kimbrough made his final film appearance in Crazy Mama (1975).

Trivia: Large and muscular at an early age, American actor Dick Miller entered the Navy during World War II while still a teenager, distinguishing himself as a boxer. He attended CCNY, Columbia University and New York University, supporting himself with semi-pro football jobs, radio DJ gigs and as a psychological assistant at Bellevue. At age 22, he was host of a Manhattan-based TV chat show, Midnight Snack. Stage and movie work followed, and Miller joined the stock company/entourage of low-budget auteur Roger Corman. His first great Corman role was as the hyperthyroid salesman in Not of this Earth (1956); a handful of rock-and-roll quickies followed before Miller received his first sci-fi lead in War of the Satellites (1958). In Corman's Bucket of Blood (1959), Miller originated the role of Walter Paisley, the nebbishy sociopath who "creates" avant-garde sculpture by murdering his subjects and dipping them in plaster. He was then cast in the immortal Little Shop of Horrors (1960); Miller not only makes a terrific entrance by buying a bouquet of flowers and then eating them, but also narrates the picture. Miller stayed with Corman into the 1970s, at which time the director was in charge of New World Pictures. Seldom making a liveable income in films, Miller remained an unknown entity so far as the "big" studios were concerned -- but his teenaged fans were legion, and he was besieged on the streets and in public places for autographs. When the adolescent science-fiction fans of the 1950s became the directors of the 1980s, Miller began receiving some of the best roles of his career. In Joe Dante's Gremlins (1984), Miller was paired with his Little Shop costar Jackie Joseph, as a rural couple whose house is bulldozed by a group of hostile gremlins. Miller and Joseph returned in the sequel Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1989), in which the actor heroically helped squash the gremlins' invasion of New York. Miller's most Pirandellian role was as the "decency league" activist in Matinee (1993) who is actually an actor in the employ of William Castle-like showman John Goodman. Directed again by longtime Miller fan Dante, Matinee contains a wonderful "in" joke wherein Miller is identified as a fraud via his photograph in a Famous Monsters of Filmland-type fanzine -- the very sort of publication which canonized Miller throughout the 1970s.

Trivia: Argenziano, a supporting actor, appeared onscreen from the '70s.

Trivia: Mickey Fox was a character actress who worked in films and television during the '70s and '80s. She was also the owner of nightclubs and eateries in New York, California, and Europe. In film, Fox started out working in Rome and appeared in a few Fellini films, including Fellini Satyricon(1969). She also appeared in those of other noted Italian directors including Visconti and De Sica. Fox later returned to the states and continued working in low-budget films through 1983.

Trivia: Aprea is a supporting actor, onscreen from Bullitt (1968); he married Cherie Latimer.

Trivia: Over the course of her groundbreaking career, television personality Barbara Walters has consistently offered the public a face and voice they came to trust and enjoy. Born to a father who made his living producing theater and running nightclubs, Walters graduated from Sarah Lawrence in 1949 with an English degree. In 1961 she became part of The Today Show staff, writing copy and researching. Over the course of the decade, she learned new skills, eventually appearing in a number of segments on-air. NBC made history in 1974 when they made her the first female co-host in the show's venerable history. Her popularity was so strong, her distinctive voice provided fodder for many comedians and impressionists, most famously Gilda Radner's impression on Saturday Night Live. She left NBC after ABC offered her the co-anchor chair for the evening news next to Harry Reasoner. In addition to hosting a string of successful celebrity interview specials, including an annual Oscar special that ran for a number of years, Walters co-hosted the news magazine 20/20 for two decades, ending her run on that program in 2004. She branched out in 1997 with The View, a morning chat show she created aimed at women. The success of that program was yet another jewel in the crown of the woman whom Oprah Winfrey claimed inspired her to want to be a television personality.

Trivia: Vince Barnett was the son of Luke Barnett, a well-known comedian who specialized in insulting and pulling practical jokes on his audiences (Luke's professional nickname was "Old Man Ribber"). Vince remained in the family business by hiring himself out to Hollywood parties, where he would insult the guests in a thick German accent, spill the soup and drop the trays--all to the great delight of hosts who enjoyed watching their friends squirm and mutter "Who hired that jerk?" The diminutive, chrome-domed Barnett also appeared in the 1926 edition of Earl Carroll's Vanities. He began appearing in films in 1930, playing hundreds of comedy bits and supporting parts until retiring in 1975. Among Vince Barnett's more sizeable screen roles was the moronic, illiterate gangster "secretary" in Scarface (1931).

Trivia: American actress Tisha Sterling was the daughter of film stars Ann Sothern and Robert Sterling. Though her parents were divorced when she was 3, she had a relatively sedate childhood for a Hollywood kid, even with such playthings as a private soda fountain. Her mother raised her to be a society belle (what a career goal!), but Sterling opted for acting, something that had interested her since grade school. Upon inagurating her Hollywood career, Sterling went through the usual cheesecake-photo mill, though she quickly outgrew this with excellent guest performances on such TV series as Run For Your Life, Mr. Novak and Get Smart. In 1968, she costarred with Clint Eastwood in the feature film Coogan's Bluff, bringing three-dimensionality to the otherwise cliched role of a hippie. Throughout her life, Tisha Sterling has had a rollercoaster relationship with mother Ann Sothern, sometimes close, ofttimes distant; whatever the case, Sterling showed up in 1987 playing Ms. Sothern as a young woman in the well-received film The Whales of August.

Trivia: Possessing a special talent for totally immersing himself in his roles, Bill Paxton did not always get the recognition he deserves. Tall, rangy, and boyishly good looking, Paxton's career was a curiosity that found the character actor-turned-filmmaker succeeding in intermittently pulling the rug from under filmgoers' feet with a constantly expanding sense of maturity and range.Paxton's interest in films emerged during his teens when he began making his own movies with a Super-8 camera. He formally entered the entertainment industry in 1974 as a set dresser for Roger Corman's New World Pictures. Paxton made his acting debut as a bit player in Crazy Mama (1975), and afterward, the young thespian moved to New York to hone his skills. Following performances in a couple of horror quickies, Paxton formally launched his Hollywood career with a tiny part in Ivan Reitman's Stripes (1981) and this led to a steady if not unremarkable career in film and television during the '80s. In addition to acting, Paxton made short independent films such as Fish Heads, (1982) which became a favorite on NBC's Saturday Night Live. Paxton's acting career got a much-needed boost in 1985 when he was cast as Ilan Mitchell-Smith's obnoxious big brother Chet Donolley in John Hughes' Weird Science. Some of Paxton's more memorable subsequent roles include that of a cocky intergalactic soldier in James Cameron's Aliens (1986), a crazed vampire in Kathryn Bigelow's Near Dark, and sickly astronaut Freddie Hayes in Ron Howard's Apollo 13. In 1996, Paxton landed a starring role, opposite Helen Hunt, in the special-effects blockbuster Twister; his career took an upward turn and Paxton got more leads than ever. Though few audiences saw it in its limited release, critics were quick to praise Paxton's turn as con-artist Traveler in the 1997 movie of the same name. Following a doomed voyage on the Titanic the same year, the workhorse actor once again intrigued filmgoers as a small-town dweller struggling with his conscience after stumbling into over a million dollars in usually flamboyant director Sam Raimi's strikingly subdued A Simple Plan. A quiet and intense performance enhanced by a talented cast including Billy Bob Thornton and Bridget Fonda, the psychological crime drama once again provided further proof that Paxton's impressive range of emotion stretched beyond what many filmgoers may have previously suspected. Though subsequent performances in Mighty Joe Young (1998) and U-571 (2000) did little to backup the promise shown in A Simple Plan, Paxton still had a few tricks up his sleeve, as evidenced by his directorial debut Frailty (2002), a surprisingly competent and genuinely frightening tale of religious fervor and questionable sanity. Though cynical filmgoers may have initially viewed the trailer-touting praises of former collaborators Raimi and James Cameron as favors from old friends, the taut tale of a father who claims that God has provided him with a list of "demons" that he and his sons must cast from the earth blind-sided critics and filmgoers with its disturbingly minimalistic yet complex psychological thriller that recalled the thematic elements of previous efforts as Michael Tolkin's The Rapture (1991). His performance as a loving father who reluctantly embarks on God's mission was a vital component of the films emotional impact, and was once again proof that this former supporting player still had a few tricks up his sleeve.Though he hadn't paid much attention to television since his early career, in 2006, Paxton took on the lead role in HBO's Big Love, playing a polygamous husband with three wives. The show was a hit and garnered critical acclaim, including three Golden Globe nominations for Paxton. When the show wrapped up after five seasons, Paxton joined the miniseries Hatfields & McCoys, earning his only Emmy nomination of his career for the role. In 2014, Paxton took on a recurring role in Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., playing the villainous John Garrett. He also played Sam Houston in 2015 miniseries Texas Rising. In 2017, his new network show Training Day (a small-screen version of the film) aired only three episodes before Paxton suddenly died of complications from surgery at age 61.