Trivia: The son of a prominent archaeologist/museum director, American actor Ted Danson grew up near the Navajo reservation in Arizona. He played basketball while at Kent School Connecticut, and then moved on to Stanford University. It was in the process of getting acquainted with an aspiring actress at Stanford that Danson found himself attending his first audition-- and by years' end had transferred to the drama department at Carnegie Tech. Marking time in non-speaking roles, Danson left the stage for the more lucrative world of TV commercials, some of which have been well-circulated on videotape since Danson has become famous. Danson's first steady TV work was as a slimy villain on the NBC soap opera Somerset. Shortly afterward, the actor attained his first film role, as a murdered cop, in The Onion Field (1978). After seeing Danson in the movie Body Heat (1981) and in an episode of the TV series Taxi, producer Glen Charles cast the actor as Sam Malone, ex-sports star and full-time barkeeper and womanizer, on the long-running, well-loved sitcom Cheers He won Emmys for the 1989-90 and 1992-93 seasons. Frequently making attempts at film stardom during the 11-season run of Cheers, Danson finally struck gold in Three Men and a Baby (1987) and its sequel Three Men and a Little Lady (1990). Danson's most recent work includes the 1996 starring role in the TV miniseries Gulliver's Travels and a co-starring role, opposite his new wife Mary Steenburgen, in the television sit-com Ink (also 1996). In 1998 Danson began a six-year run on another successful sitcom portraying the lead character on Becker, playing a caustic grump who couldn't have been further from Sam Malone's effortless charm. He continued to work steadily on the big screen as well scoring appearances in Saving Private Ryan and Mumford. He made sporadic appearances on Larry David's award-winning Curb Your Enthusiasm, and earned strong reviews for his dramatic work on the first season of the TV show Damages. He followed that up with a co-starring role on the HBO series Bored to Death, which lasted three seasons. In 2012 he could be seen in the inspirational animal movie Big Miracle.

Trivia: Best known for her television work, Marg Helgenberger started acting in college theatrical productions while studying speech at Northwestern University. A native of Omaha, NE, where she was born on November 16, 1958, Helgenberger moved to New York after graduating from college and landed a role as a tough young policewoman on the soap opera Ryan's Hope. During her four-year tenure on the show, she also maintained her ties with the theater through her involvement with TADA, the Children's Theater Company.Following a move to Southern California, Helgenberger began guest starring on such television series as Matlock, thirtysomething, and HBO's Tales From the Crypt. She co-starred on the short-lived series Shell Game (1987) before getting her big break with the role of K.C., a tough prostitute, on the distinguished drama China Beach in 1988. Helgenberger's role won her two Emmy nominations and one win in 1990. Following the series' demise in 1991, Helgenberger returned to television guest-star status on ER, where she had a four-episode-long recurring role, and in the miniseries The Tommyknockers.A presence on the big screen since 1989, when she made her feature-film debut in Steven Spielberg's romantic fantasy Always, Helgenberger has played a wide variety of roles in films ranging from Species (1995) to the moody The Last Time I Committed Suicide (1997) to Steven Soderbergh's widely acclaimed Erin Brockovich (2000). Helgenberger would continue to appear in films like In Good Company and Mr. Brooks, and found particular success with the starring role of Catherine Willows on the long running proceedural CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

Trivia: Whether scanning a homicide scene for evidence or blasting up a motorcycle ramp at 120 miles per hour as one of the world's greatest daredevils, it seems there's little that square-jawed CSI star George Eads can't accomplish on the small screen. However, the future wasn't always so sunny for the decidedly down-to-earth star; Eads has most certainly earned his rank among television's best, thanks to a solid work ethic and the kind of steadfast determination that's been known to move mountains. Born in Fort Worth, TX, and raised in nearby Belton, it didn't take the Texas Tech graduate long to realize his calling -- and despite the fact that chiseled Texans with big-time aspirations are a dime a dozen in Hollywood, Eads was determined to stand apart from the crowd. Of course, nothing comes easy in Hollywood, and after making the rounds to various auditions during the daytime, the eager up-and-comer would earn his keep as a weight adjuster at the local Gold's Gym in the off hours. Persistence eventually paid off in the form of a supporting role on the little-seen nighttime soap opera Savannah, and though the show barely lasted one season, it did provide an ideal training ground for the relatively inexperienced Eads. In the years that followed, Eads continued to hone his craft with a recurring role on the hit series ER as well as numerous supporting performances in such blink-and-you-miss-them made-for-television pictures as The Ultimate Lie and Crowned and Dangerous. Eads' persistence eventually paid off, and he was hired for the key role of forensic analyst Nick Stokes in the breakout television hit CSI. Cast as a former college baseball star with a hero complex, Eads charmed audiences by creating a character that was as believable as he was personable. The show proved an enormous success, but the young star nearly lost the role forever by making the simple mistake of oversleeping on the day of his salary negotiations (CBS at first thought Eads was attempting to strong-arm them for more money, but the situation soon blew over when Eads apologized for his actions). Now seated comfortably at the top of the television food chain, Eads continued to make a name for himself with roles in numerous made-for-television features including Just a Walk in the Park and Monte Walsh, though it was a role as his childhood hero Evel Knievel in a small-screen biography that truly brought Eads' career full circle. When he's not investigating some of the most grisly crimes ever witnessed on the small screen in CSI, Eads fulfills his duties as part owner of Hollywood's popular Cinespace restaurant -- a perfect place to take in dinner and a movie.

Trivia: The son of an actor of the same name, Paul Guilfoyle has appeared in several major film productions, portraying a wide variety of supporting characters. He is a member of the prestigious Actor's Studio, as well as being a longtime resident of New York. He also has numerous stage credits to his name. However, the actor is best known for his role in the crime drama CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. He joined the show in its first season in 2000 as L.V.P.D Captain James "Jim" Brass, and continued to work on the show throughout the 2000s and early 2010s.

Trivia: The lithe and attractive brunette American actress Jorja Fox entered the public eye in the late '90s and early 2000s, given her involvement as a recurrent cast member in three consecutive, top-ranked U.S. television series: ER (1994), The West Wing (1999), and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (2000). Fox is perhaps most familiar to fans of CSI, appearing in well over 150 episodes and numerous seasons.Born Jorja-An Fox on July 7, 1968, in New York, NY, but raised in Melbourne Beach, FL, Fox moved back to Manhattan in her teens and began a modeling career after winning a local modeling contest, then subsequently enrolled as a drama student at the Lee Strasberg Institute, where she studied acting under the aegis of legendary actor William Hickey (Prizzi's Honor, Forget Paris). Fox's early roles were minor and somewhat forgettable, though she debuted onscreen under the tutelage one of the finest American indie filmmakers -- Maggie Greenwald -- in that director's well-received film noir debut The Kill-Off (1991). She followed it up with an equally dark turn, as Fate 3 (alongside future West Wing co-star Allison Janney), in John Feldman's little-seen black comedy thriller Dead Funny (1995), and joined mentor Hickey and Alan Arkin for the best-forgotten Jerky Boys (1995) -- a loud, rude and obnoxious farce about a couple of prank phone callers. The film bombed with critics and the public, and disappeared instantly.Fox joined the cast of the blockbuster series ER in 1996, during its third season on the air. She played Maggie Doyle, a lesbian intern at County General Hospital who launches a sexual harassment suit against a seemingly invincible administrator. The role lasted for three seasons, wrapping in 1999; that same year, Fox signed for a supporting role on The West Wing, mega-producer Aaron Sorkin's blockbuster series drama about life in the Oval Office. Fox would spend the following years finding continued success on the small screen, most notably in the role of investigator Sara Sidle on the hit CBS series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

Trivia: Although bit parts in A-list features such as The Rules of Attraction (2002) and Little Athens (2005) highlight his resumé, the sandy-blonde-haired actor Eric Szmanda may find it difficult to supersede his own ties with the characterization of Greg Sanders on the top-tiered CBS series drama CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. As Sanders -- a DNA and trace expert analysis with a "nonconformist exterior" and an enduring taste for heavy metal (not to mention a deep-seated infatuation for Sarah Sidle [Jorja Fox]), Szmanda made an enduring impression among series fans, starting as a recurring character and working his way up to series regular; he stayed with the show for several years.

Trivia: After a scant few supporting roles in both Tinseltown duds (Here Come the Littles, 1985) and respected Hollywood A-listers (Michael Apted's Class Action, 1991), American actor Robert David Hall connected with his broadest fan base via his multi-season portrayal of Dr. Albert Robbins, the middle-aged coroner on the television phenomenon CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. With his portly figure, balding pate, and ever-present white beard, Hall lent a distinguished aura to his evocation of Robbins, a character with the most unusual of personal and professional histories. Off-camera, Hall is a double-leg amputee who has served for long periods as the national chairperson of the Performers With Disabilities committees of SAG and AFTRA. His career includes a long tenure as the daytime music and voice director of KNX-FM, Los Angeles. In addition to his acting role on CSI and occasional movie work, Hall made occasional guest appearances on such series as L.A. Law and The Practice.

Trivia: HBO enthusiasts will invariably remember character actor Wallace Langham for his winning multi-season portrayal of Phil, the conceited head writer of Larry Sanders' late-night talk show, on the Garry Shandling-headlined sitcom The Larry Sanders Show. Langham (who first received billing in projects as Wally Ward) grew up in Los Angeles; his parents divorced at an early age and his mother, Sunni, designed costumes for the musical variety series Donny and Marie. Langham was, by all accounts, drawn magnetically to showbusiness; he enrolled in acting classes, signed with an agent, and landed a string of television commercials beginning at age 16 (in 1981). After high school, Langham enrolled briefly in Cal State Northridge, but dropped out after snagging a bit part in John Hughes' teenage sci-fi comedy Weird Science (1985). Scattered appearances on such series as Murder, She Wrote and Star Trek: Voyager followed -- as well as the recurring role of Josh, smart-alecky assistant to lingerie proprietor Veronica on the Kirstie Alley sitcom Veronica's Closet. It was the Shandling turn, however, that put Langham on top of his game. He made occasional feature appearances in such pictures as the Nora Ephron comedy-fantasy Michael (1996) opposite John Travolta, the Eddie Murphy vehicle Daddy Day Care (2003), the ensemble comedy drama Little Miss Sunshine (2006), the award-winning The Social Network and 2012's Ruby Sparks but -- outside of Larry Sanders -- he is probably best known for his fine work on the series drama CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. On that program, Langham sustained a multi-season portrayal as lab technician David Hodges.

Trivia: Detroit native Elisabeth Harnois relocated to California at a young age and was raised in Los Angeles. Living in such close proximity to the home of the film industry, she began appearing in film and TV at the age of six, with a role in the movie One Magic Christmas. She would go on to study at Wesleyan University, and graduated in 2001 with a degree in film studies. Getting back into the business after graduation, Harnois began appearing in films like the critically acclaimed Pretty Persuasion in 2005, Chaos Theory in 2007, and A Single Man in 2009. Branching into lighthearted fare in 2011, the actress would sign on to provide the voice of Ki in the animated film Mars Needs Moms. Later that same year, Harnois joined the cast of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation as Morgan Brody.

Trivia: Growing up in Northern California, Grant Show developed an interest in acting while he was still in high school. He pursued his passion to UCLA, where he studied theater arts for a year before leaving school to appear on the TV show Ryan's Hope. Other appearances would follow on shows like The Love Boat, but Show didn't give up on studying his craft at the first sign of a blossoming career. He also traveled to London, where he enrolled at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art for a year.In 1992, Show joined the cast of a new night-time soap called Melrose Place, premiering on the Fox network. The show became a massive hit, and thousands of viewers came to know Show for his hunky character, Jake Hanson. He stayed with the show until 1997, and he went on play prominent roles in the cult hit Point Pleasant and 2007's The Girl Next Door. He also took a recurring role as Jack Dawson on the saucy series Dirt with Courteney Cox Arquette. The next year, Show appeared in the regular role Tom Decker in the '70s period drama series Swingtown. He went on to appear in Justice for Natalie Holloway, Born 2 Race, and the 2012 horror film The Possession. In 2013, Show returned to television in Lifetime series Devious Maids.

Trivia: As a child, lived in Ireland for five years with his family. Made his TV debut on a 2007 episode of 30 Rock. Best-known for playing Luke Cafferty on Friday Night Lights from 2009 to the series finale in 2011. Was cast in the role of Caleb Evers on FOX's 2011 drama The Chicago Code. Plays electric guitar and specializes in blues-rock.

Trivia: Actor Titus Welliver sailed to fame as a character player, largely via television roles. Though Welliver exhibited such an individualistic presence (and appearance) that his identity became inextricable from the casts of the programs in which he played, he also evinced such versatility with characterizations that series creators (and feature producers) were able to successfully cast him as a broad spectrum of occupational types, from cops to physicians to military sergeants. Regular roles included Officer Jack Lowery on Steven Bochco's short-lived police drama Brooklyn South and Silas Adams on the revisionist Western show Deadwood; he also had a recurring role as physician Dr. Mondzac on the seminal cop series NYPD Blue. Welliver's cinematic resumé includes parts in such features as The Doors (1991), Mulholland Falls (1996), Assault on Precinct 13 (2005), and Gone Baby Gone (2007). Welliver continued to work heavily in television, booking guest appearances on shows like NCIS, Prison Break and Supernatural, before joining Lost in a pivotal final-season role as The Man in Black. His profile justifiably raised, Welliver booked recurring gigs on Sons of Anarchy and The Good Wife. After working with director Ben Affleck in Gone Baby Gone, Welliver appeared in his next two films, The Town (2010) and the Academy Award-winning Argo (2012).

Trivia: Though actress Annabeth Gish is not, as has frequently been reported, related to silent-film legend Lillian Gish (she is decidedly not the never-married Lillian's granddaughter!), Annabeth does have one thing in common with her famous namesake: she began acting at a very early age, and achieved film stardom before she was 20. Born in Albuquerque, Annabeth moved to Cedar Falls, Iowa, when her college-professor dad accepted a position there. From age eight onward, Gish was active in local community and children's theatre; by the time she was 11, she was a professional model. Her first film appearance was in 1986's Desert Bloom, in which, as a troubled preteen plagued by family squabbles and nuclear testing, she all but stole the show. Gish's career went into Drive when she starred in the cult favorite Mystic Pizza, though when the film is now shown on television, the supporting appearance of Julia Roberts is the focus of ad-campaign attention. A most attractive young lady, Gish scored as one of four beautiful vacationing teens in 1988's Shag (her screen chums were Phoebe Cates, Bridget Fonda and Paige Hannah). In 1993, Annabeth Gish briefly interrupted her film career to earn a BA in English; within a year, she was back at work in the theatrical film Wyatt Earp and the made-for-TV Scarlet. In 1997, Gish appeared alongside Angelina Jolie and Dana Delaney for a starring role in the TV movie True Women; however, she would find more significant success on the small screen in 2001, when she joined the cast of The X-Files to play feisty FBI Agent Monica Reyes. Gish and Robert Patrick effectively became the lead characters during the show's 8th and 9th seasons, though ratings indicated that their onscreen chemistry couldn't compete with that of Duchnovy and Anderson, who had become beloved as the characters of Mulder and Scully. In 2006, Gish took on the starring role of Eileen Caffee in Brotherhood, a drama from Showtime, and joined the cast of A&E's TV miniseries Stephen King's Bag of Bones in 2011, and played a therapist with demons of her own in ABC's Pretty Little Liars the same year.

Trivia: Began acting at age 6 with a stage role in The Grapes of Wrath with the West Coast Ensemble. Appeared in the 2006 Geffen Playhouse revival of All My Sons, opposite Neil Patrick Harris and Laurie Metcalfe. Won the Young Artists Award for Best Performance in Live Theater in 2010 for his work in Big! The Musical. Mentors kids through hockey with the Special Needs Hockey team. Supports numerous charities, including the American Cancer Society and Bookshare.

Trivia: Kay Panabaker, the younger sister of child actress Danielle Panabaker, actually preceded her older sibling in tackling feature roles. A wunderkind to end all, Kay grew up in the Atlanta area and discovered a love for community theater at an early age, then made a swift and easy transition to Los Angeles at the behest of her agent. She landed her first major part voicing characters for the 2001 Disney/Pixar blockbuster Monsters, Inc., and subsequently assumed countless guest roles on series programs including Angel, ER, Summerland, and CSI. Like many of her teenage and preteen predecessors, however, the young actress achieved lead status via original movies on The Disney Channel -- in vehicles such as Life Is Ruff (2005) and Read It and Weep (2006). An early and much-publicized college graduation, reportedly before the age of 18, only boosted her recognition.2007, however, marked the budding actress' breakthrough year; that fall, she realized her first theatrical lead with the issue of the feature Moondance Alexander, a National Velvet-like outing about a young lady determined to turn an ordinary horse into a champion racer, despite the objections of his curmudgeonly owner (Don Johnson). At about the same time, Panabaker tackled a supporting role in the much-anticipated cinematization of Nancy Drew, adapted from the books by Carolyn Keene. She had a small part in the remake of Fame, and went on to appear in The Lake Effect, Little Birds, and Cyberbully.

Trivia: Having journeyed from fresh-scrubbed teen stardom to virtual nonentity and then into a full-bodied critical embrace with her portrayal of a hooker with a heart of gold, the blonde, blue-eyed and impossibly wholesome-looking Elisabeth Shue can truly be said to have had one of Hollywood's more unpredictable careers.The descendent of a blue-blooded, Mayflower-imported East Coast family, Shue was born in Wilmington, Delaware, on October 6, 1963. Raised in the company of three brothers (one of whom, Andrew, would go on to star on Fox's Melrose Place), she excelled in gymnastics, and on the basis of her athletic abilities, she was encouraged by a friend to audition for television commercials. Shue promptly landed a number of jobs pushing everything from Hellmann's Mayonnaise to Burger King, and she managed to keep working as an actor during her college studies at Wellesley and Harvard. In 1984, she won a role on the TV series Call to Glory, and that same year, she made her film debut as Ralph Macchio's girlfriend in the blockbuster The Karate Kid. Starring roles in Adventures in Babysitting (1987) and Cocktail (1988) followed, but Shue quickly found herself being relegated to playing the disposable girlfriend in any number of films. Things went from bad to worse to just flat-out embarrassing, and by the time she was in her late 20s, the actress was in what could charitably be described as the career doldrums.Fortunately, with her casting in Mike Figgis' 1995 Leaving Las Vegas, Shue's fortunes did a complete about-face. A film that nearly did not get made and that no major Hollywood studio would finance, it was a completely unexpected hit, and Shue's performance as Sera, a used-and-abused prostitute who takes up with a drunk with a death wish (Nicolas Cage), was hailed as one of the finest comebacks in recent memory. The actress earned a Best Actress Oscar nomination -- as well as a host of other honors -- for her portrayal, and almost overnight she found herself on Hollywood's A-list. However, Shue's newfound adulation did not guarantee that her subsequent films would be worthy of her talents, something that was demonstrated all too well with her next three films, The Underneath (1995), The Trigger Effect (1996), and Cousin Bette (1997), which were consecutive flops. The actress fared somewhat better in Woody Allen's Deconstructing Harry (1997), garnering a positive reception for her performance as one of Allen's unfortunate conquests.Following another triple round of potential career disembowelment that assumed the form of The Saint (1997), Palmetto (1998), and Molly (1999), Shue re-emerged with The Hollow Man (2000), a thriller that cast the actress as a scientist who teams up with Kevin Bacon and Josh Brolin to fight an invisible killer. In the several years to come, Shue would remain active on screen, appearing in everything from the family film Dreamer: A True Story, to the R-rated comedy Hamlet 2. Shue would also find tremendous success on the show CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

Trivia: Ever since his film debut in director Michael Mann's 1981 crime drama Thief, actor William L. Petersen (born February 21st, 1953) has carved a successful niche for himself in the realm of crime-oriented television and film. Audiences were quick to warm to the actor thanks to his everyman appearance and ability to elicit sympathy by portraying authority figures whose rank rarely surpassed their humanity, and in the following decades, Petersen would hone this persona to a fine point in such efforts as Mann's 1986 thriller Manhunter and, much later, the popular CBS crime series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. It was while studying on a football scholarship at Idaho State University that the Evanston, IL, native first discovered his love for the stage, and though the popular jock initially signed up for drama classes as a means of boosting his grade point average, his love for the stage soon surpassed his grip on the gridiron. A post-graduate move to Spain found Petersen studying Shakespearean acting, with a subsequent return to the States leading the burgeoning actor to Chicago. In addition to an association with the famed Steppenwolf Theater, Petersen and several of his peers co-founded Chicago's Remains Theater Ensemble in 1980. The next year, a small supporting role in Mann's Thief marked Petersen's first foray into the celluloid universe, and it was also around this time that Petersen made his Broadway debut with a starring role in The Night of the Iguana. The actor remained a fixture on CSI until 2008, and went on to co-star in the films Detatchment (2011) and Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (2010).As the 1980s progressed, Petersen became an increasingly recognizable figure in the world of film, in particular thanks to solid performances in such efforts as To Live and Die in L.A., Manhunter, and Amazing Grace and Chuck, with his stature on the screen virtually cemented by the time he kicked off the 1990s with a turn as Pat Garrett in Young Guns II. Though roles in such films as Return to Lonesome Dove, Fear, and The Beast did indeed increase Petersen's recognition factor among the moviegoing and television-viewing masses, he more often than not seemed to be lost without Mann's direction and criminals to chase. Of course, all of this would be solved when the veteran actor stepped into the role of crime scene investigator for the 2000 television series CSI, and though feature work had certainly taken precedence over television thus far in his career, the transition seemed to benefit Petersen when the Emmy-nominated series soon shot to the top of the ratings.

Trivia: Best known for his role as Warrick Brown, the detective with a marked predilection for risk (and an ongoing gambling addiction), on CBS's blockbuster series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, the easygoing, congenial, and memorably handsome African-American actor Gary Dourdan has built his life and his public image around uniqueness and originality. Six foot two inches tall, green-eyed, sporting bushy yet sculpted dreadlocks, and straddling the worlds of drama and avant-garde music, Dourdan commented to Ebony magazine, "I've always tried to be unconventional as much as I possibly could...one thing I'm trying to do with my career and with my craft is to blur the lines between what people think African-Americans should play and what I'm doing. I'm not much into fads and fashions and trying to follow things."Born December 11, 1966, in Philadelphia, PA, as the son of Robert and Sandy Durdin (his actual surname), the adolescent Dourdan attended "Freedom Theater," an inner-city program for aspiring actors, during adolescence. Success in this venue prompted him to travel to Manhattan on a weekly basis for musical training and dramatic auditions. Dourdan landed his "big break" as an actor in the early '90s, seemingly without even trying. While dating fashion model Roshumba Williams around 1991 and vacationing with her in France, Dourdan was spotted by powerhouse Debbie Allen, then the producer and director of A Different World; impressed by his looks and manner, she invited him to audition for the series. He played Shazza Zulu, the resident "con man" of Hillman College -- a role he sustained through the end of 1992 (for less than one season), before moving on to new endeavors. Dourdan debuted onscreen inauspiciously, with a bit part as the Second Cartel Man in Weekend at Bernie's II. Additional roles included that of a copy guy in Ron Howard's The Paper (1994), Christie in Alien Resurrection, and Yates in the Andy Wilson-directed medical thriller Playing God (1997). In 2000, Dourdan landed his biggest break with the CSI role, for executive producer Jerry Bruckheimer -- and (when the program instantly shot up to number one) continued the part as the series progressed. The same year that he signed with Bruckheimer and company, Dourdan played Malcolm X in the telemovie Muhammad Ali: King of the World. As mentioned, Dourdan is also a prolific alternative musician (with solo albums to his credit) and a record producer. He married African-American model Williams in 1992; the couple divorced two years later. He has two children, a son, Lyric, and a daughter, Nyla (the daughter of Jennifer Sutton, whom Dourdan dated from 1995 to 2000). He voiced the character of Detective Crispus Allen in 2008's Batman: Gotham Knight, and took on a supporting role as a chef in Jumping the Broom (2011).

Trivia: Louise Lombard lived and breathed the fine arts from an early age, and projected extreme versatility in many arenas. A trained dancer and actress from early childhood, Lombard graduated to television commercials by age 14, and subsequently delved into dramatic roles. Lombard evinced a remarkable predilection for emotionally and psychologically challenging evocations, such as that of a heroin addict in a PSA directed by Jon Amiel (Copycat). After gracing the BBC series Casualty and Bergerac, the ITV show Capital City, and the ITV telemovies Catherine Cookson's A Black Velvet Gown, and Perfect Scoundrels: Sweeter Than Wine, Lombard broke through to national fame in 1991, with the lead role of Evangeline Eliott in the three-season House of Eliott series on the BBC. The story concerns two sisters who travel the road from extreme poverty to wealth as proprietors of the most successful dressmaking business in all of England.For the remainder of the 1990s, Lombard sought out a series of highly individualized and intelligent projects, including Elizabeth Gill's 1997 ensemble drama Gold in the Streets (as the girlfriend of an illegal Irish immigrant) and the ITV series Bodyguards (as one of the toughs of the title). After a brief tenure as a literature student at Cambridge University (as well as studying photography and print work at St. Martin's College), Lombard spent the first decade of the new millennium branching out into more internationally oriented roles, including insurance investigator Ellen Brachman in the Dutch movie Claim (2000), and the part of Kath in My Kingdom (2001), a highly modernized adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear. American viewers, however, will most closely associate Lombard with the romantic lead of Lady Anne Davenport in the Viggo Mortensen period adventure saga Hidalgo (2004), and the role of Dr. Harriet Fellows, a physician who assists crash survivor Alec Baldwin, in the TNT telemovie Second Nature (2003).

Trivia: North Carolina native Liz Vassey began acting on-stage when she was just nine years old, studying acting at a number of universities over the coming years before beginning her onscreen acting career. She appeared on the soap opera All My Children beginning in 1988 and would make guest appearances on numerous TV series, including Murphy Brown, Quantum Leap, and others. Soon, Vassey would be snagging staring roles on TV shows, playing roles like Captain Liberty on the cult favorite The Tick and Wendy Simms on the procedural drama CSI. Among her other credits are the supernatural series Tru Calling and the Elmore Leonard adaptation Maximum Bob.

Trivia: Initially known for her multi-telefilm portrayal of Christy Huddleston, the young woman who accepts a teaching position in rural Cutter Gap, NC, and begins educating the ignorant locals -- a role she inherited from Kellie Martin, the star of the mid-'90s TV series -- actress Lauren Lee Smith simultaneously defied any related attempts to pigeonhole her as a family-friendly actress by branching out into much grittier and edgier material. Role choices included that of a psychic mutant in the sci-fi series Mutant X (2001-2004), a nymphomaniac in the racy Lie With Me (2005), a lesbian cook on the Showtime drama series The L Word (2004-2006), a "beat" girl in Terry Zwigoff's misanthropic comedy drama Art School Confidential (2006), and a homicidal med student in the thriller Pathology (2008). In the years to come, Smith would remain active on screen, appearing on shows like CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Good Dog, and The Listener.