Trivia: While his police-chief father wanted him to become a soccer player, Austrian-born actor Arnold Schwarzenegger opted instead for a bodybuilding career. Born July 30, 1947, in the small Austrian town of Graz, Schwarzenegger went on to win several European contests and international titles (including Mr. Olympia) and then came to the U.S. for body-building exhibitions, billing himself immodestly but fairly accurately as "The Austrian Oak." Though his thick Austrian accent and slow speech patterns led some to believe that the Austrian Oak was shy a few leaves, Schwarzenegger was, in fact, a highly motivated and intelligent young man. After graduating from the University of Wisconsin with a degree in business and economics, he invested his contest earnings in real estate and a mail-order bodybuilding equipment company.A millionaire before the age of 22, Schwarzenegger decided to try acting. Producers were impressed by his physique but not his mouthful of a last name, so it was as Arnold Strong that he made his film bow in the low-budget spoof Hercules in New York (1970, with a dubbed voice). He reverted to his own name for the 1976 film Stay Hungry, then achieved stardom as "himself" in the 1977 documentary Pumping Iron. In The Villain (1979), a cartoon-like Western parody, he played "Handsome Stranger," exhibiting a gift for understated comedy that would more or less go unexploited for many years thereafter. With Conan the Barbarian (1982) and its sequel, Conan the Destroyer (1984), the actor established himself as an action star, though his acting was backtracking into two-dimensionality (understandably, given the nature of the Conan role). As the murderous android title character in The Terminator (1984), Schwarzenegger became a bona fide box-office draw, and also established his trademark of coining repeatable catchphrases in his films: "I'll be back," in Terminator, "Consider this a divorce," in Total Recall (1990), and so on.As Danny De Vito's unlikely pacifistic sibling in Twins (1988), Schwarzenegger received the praise of critics who noted his "unsuspected" comic expertise (quite forgetting The Villain). In Kindergarten Cop (1991), Schwarzenegger played a hard-bitten police detective who found his true life's calling as a schoolteacher (his character was a cop only because it was expected of him by his policeman father, which could have paralleled his own life). Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), wherein Schwarzenegger exercised his star prerogative and insisted that the Terminator become a good guy, was the most expensive film ever made up to its time -- and one of the biggest moneymakers. The actor's subsequent action films were equally as costly; sometimes the expenditures paid off, while other times the result was immensely disappointing -- for the box-office disappointment Last Action Hero (1992), Schwarzenegger refreshingly took full responsibility, rather than blaming the failure on his production crew or studio as other "superstars" have been known to do.A rock-ribbed Republican despite his marriage to JFK's niece, Maria Shriver (with whom he has four children), Schwarzenegger was appointed by George Bush in 1990 as chairman of the President's Council of Physical Fitness and Sports, a job he took as seriously and with as much dedication as any of his films. A much-publicized investment in the showbiz eatery Planet Hollywood increased the coffers in Schwarzenegger's already bulging bank account. Schwarzenegger then added directing to his many accomplishments, piloting a few episodes of the cable-TV series Tales From the Crypt as well as a 1992 remake of the 1945 film Christmas in Connecticut.Schwarzenegger bounced back from the disastrous Last Action Hero with 1994's True Lies, which, despite its mile-wide streak of misogyny and its gaping plot and logic holes, was one of the major hits of that summer's movie season. Following the success of True Lies, Schwarzenegger went back to doing comedy with Junior, co-starring with Emma Thompson and his old Twins accomplice Danny De Vito. The film met with critically mixed results, although it fared decently at the box office. Undeterred, Schwarzenegger continued down the merry, if treacherous, path of alternating action with comedy with 1996's Eraser and Jingle All the Way, the latter of which proved to be both a critical bomb and a box-office disappointment. In a move that suggested he had realized that audiences wanted him back in the world of assorted weaponry and explosives, Schwarzenegger returned to the action realm with 1997's Batman & Robin, which unfortunately proved to be a huge critical disappointment, although, in the tradition of most Schwarzenegger action films, it did manage to gross well over 100 million dollars at the box office and over 130 million dollars more the world over.The turn of the century found Schwarzenegger's star losing some of its luster with a pair of millennial paranoia films, 1999's End of Days and 2000's The 6th Day. The former film -- in which a security consultant has to save the world from Satan -- was critically lambasted and, despite a powerful opening weekend, failed to recoup its cost in the States. The latter film -- a cloning parable which bore more than a passing resemblance to Total Recall -- received more positive notices, but took in less than half the receipts Days did just one year prior. Perhaps as a response to these failures, Schwarzenegger prepped three films reminiscent of former successes, all scheduled for release in 2001 and 2002: the terrorist action thriller Collateral Damage, True Lies 2, and the long-anticipated Terminator 3. Though Collateral Damage received a chilly reception at the box office and the development of True Lies 2 fell into question, longtime fans of the cigar-chomping strongman rejoiced when Arnold resumed his role as a seriously tough cyborg in Terminator 3. Though he made a cameo in director Frank Coraci's adaptation of Around the World in 80 Days, Arnold's most notable role of the new millenium was political -- Schwarzenegger replaced Gray Davis as governor of California in the highly controversial recall election of 2003.In 2010, Schwarzenegger played the character of Trench in The Expendables, an action thriller following a group of tough-as-nails mercinaries as they deal with the aftermath of a mission gone wrong, and reprised the role for The Expendables 2 in 2012.

Trivia: Actress Kathryn Harrold seems content with merely being one of the most brilliant, experimental actresses on the off-Broadway and "small" movie scene. Trained in her craft by Sanford Meisner and Uta Hagen, Harrold began building her theatrical reputation in the mid-1970s while teaching acting classes at NYU and Connecticut College. She made her first film, Nightwing, in 1979, and has since appeared intermittently in films ranging from the nirvana of Into the Night (1985) to the nadir of Yes, Giorgio (1982). She has been a regular on several television series, and in 1980 was cast as Lauren Bacall in the made-for-TV biopic Bogie. Long-time televiewers will probably be most familiar with Kathryn Harrold as Nola Dancy on the NBC daytimer The Doctors, as Christina LaKatzis on the succes d'estime series I'll Fly Away and as talkshow host Garry Shandling's ex-wife on cable's The Larry Sanders Show.

Trivia: Actor/director Sam Wanamaker was one of those whose career was nearly derailed by the machinations of Senator McCarthy and his House Un-American Activities Committee. A native of Chicago, born Samuel Watenmaker, he began his career in theater at age 17 following training at Chicago's Goodman Theater. Wanamaker honed his acting skills in stock, traveling shows, and on Broadway. He also attended Drake University. Between 1943 and 1946, Wanamaker was in the U.S. Army. Early in his career, he also worked in radio. He made his feature film debut in My Girl Tisa (1948). The following year, Wanamaker, whose leftist political views were no secret in Hollywood, went to England to appear in blacklisted director Edward Dymtryk's Give Us This Day (1949). After making another film in Britain, Wanamaker learned that he too was about to be investigated and had been blacklisted; therefore, Wanamaker elected to remain in England. Over the next ten years, Wanamaker worked on-stage as a director, producer, and actor. In the 1960s, Wanamaker resumed his acting career in internationally produced films such as The Concrete Jungle (1962) and The Spy Who Came in From the Cold (1965). He made his directorial bow in 1969 with The File of the Golden Goose (1969) and went on to make several more films, including The Executioner (1970). He also made television movies such as the well-regarded true story, The Killing of Randy Webster (1981). In 1985, Wanamaker appeared on the short-lived television series The Berrengers. When not busy acting or directing, Wanamaker had been an active supporter of the plan to restore Shakespeare's Globe Theatre. Unfortunately, Wanamaker died of cancer just before the project was completed. His daughter Zoe Wanamaker is also an actor.

Trivia: Actor-singer in supporting roles, onscreen from 1978.

Trivia: Rugged, tall, and heavily pock-marked, actor Robert Davi has built a long career out of playing anonymously ethnic bad guys. Born in Queens, NY, to Italian parents, he studied opera, Shakespeare, and stage acting under the wing of Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler before becoming one of Hollywood's most recognizable villains. His big feature-film break came in 1977, playing opposite Frank Sinatra in the detective drama Contract on Cherry Street. He would go on to appear with other superstars, toting guns as a mobster, corrupt cop, or general villain in numerous action movies. One of his most noticeable roles was as a Fratelli brother in The Goonies. He also played bad guys on television, building a long list of credits in popular series like The Fall Guy, The A-Team, and Wiseguy. Mostly a supporting actor, his first lead role was as a Palestinian terrorist in the TV movie Terrorist on Trial: The United States vs. Salim Ajami. His tough guy career reached its culmination in 1989, in the role of James Bond villain Franz Sanchez in License to Kill. After that, he occasionally broke out of the pattern and appeared in comedies and dramas. His first leading good guy part was in 1996 as FBI agent Bailey Malone in the NBC drama The Profiler. He even went so far as to star in the Rodney Dangerfield comedy The 4th Tenor and Rob Schneider's The Hot Chick. In 2002, Davi appeared in The Sorcerer's Apprentice as Merlin, lent his voice to the video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, and gained a starring role as Nick in the thriller Hitters.

Trivia: An English major in college, Ed Lauter worked as a stand-up comic before entering films in 1971. The tall, menacing Lauter has generally been typecast as humorless, easily corruptible authority figures. He was at his meanest as the vindictive Captain Knaur in Robert Aldrich's The Longest Yard. His TV credits include such roles as Sheriff Cain in BJ and the Bear (1979-80) and General Louis Crewes in Stephen King's The Golden Years (1991). In 1976, Ed Lauter was afforded a rare leading role--and a sympathetic one to boot--in the made-for-TV murder mystery Last Hours Before Morning (1976). Lauter appeared in the 2005 remake of The Longest Yard and had a small role in the Oscar-winning film The Artist (2011). He also had a recurring role on the TV series Shameless. Lauter passed away in 2013 of mesothelioma at age 74, with several films in post-production, awaiting release.

Trivia: Darren McGavin dropped out of college after one year and moved to New York, where he trained for the stage at the Neighborhood Playhouse and the Actors Studio. In the mid '40s he began landing small roles in occasional films, but worked primarily onstage. He first made an impression onscreen as a painter in David Lean's Summertime and a drug pusher in Otto Preminger's The Man with the Golden Arm (both 1955); nevertheless, his subsequent film work tended to occur in intermittent spurts, with long periods off-screen between roles. He is best known as a TV actor; he starred in the TV series Crime Photographer, Mike Hammer, Riverboat, The Outsider, and Kolchak: The Night Stalker, and also appeared in a number of TV movies. He occasionally directed episodes of his TV shows, and directed and produced the film Happy Mother's Day, Love George (1973), whose title was later changed to Run, Stranger, Run.

Trivia: Joe Regalbuto has been seen in films since 1982, when he played an investigative reporter in Costa-Gavras' Missing. Before his big-screen debut, Regalbuto played shifty Wall Street lawyer Elliot Streeter in the 1979 TV series The Associates. His other TV roles included Toomey, the CPA assistant to bumbling detective Tim Conway in Ace Crawford, Private Eye (1982), and Harry Fisher in Knots Landing (1985-86 series). Regalbuto also labored in what one journalist described as "relative obscurity" on the TV-movie circuit, playing such roles as William C. Sullivan in 1987's J. Edgar Hoover. In his most famous characterization, Joe Regalbuto travelled full circle from his Missing days, playing investigative reporter Frank Fontana on the TV sitcom Murphy Brown (1988- ).

Trivia: After a four-year hitch with the Naval Reserve, actor Steven Hill made his first New York stage appearance in Ben Hecht's A Flag is Born (1946), which also featured a young Marlon Brando. Hill made his film debut in 1950, then returned to the Navy for two more years before settling down to acting on a permanent basis. He was particularly busy in the so-called Golden Age of live TV drama, appearing in such prestigious video offerings as The Trial of Sacco and Vanzetti (1959). In 1966, he was cast as Daniel Briggs--as in "Good morning, Mr. Briggs"--on the hit TV adventure series Mission: Impossible. He left this lucrative assignment in 1967, reportedly because his Orthodox Jewish faith prevented him from filming on weekends; his replacement was Peter Graves as "Mr. Phelps" (in 1989, Hill guest-starred on the short-lived Mission: Impossible revival). Hill remained very much in demand throughout the 1980s and 1990s playing parental and authority-figure roles in such films as Yentl (1983) Heartburn (1986) and Billy Bathgate (1991). Contemporary TV viewers are most familiar with Steven Hill for his work as Michael Steadman's father on thirtysomething (1987-91) and DA Adam Schiff on the weekly TVer Law and Order, a role he stayed with from 1990 to 2000. Hill died in 2016, at age 94.

Trivia: American actor Victor Argo was principally a stage performer, both in New York and in regional repertory, when he tentatively began his film work in the 1970s. Early Argo movie credits include 1972's Boxcar Bertha and the 1975 Martin Scorsese production Mean Streets. In the late 1980s, Argo enjoyed a burst of movie activity, though thanks to location shooting he didn't have to leave Manhattan too often. The actor was seen as Roy Bishop in King of New York (1987), Avram in Her Alibi (1989), a cop in New York Stories (1989). Woody Allen utilized Argo in two films, Crimes and Misdemeanors (1988) (as a detective) and Shadows and Fog (1990). Rare non-New York film productions featuring Victor Argo have included McBain (1988), in which he played "El Presidente," and the controversial Last Temptation of Christ (1988) in which Argo portrayed Peter Apostle. And in early 1989, Victor Argo had weekly work as Anthony Coltrera on the New Jersey-based TV series Dream Street. His 1990s film credits included a major role in Smoke (1995) and its sequel Blue in the Face (1996) and Next Stop Wonderland (1998).

Trivia: A veteran actor with a charming drawl, South Carolina native Leon Rippy began his acting career in the early '80s, making very minor appearances in very big films, like a store clerk in The Color Purple and an FBI agent in Firestarter. Rippy would continue to appear in several projects over the coming years, often taking on a number of roles every year. He notably played a prosecutor in 1988's Illegally Yours, and an Army sergeant in 1990's Moon 44, one of seven collaborations Rippy would make with director Roland Emmerich. The '90s would find the actor just as active as ever, appearing in the usual plethora of movies and TV shows, including high-profile appearances in 2000's The Patriot and on the series Walker, Texas Ranger. The new millennium would bring even more prominent work for the now silver-haired actor, with a starring role on the HBO western series Deadwood, which Rippy would appear on from 2004 to 2006. He soon took on another starring role on the police drama Saving Grace with Holly Hunter, playing Earl, a tough-talking, tobacco-spitting messenger from God. Although he was away from screens for nearly a half-decade after Saving Grace came to an end, he returned in the Johnny Depp project The Lone Ranger.

Trivia: Former Olympic athlete Dean Smith worked as a stuntman and supporting actor on television and in feature films. In addition to participating in the 1952 Olympic Games at Helsinki, Smith also played football and was a champion rodeo rider.