Trivia: Born Carlos Ray Norris, Chuck Norris served in Korea in the Army. While there, he studied karate and later became the World Middleweight Karate Champion. He was encouraged by one of his karate students, actor Steve McQueen, to go into acting. He debuted onscreen in the enormously popular Bruce Lee vehicle Enter the Dragon (1973); since the death of Lee he has been the screen's premier martial arts star. He has appeared primarily in militaristic movies in which he single-handedly kills many enemies. His breakthrough film was Missing in Action (1984), in which he played an ex-POW in search of American prisoners still held in Vietnam.

Trivia: Formerly a schoolteacher, Texas-born Noble Willingham has been essaying crusty character roles since 1969. Willingham's resumé includes a brace of location-filmed Peter Bogdanovich films, The Last Picture Show (1971) and Paper Moon (1973), and the role of Clay Stone in both of Billy Crystal's City Slickers comedies. Among his TV-movie credits is the part of President James Knox Polk in 1985's Dream West. A regular on several TV series (The Ann Jillian Show, Texas Wheelers, Cutter to Houston, AfterMASH, When the Whistle Blows), Willingham is best known to 1990s viewers as Mr. Binford (of Binford Tools) in Home Improvement and C. D. Parker in Walker, Texas Ranger. Noble Willingham's most recent film assignments include Ace Ventura, Pet Detective (1994) Up Close and Personal (1996) and Space Jam (1996). In 2000, Willingham left Walker, Texas Ranger to run for Congress in Texas. After losing the election to his Democratic opponent, Max Sandlin, Willingham returned to acting with a supporting role in the Val Kilmer thriller Blind Horizon. Sadly, the part would be the actor's last. In early 2004, at the age of 72, Willingham passed away at home from natural causes.

Trivia: Tony Mordente was born in New York City in 1933. Trained as an actor, dancer, and singer, his first major credit was in the role of Action in West Side Story, on which he also served as an assistant choreographer. He also had a short-lived recording career around 1960, on Roulette Records, which was hoping to capitalize on the success of West Side Story. Mordente concentrated primarily on stage roles during the early '60s, a period in which he was based in New York, and his only screen role, apart from West Side Story, came in 1963 with a small part in Love With the Proper Stranger. His early television appearances included two episodes of Combat during the series' first season, but it was his role as Genaro Planetta in The Outer Limits episode "The Invisibles" -- one of the most chilling in the series' output -- that showed him at the peak of his powers as an actor. Portraying Planetta, the fidgety, neurotic recruit into a secret society run by alien invaders, Mordente almost managed to steal the show from its star, Don Gordon, and a supporting cast that included such veterans as George Macready and Neil Hamilton, in what should have been an Emmy-nominated performance. Mordente turned to directing after the mid-'60s, and has proved equally adept at handling comedy, drama, or action subjects. He has helmed installments of M*A*S*H, Rhoda, Busting Loose, The Greatest American Hero, Family Ties, Quincy, M.E., The A-Team, Hunter, Matlock, and 7th Heaven, and was responsible for directing 37 episodes of Walker Texas Ranger during the series' first five seasons -- the latter credit puts him in the same league with his fellow West Side Story alumnus Gus Trikonis as a top small-screen action-adventure directorial hand. Mordente has been married to Broadway star Chita Rivera since the 1960s, and their daughter is the actress Lisa Mordente.

Trivia: From the time of his onscreen debut in the mid-'80s, character actor Robert Harvey specialized in earnest portrayals of everyman professional types, nearly always in a bit capacity, roles such as firemen, prison wardens, countermen, bartenders, and physicians. He took his premier onscreen bow in the Clint Eastwood-headlined, Richard Tuggle-directed psychothriller Tightrope (1984) and thereafter appeared in dozens of motion pictures over the following decades. These included Above the Rim (1994), The Patriot (1998), The Contender (2000), Reign Over Me (2007), and Nothing But the Truth (2008).

Trivia: Supporting actor, onscreen from the late '80s.

Trivia: A frequent presence in both film and television from the 1970s onward, African-American character player Earl Billings moved from landing one- and two-shot bit roles in prime-time series programs and low-profile movies to signing for supporting roles in some of Hollywood's most acclaimed comedies and dramas. This stocky, heavyset player demonstrated a knack for playing black everymen -- often essaying the parts of police officers, detectives, and security guards. Billings first began receiving onscreen credit around 1976, with a single-episode contribution to Norman Lear's sitcom Good Times. Soon after that, the actor appeared in the recurring role of Rob on What's Happening!! Following a turn in the little-seen Sounder, Part Two (1976) and credit as a parole office worker in the gentle yet profane Richard Pryor comedy Bustin' Loose (1981), Billings acted in several telemovies. After a cinematic lapse of several years, Billings rebounded with an appearance in the blockbuster 1987 John Badham crime comedy Stakeout. A consistent string of supporting turns in A-list productions followed, including (but not limited to) Jimmy Hollywood (1994), Crimson Tide (1995), American Splendor (2003), Thank You for Smoking (2005), and Something New (2006). Billings augmented this success with occasional work on such prime-time series as Ally McBeal and ER. In 2008, he took on his first regular TV role, playing Principal Huffy on the sitcom Miss Guided, starring Judy Greer as an earnest high-school guidance councilor, but the series was unfortunately very short-lived.

Trivia: Good-ole-boy character actor Gailard Sartain first came to the attention of TV fans as a member of the comedy ensemble of The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour (1976-77 season). Sairtain enjoyed more TV-screen time as dufus short order cook Willie Billie Honey in the 1978 syndicated comedy-variety weekly Hee Haw Honeys; cast as Willie Billie's younger sister, by the way, was one Kathie Lee Johnson, who went on to chatshow fame as Kathie Lee Gifford. In films, Sairtain was prominently featured as the Big Bopper in The Buddy Holly Story (1981) and as bucolic bumpkin Chuck in Jim Varney's Ernest flicks. Active into the 1990s, Gailard Sairtain usually shows up these days in featured roles as redneck Southern sheriffs and state troopers.