Trivia: An actress whose piercing, pale blue eyes could give even Meg Foster a run for her money, Emily Deschanel has come quite a long way since being listed as one of Interview magazine's "Six Actors to Watch" back in 2001. The firstborn daughter of Oscar-winning cinematographer Caleb Deschanel and actress Mary Jo Weir (their second was starlet Zooey), Emily received her B.F.A. in theater from Boston University before launching her career on the stage and screen. Early roles in It's a Shame About Ray and Rose Red found the rising starlet gradually gaining her footing before the cameras, and as her confidence as an actress increased, so did her screen time. By the time Deschanel appeared in such features as Cold Mountain and The Alamo, viewers were already beginning to pick up on her talent, while she could also still be seen acting on-stage, frequently appearing in plays for the Interact Theatre Company. In 2003, Deschanel appeared in minor capacity as a receptionist in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 2, with her role in Ghost House Pictures' 2004 frightener Boogeyman serving to prove that she was much more than just another pretty face.As the 2000's rolled on, Deschanel would prove to be an even bigger force on the small screen, playing forensic anthropologist Dr. Temperance "Bones" Brennan, partner of FBI agent Seeley Booth (David Boreanaz), on the popular Fox crime drama series Bones.

Trivia: Look up the words "handsome" and "brooding" in any dictionary and chances are you'll have a pretty good description of actor David Boreanaz. Tall, dark, and possessing the sort of alluring charisma that suggests an Abercrombie and Fitch model from the dark side, Boreanaz flourished on the small screen in the early 2000s when his Buffy the Vampire Slayer role was spun off into the supernatural-flavored series Angel.Born in Buffalo, NY, and raised in Philadelphia, Boreanaz was inspired at age seven to pursue a career in acting after witnessing the legendary Yul Brynner's performance in The King and I. In the years that followed, the aspiring actor would strive to keep the dream alive, and when it came time for higher education, Boreanaz opted to study his craft at Ithaca College in New York. The allure of a life in films soon drew Boreanaz to Los Angeles, although it wouldn't take him long to realize that struggling actors were a dime a dozen in sunny California. Dreams of his name in lights soon gave way to realities such as earning a living by parking cars and handing out towels at a sports club -- and uncredited parts in such films as Aspen Extreme and Best of the Best 2 (both 1993) certainly weren't paying the rent. A one-time role on Married...With Children as daughter Kelly's (Christina Applegate) motorcycle-riding boyfriend gained the struggling actor modest exposure -- and his luck would soon change in the most unexpected (though somewhat typical by Hollywood standards) way. While Boreanaz was walking his dog in Hollywood, a manager was taken by his captivating intensity, and a subsequent introduction to casting agent Marcia Shulman almost immediately ensured his landing the role of the vampire Angel on the soon-to-be-hit series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Two years after the premiere of Buffy, Boreanaz's character proved popular enough to earn his own eponymously titled spin-off series, and the show proved a solid hit for the WB until it was inexplicably canceled in mid-2004. Of course, by this point, Boreanaz could rest fairly easy thanks to roles in such features as Valentine (2001) and I'm With Lucy (2002). Fans who couldn't get enough of the actor's dark side could look forward to his role as the villainous Luc Crash in The Crow: Wicked Prayer (2004).Soon however, Boreanaz found another compelling small-screen role, playing Special Agent Seeley Booth on the hit detective series Bones.

Trivia: A Boston native whose early work included stints with the Dallas Theater Center and New York's Mint Theater Company, actor T.J. Thyne studied his craft with theaters throughout the United States and British Columbia before receiving his B.F.A. in acting from the USC School of Theater. Numerous television roles were quick to follow after Thyne hit the audition circuit with unusual ferocity, and by the year 2000, Thyne had racked up nearly 50 small-screen credits thanks to appearances on such shows as Home Improvement, Party of Five, Walker, Texas Ranger, and Just Shoot Me. In 2002, Thyne founded the Los Angeles-based Theater Junkies Productions with the aim of producing for both stage and screen; their popular short film Validation subsequently screened at film festivals across the country. Memorable supporting roles in such high-profile features as Erin Brockovich Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Ghost World, How High, and Something's Got to Give made Thyne an increasingly familiar face to movie fans, though it was the actor's casting as bug expert Dr. Jack Hodgins in the hit Fox forensics drama Bones that would transform him into a bona fide television star. Thyne has also done frequent commercial work, with his role as a Shania Twain-singing Chevy truck passenger proving a particularly memorable television spot.

Trivia: Michaela Conlin knew she wanted to be an actress from the tender age of six, and from the time she appeared in her first play that same year, there was no turning back from her future on the stage and screen.A native of Allentown, PA, who honed her skills in community and regional theater before studying acting at New York City's Tisch School of the Arts, Conlin earned her B.F.A. while simultaneously appearing in productions at the Playwrights Horizons Theater School and the Atlantic Theater Company. Later, she would travel to Amsterdam to take part in the Experimental Theater Wing's International Training Program. While Conlin's first screen role after graduation was grounded firmly in reality (she was chosen to appear in a documentary film detailing the lives of young actors in New York City), it was only after moving to Los Angeles that her career truly began to catch on. Roles in MDs, JAG, and The D.A. quickly helped to establish Conlin as a rising small-screen talent, and in 2005 she signed on to play Angela Montenegro in the Fox forensic crime drama Bones. She made her first post-Bones jump to the big screen playing a detective in the legal thriller The Lincoln Lawyer.

Trivia: Canadian-born Tamara Taylor first caught the eyes of fans with a recurring role on the '90s series Party of Five. She would make numerous appearances on various shows over the coming years, but Taylor's next big break came in 2006, with a starring role on the crime series Bones playing Dr. Camille Saroyan.

Trivia: Many know Illinois native John Francis Daley for his memorable role as high school freshman Sam Weir on the cult hit series Freaks and Geeks. An actor from the age of nine, Daley appeared in the touring production of the Broadway musical Who's Tommy? before branching into screen acting. He would go on to appear in films like Waiting and on the series Kitchen Confidential, later scoring another leading role on the popular crime show Bones, playing psychologist Lance Swees. He turned his talents to work done behind the camera, co-writing the script for the hit 2011 comedy Horrible Bosses.

Trivia: Inventor of the Chill Pak, a cooling product for laptop computers, which also won him a silver medal at the International Inventors Expo in Geneva. Previously served on the advisory board Sci-Fest, a Science Fiction One-Act Play Festival in Los Angeles that began in 2014. Co-hosts a podcast with Phil Leirness called Chill Pak Hollywood Hour, in which he discusses happenings within the entertainment industry.

Trivia: Started acting in high-school plays and joined a theater company in college. Dustin Hoffman made her go to his dermatologist during their time on the 1989 Broadway production of The Merchant of Venice to treat a copperhead snake bite. Into her mid-30s, she worked in Los Angeles as a valet parking attendant and waitress to survive until the next acting opportunity came along. Quit her office job at a non-profit organization once My Name Is Earl got picked up for a second season on NBC. Won a 2010 Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Winter's Bone.

Trivia: Although she officially launched her dramatic career on the big screen, with bit parts in Jonathan Demme's nostalgic period piece Swing Shift (1984) and Wes Craven's gore picture The Hills Have Eyes, Part II (1984), African-American actress Penny Johnson (also occasionally credited by her full married name, Penny Johnson Jerald) gained broadest recognition as a network mainstay on innumerable short-lived and long-running U.S. television series. Her presence on the glitter box quickly became so widespread, in fact, that devoted prime-time viewers who fail to connect with Johnson's name will invariably identify her countenance.Born March 14, 1961, in Baltimore, MD, Johnson recognized acting as her life's work while a teenager, and subsequently commenced dramatic training at her home city's Centre Stage Theatre, at age 13, by lying about her age to get in. (She claimed to be 14 -- the ensemble's minimum age requirement.) The ruse worked, and Johnson's success with that troupe encouraged her to subsequently perform in a traveling ensemble (as a mime, juggler, and fire eater) with the Baltimore-based Theatre Project, and attend university for dramatic training at Juilliard several years later. After the aforementioned film roles, Johnson segued into television, first with a brief ongoing role as Debbie on the daytime soap General Hospital (in 1986), then as university law student Vivian on the Showtime pay cable service's revival of the late '70s CBS series The Paper Chase, retitled The Paper Chase: The Second Year (a role she sustained from 1984-1986). After guest spots on such programs as The Jeffersons, Simon & Simon, and Tour of Duty, Johnson landed one of the leads on the very short-lived ABC sitcom Homeroom -- starring as Virginia "Vicki" Harper, the medical-student wife of adman-turned-fourth grade teacher Darryl Harper (Darryl Sivad). That program premiered on September 24, 1989, and wrapped not three months later, unable to find an audience.Johnson then re-teamed with Craven for the director's telemovie Night Visions (1990), about a tough L.A. cop (James Remar) who solicits the help of a psychic (Loryn Locklin) to root out a serial murderer. Craven and co. shot that effort as a pilot for a prospective series, but it never took off. In 1992, the actress returned to pay cable by joining the cast of The Larry Sanders Show, comedian Garry Shandling's HBO satire about the behind-the-scenes shenanigans at a late-night, Carson-style talk program. Johnson struck gold with that move; the show lasted until 1998 and became a massive runaway hit and a critical darling.After small turns in two A-list cinematic releases -- 1993's Tina Turner biopic What's Love Got to Do With It? (as Lorraine) and Rusty Cundieff's 1994 gangsta rap satire Fear of a Black Hat (as Re-Re) -- Johnson carved a permanent niche for herself on three number-one television series, sequentially Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, ER, and 24. In the first, she played Kasidy Yates, a stunningly gorgeous freighter captain who meets and falls in love with Benjamin Sisko, but is indefinitely abandoned by him when he moves into another dimension with The Prophets. She then donned a nurse's uniform for a season (1998-1999) as Lynette Evans at ER's Chicago County General Hospital, alongside co-stars George Clooney, Anthony Edwards, and others, and keyed up for her most prominent role: Sherry Palmer, the wife of Senator David Palmer, and essentially a shrewd, diabolical, Lady Macbeth-like character willing to break any and every moral precept to lock down the presidency of her husband. More recently, Johnson portrayed Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice in the 2003 TV movie DC 9/11: Time of Crisis and again in another TV movie, The Path to 9/11, in 2006. Johnson married her husband, musician Gralin Jerald, in 1982. They have one daughter. In her off time, Johnson is actively involved with her church and with many progressive social causes; she played a significant role in securing aid for victims of Hurricane Katrina.