Trivia: Best known for portraying time traveler Dr. Sam Beckett in the popular sci-fi series Quantum Leap, Scott Bakula is also a noted Broadway actor and occasional movie star, though it is in the last venue that he has had the least amount of success. The son of a musician, Bakula is said to have started his own rock band when he was in the fourth grade. He also sang with the St. Louis Symphony before attending the University of Kansas. Bakula launched his acting career as a teen in regional theater and as a stage actor specializes in musical comedy. He made his Broadway debut in 1983 in Marilyn: An American Fable. He started showing up regularly on television as a guest star on such series as My Sister Sam and Designing Women during the 1980s. In 1986, Bakula starred in an unsuccessful television series, Gung Ho! Two years later he headlined another unsuccessful one, Eisenhower and Lutz. In 1988, Bakula was nominated for a Tony for his work in Romance, Romance. The following year, he was cast in Quantum Leap and has since gained a cult following; in 1992, he won a Golden Globe and was nominated four more times. Bakula was also nominated for a quartet of Emmys. Bakula made his feature-film debut starring opposite Kirstie Alley in Sibling Rivalry (1990). Other notable film appearances include L.A. Story (1991) and My Family/Mi Familia (1995). In 1993, Bakula had a recurring role on the CBS sitcom Murphy Brown as a love interest of Candice Bergen. He has also appeared in a number of television movies and in 1996, he had a stint in another short-lived series, Mr. and Mrs. Smith.Though he worked steadily in movies, television turned out to be his next great success when, in 2001, he took the part of Capt. Jonathan Archer on Star Trek: Enterprise, a program that lasted four seasons.In 2009 Bakula would star alongside Ray Romano and Andre Braugher in the well-respected comedy/drama series Men of a Certain Age, and landed in one of the best films of his career, Steven Soderbergh's The Informant!.

Trivia: Though he has proven to be a natural, allegedly Lucas Black's ambition is not to be an actor when he grows up. Born and raised in Alabama, Black became a professional actor when an open casting call landed him a bit part in Jon Avnet's The War (1994). After starring on TV's American Gothic (1995), Black definitively caught the audience's attention with his pivotal role in Billy Bob Thornton's award-winning drama Sling Blade (1996). Resisting child actor treacle, Black turned in a genuinely charming and moving performance as the young boy who befriends Thornton's mentally challenged ex-con. Despite the acclaim, however, Black opted to stay home in Alabama rather than go Hollywood. Black continued to act throughout his high school years, playing supporting roles in the racial drama Ghosts of Mississippi (1996) and the big-screen version of The X-Files (1998), and starring in the TV movie Flash (1997) and as the politically aware Peejoe in Crazy in Alabama (1999). In Thornton's second directorial effort All the Pretty Horses (2000), Black's performance as the young drifter who gets Matt Damon into trouble once again revealed his ability to hold his own against -- indeed outshine -- Hollywood's best. Black, however, has asserted that his ultimate goal is to become a professional fisherman. High profile roles as everything from a piano savant in Killer Diller to a high school football star in Friday Night LIghts and a fresh-faced Marine in Jarhead proved without question that Black had the acting range needed to craft and impressive and enduring career, and in 2006 Black put the peddle to the metal as a troubled teen whose trip to Tokyo finds him mastering the art of the drift in the adrenaline-charged sequel The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift.

Trivia: Born in Guyana on December 25, 1952, actress CCH Pounder made her first film appearance as a nurse in Bob Fosse's All That Jazz (1979). Pounder went on to play a small part in Prizzi's Honor before her first big role as truckstop owner Brenda in Bagdad Cafe. Her first TV-series assignment was as husband-murderer Dawn Murphy in the short-lived FOX sitcom Women in Prison. Many dramatic TV movies followed, including Leap of Faith, Third Degree Burn, Murder in Mississippi, and the two-part CBS miniseries Common Ground. On the big screen, she had supporting parts in Postcards From the Edge, Kurt Baker's version of The Importance of Being Earnest, and the romantic comedy Benny & Joon. After appearing in Sliver and Robocop 3, she returned to television for the role of Dr. Angela Hicks on ER, earning her an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress. She left the show in 1997 and went on to countless TV movies (Final Justice, Netforce, A Touch of Hope, just to name a few), as well as a couple feature films (Face/Off, End of Days) and TV miniseries (House of Frankenstein, To Serve and Protect). In 2001, she narrated the PBS documentary series Race: The Power of an Illusion and played a judge in Allison Anders' independent drama Things Behind the Sun. In 2002, she was back on television as Detective Claudette Wynn on the FOX police drama The Shield.Pounder continued to work on The Shield until the series concluded in 2007, and was nominated for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series by the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for her role as Detective Wynn. The actress appeared in 2009's psychological horror The Orphan, and voiced Mo'at, the spiritual leader of the Omaticaya clan, in James Cameron's mega-blockbuster Avatar the same year. 2009 would prove a rewarding year for Pounder, as her guest appearances on the BBC/HBO series No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency would earn her an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series.

Trivia: Was part of the comedy troupe Commedus Interruptus in college. Co-founded the comedy troupe Summer of Tears with Todd Waldman in 2004. Won the U.S. Comedy Art Festival's jury prize for best sketch comedy in 2007 with Summer of Tears. Was a writer for ABC's Happy Endings.

Trivia: Was a member of '80s hip-hop group Groove B. Chill. Paralyzed from the waist down as the result of a November 2001 motorcycle accident in South Carolina. Has served as a spokesman for the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation. Established the Daryl Mitchell Foundation, which was founded on the principles of awareness, education and advocacy for those impacted by spinal-cord injuries.

Trivia: Was honored as a Presidential Scholar in the Arts by the U.S. Presidential Scholars Program during her senior year in high school. Wrote two articles that were published in The Juilliard Journal while in college. Made her New York stage debut in the Delacorte Theater's production of The Merchant of Venice in 2010. In 2013, made her Broadway debut in Christopher Durang's production of Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike as Cassandra, a role that she originated. Is involved with an anti-racism organization, A People's Institute for Survival and Beyond.

Trivia: Brooklyn, NY, native Vanessa Ferlito grew up amid somewhat challenging circumstances as an only child (the daughter of two Italian-American hair salon owners) whose father died before she reached the age of three. She developed acting aspirations early in life and broke into the entertainment business via television, with guest spots and recurring roles on crime-themed series programs including CSI: New York and The Sopranos -- where her unmistakably ethnic, weathered but voluptuous look lent her time and again to effective portrayals of molls, mistresses, and other gritty urban female types. She landed her most prominent early feature roles in Spider-Man 2 (as a co-star in Mary Jane's play) and Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof segment of the 2007 two-episode omnibus Grindhouse (as one of the low-down women stalked and murdered by Kurt Russell's psychopath Stuntman Mike). After the Tarantino project, Ferlito joined co-stars Debra Messing and Alfred Molina for the gentle comedy Nothing Like the Holidays and worked with Tyler Perry on the farce Madea Goes to Jail (2009).

Trivia: While savvy television viewers will no doubt recognize prolific small-screen actress Wendie Malick from such popular series as Baywatch, Just Shoot Me, and HBO's smart and sexy comedy Dream On, the late '90s found her feature career warming up in such independent efforts as Manna From Heaven (2001) and Bathroom Boy (2003). A native of Buffalo, NY, who first found work in front of the cameras as a Wilhelmina model in the 1970s, the Ohio Wesleyan University alum would later work for New York congressman Jack Kemp following her graduation. Subsequently gracing the catwalks of New York, Paris, and Madrid, it was a small role in the 1978 comedy How to Pick up Girls that provided the aspiring actress with her first screen break. Though she would appear in a few theatrical releases such as Scrooged (1988) during the 1980s, most of her work came with made-for-television features and such series as Kate and Allie and Anything But Love. Increasingly visible on the small screen during the 1990s, Malick's role as series protagonist Martin Tupper's (Brian Benben) ex-wife on Dream On utilized her comic abilities to maximum effect and netted the actress four Cable ACE awards. Following the final episode of Dream On in 1996, it was only one short year before Malick began a stint on another popular series that would gain her accolades among sitcom junkies, Just Shoot Me. Her background in the modeling industry provided the ideal foundation for her role as former model Nina Van Horn, and Malick (Emmy-nominated for the role) remained with the show until its final episode in 2003, simultaneously taking occasional parts in both made-for-TV and theatrical features. In 1997 Malick took the lead in the little-seen romantic comedy Just Add Love, and following voice work as the egotistical principal in the Disney series Fillmore!, she appeared alongside Valerie Bertinelli, Jane Leeves, and Betty White the Emmy-winning comedy series Hot in Cleveland. In addition to her screen work, Wendie Malick met husband Richard Erickson while building homes for poor families in Mexico, and she also helps the homeless with her work for the Adopt-A-Family organization.