Trivia: The daughter of a commercial artist, Jean Arthur became a model early in life, then went on to work in films. Whatever self-confidence she may have built up was dashed when she was removed from the starring role of Temple of Venus (1923) after a few days of shooting. It was the first of many disappointments for the young actress, but she persevered and, by 1928, was being given co-starring roles at Paramount Pictures. Arthur's curious voice, best described as possessing a lilting crack, ensured her work in talkies, but she was seldom used to full advantage in the early '30s. Dissatisfied with the vapid ingenue, society debutante, and damsel-in-distress parts she was getting (though she was chillingly effective as a murderess in 1930's The Greene Murder Case), Arthur left films for Broadway in 1932 to appear in Foreign Affairs. In 1934, she signed with Columbia Pictures, where, at long last, her gift for combining fast-paced verbal comedy with truly moving pathos was fully utilized. She was lucky enough to work with some of the most accomplished directors in Hollywood: Frank Capra (Mr. Deeds Goes to Town [1936], You Can't Take It With You [1938], Mr. Smith Goes to Washington [1939]); John Ford (The Whole Town's Talking [1935]); and Howard Hawks (Only Angels Have Wings [1937]). Mercurial in her attitudes, terribly nervous both before and after filming a scene -- she often threw up after her scene was finished -- and so painfully shy that it was sometimes difficult for her to show up, she was equally fortunate that her co-workers were patient and understanding with her . Arthur could become hysterical when besieged by fans, and aloof and nonresponsive to reporters. In 1943, she received her only Oscar nomination for The More the Merrier (1943), the second of her two great '40s films directed by George Stevens (Talk of the Town [1942] was the first). After her contract with Columbia ended, she tried and failed to become her own producer. She signed to star in the 1946 Broadway play Born Yesterday -- only to succumb to a debilitating case of stage fright, forcing the producers to replace her at virtually the last moment with Judy Holliday. After the forgettable comedy The Impatient Years in 1944, Arthur made only two more films: Billy Wilder's A Foreign Affair (1948), and George Stevens' classic Shane (1952). She also played the lead in Leonard Bernstein's 1950 musical version of Peter Pan, which co-starred Boris Karloff as Captain Hook. In the early '60s, the extremely reclusive Arthur tentatively returned to show business with a few stage appearances and as an attorney on ill-advised 1966 TV sitcom, The Jean Arthur Show, which was mercifully canceled by mid-season. Surprisingly, the ultra-introverted Arthur later decided to tackle the extroverted profession of teaching drama, first at Vassar College and then the North Carolina School of the Arts; one of her students at North Carolina remembered Arthur as "odd" and her lectures as somewhat whimsical and rambling. Retiring for good in 1972, she retreated to her ocean home in Carmel, CA, steadfastly refusing interviews until her resistance was broken down by the author of a book on her one-time director Frank Capra. She died in 1991.

Trivia: One of the screen's most grizzled actors, Jack Palance defined true grit for many a filmgoer. The son of a Ukrainian immigrant coal miner, he was born Volodymyr Palahnyuk (Anglicized as Walter Jack Palaniuk) on February 18, 1920, in Lattimer Mines, Pennsylvania. As a young man, Palance supported himself with stints as a miner, professional boxer, short-order cook, fashion model, lifeguard, and radio repairman. During WWII service, he enlisted in the AAC and piloted bombers, one of which crashed, knocking him unconscious in the process. The severe burns he received led to extensive facial surgery, resulting in his gaunt, pinched face and, ironically, paving the way for stardom as a character actor. Palance attended the University of North Carolina and Stanford University on the G.I. Bill and considered a career in journalism, but drifted into acting because of the comparatively higher wages. Extensive stage work followed, including a turn as the understudy to Anthony Quinn (as Stanley Kowalski in the touring production of A Streetcar Named Desire) and the portrayal of Kowalski on the Broadway stage, after Marlon Brando left that production. Palance debuted on film in Elia Kazan's 1950 Panic in the Streets, as a sociopathic plague host opposite Richard Widmark. He landed equally sinister and villainous roles for the next few years, including Jack the Ripper in Man in the Attic (1953), Simon the Magician (a sorcerer who goes head to head with Jesus) in The Silver Chalice (1954), and Atilla the Hun in Sign of the Pagan (1954). Palance received Best Supporting Actor Oscar nominations for his performances in both Sudden Fear (1952) and Shane (1953). Beginning in the late '50s, Palance temporarily moved across the Atlantic and appeared in numerous European pictures, with Jean-Luc Godard's 1963 Le Mépris/Contempt a particular highlight. Additional big-screen roles throughout the '60s and '70s included that of Ronald Wyatt in Freddie Francis's horror episode film The Torture Garden (1967), the monastic sadist Brother Antonin in Jesús Franco's Justine (1969), Fidel Castro in Che! (1969), Chet Rollins in William A. Fraker's Western Monte Walsh (1970), Quincey Whitmore in the 1971 Charles Bronson-starrer Chato's Land, and Jim Buck in Portrait of a Hitman (1977). Unfortunately, by the '80s, Palance largely disappeared from the cinematic forefront, his career limited to B- and C-grade schlock. He nonetheless rebounded by the late '80s, thanks in no small part to the German director Percy Adlon, who cast him as a love-struck painter with a yen for Marianne Sägebrecht in his arthouse hit Bagdad Cafe (1987). Turns in Young Guns (1988) and 1989's Batman (as the aptly named Carl Grissom) followed. In 1991, Palance was introduced to a new generation of viewers with his Oscar- and Golden Globe-winning performance in Ron Underwood's City Slickers. The turn marked something of a wish-fulfillment for the steel-tough actor, who had spent years believing, in vain, that he would be best suited for comedy. These dreams were soon realized for a lengthy period, as the film's triumph yielded a series of additional comic turns for Palance on television programs and commercials.Accepting his Best Supporting Actor award at the 1992 Academy Awards ceremony, Palance won a permanent place in Oscar history when he decided to demonstrate that he was, in fact, still a man of considerable vitality by doing a series of one-handed push-ups on stage. He reprised his role in the film's 1994 sequel, City Slickers II: The Legend of Curly's Gold.Over the years, Palance also starred in the TV series The Greatest Show on Earth (ABC, 1963-4), as a hard-living circus boss, and Bronk (CBS, 1975-6) as a pipe-smoking police lieutenant, as well as in numerous TV dramas, notably Rod Serling's Requiem for a Heavyweight (1956). From 1982-1986, he hosted the ABC revival of Ripley's Believe It Or Not. He also established himself as an author in the late '90s, by publishing the 1996 prose-poem Forest of Love. Accompanying the work were Palance's pen-and-ink drawings, inspired by his Pennysylvania farm; he revealed, at the time, that he had been painting and sketching in his off-camera time for over 40 years. After scattered work throughout the '90s and 2000s, Jack Palance died on November 10, 2006 at his home in Montecito, California. He had been married and divorced twice, first to Virginia Baker from 1949-1966 (with whom he had three children), and then to Elaine Rogers in 1987. Two of his children outlived him; the third died several years prior, of melanoma, at age 43.

Trivia: Intending to become a dentist like his father, American actor Edgar Buchanan wound up with grades so bad in college that he was compelled to take an "easy" course to improve his average. Buchanan chose a course in play interpretation, and after listening to a few recitations of Shakespeare he was stagestruck. After completing dental school, Buchanan plied his oral surgery skills in the summertime, devoting the fall, winter and spring months to acting in stock companies and at the Pasadena Playhouse in California. He was given a screen test by Warner Bros. studios in 1940, received several bit roles, then worked himself up to supporting parts upon transferring to Columbia Pictures. Though still comparatively youthful, Buchanan specialized in grizzled old westerners, with a propensity towards villainy or at least larceny. The actor worked at every major studio (and not a few minor ones) over the next few years, still holding onto his dentist's license just in case he needed something to fall back on. Though he preferred movie work to the hurried pace of TV filming, Buchanan was quite busy in television's first decade, costarring with William Boyd on the immensely popular Hopalong Cassidy series, then receiving a starring series of his own, Judge Roy Bean, in 1954. Buchanan became an international success in 1963 thanks to his regular role as the lovably lazy Uncle Joe Carson on the classic sitcom Petticoat Junction, which ran until 1970. After that, the actor experienced a considerably shorter run on the adventure series Cade's County, which starred Buchanan's close friend Glenn Ford. Buchanan's last movie role was in Benji (1974), which reunited him with the titular doggie star, who had first appeared as the family mutt on Petticoat Junction.

Trivia: An economics major at the Brown University and the University of Chicago, cadaverous character actor John Dierkes spent the 1930s as an ad-copy writer and as head of an independent polling service. After serving with the Red Cross in World War II, Dierkes worked for the U.S. Treasury; it was in this capacity that he was sent to Hollywood in 1946 to act as technical advisor for MGM's To the Ends of the Earth. A talent scout for Orson Welles spotted Dierkes and convinced him to audition for the part of Ross in Welles' upcoming film version of MacBeth. Dierkes won the part, and remained in Hollywood for the next two decades. He went on to critical acclaim as the Tall Soldier in John Huston's The Red Badge of Courage (1951), topping this assignment with his best screen role, that of "Morgan" in George Stevens' Shane (1953). Suffering from emphysema, John Dierkes gradually cut down on his film and TV appearances in the 1970s; he was last seen in a fleeting role in the Stanley Kramer production Oklahoma Crude (1973).

Trivia: American actor Elisha Cook Jr. was the son of an influential theatrical actor/writer/producer who died early in the 20th Century. The younger Cook was in vaudeville and stock by the time he was fourteen-years old. In 1928, Cook enjoyed critical praise for his performance in the play Her Unborn Child, a performance he would repeat for his film debut in the 1930 film version of the play. The first ten years of Cook's Hollywood career found the slight, baby-faced actor playing innumerable college intellectuals and hapless freshmen (he's given plenty of screen time in 1936's Pigskin Parade). In 1940, Cook was cast as a man wrongly convicted of murder in Stranger on the Third Floor (1940), and so was launched the second phase of Cook's career as Helpless Victim. The actor's ability to play beyond this stereotype was first tapped by director John Huston, who cast Cook as Wilmer, the hair-trigger homicidal "gunsel" of Sidney Greenstreet in The Maltese Falcon (1941). So far down on the Hollywood totem pole that he wasn't billed in the Falcon opening credits, Cook suddenly found his services much in demand. Sometimes he'd be shot full of holes (as in the closing gag of 1941's Hellzapoppin'), sometimes he'd fall victim to some other grisly demise (poison in The Big Sleep [1946]), and sometimes he'd be the squirrelly little guy who turned out to be the last-reel murderer (I Wake Up Screaming [1941]; The Falcon's Alibi [1946]). At no time, however, was Cook ever again required to play the antiseptic "nerd" characters that had been his lot in the 1930s. Seemingly born to play "film noir" characters, Cook had one of his best extended moments in Phantom Lady (1944), wherein he plays a set of drums with ever-increasing orgiastic fervor. Another career high point was his death scene in Shane (1953); Cook is shot down by hired gun Jack Palance and plummets to the ground like a dead rabbit. A near-hermit in real life who lived in a remote mountain home and had to receive his studio calls by courier, Cook nonetheless never wanted for work, even late in life. Fans of the 1980s series Magnum PI will remember Cook in a recurring role as a the snarling elderly mobster Ice Pick. Having appeared in so many "cult" films, Elisha Cook Jr. has always been one of the most eagerly sought out interview subjects by film historians.

Trivia: By the time she first appeared as Grandma Walton in 1971, American actress Ellen Corby had been playing elderly characters for nearly thirty years--and she herself was still only in her fifties. The daughter of Danish immigrants, Ellen Hansen was born in Wisconsin and raised in Philadelphia; she moved to Hollywood in 1933 after winning several amateur talent shows. Her starring career consisted of tiny parts in low-budget Poverty Row quickies; to make a living, Ellen became a script girl (the production person responsible for maintaining a film's continuity for the benefit of the film editor), working first at RKO and then at Hal Roach studios, where she met and married cameraman Francis Corby. The marriage didn't last, though Ellen retained the last name of Corby professionally. While still a script girl, Ellen began studying at the Actors Lab, then in 1944 decided to return to acting full time. She played several movie bit roles, mostly as servants, neurotics, and busybodies, before earning an Oscar nomination for the role of Trina the maid in I Remember Mama (1948). Her career fluctuated between bits and supporting parts until 1971, when she was cast as Grandma Walton in the CBS movie special The Homecoming. This one-shot evolved into the dramatic series The Waltons in 1972, with Ms. Corby continuing as Grandma. The role earned Ellen a "Best Supporting Actress" Emmy award in 1973, and she remained with the series until suffering a debilitating stroke in 1976. After a year's recuperation, Ellen returned to The Waltons, valiantly carrying on until the series' 1980 cancellation, despite the severe speech and movement restrictions imposed by her illness. Happily, Ellen Corby endured, and was back as Grandma in the Waltons reunion special of the early '90s.

Trivia: From 1939 until his death in 1960, gangly, balding Douglas Spencer could be spotted in unbilled film roles as doctors and reporters. By the early '50s, Spencer had graduated to supporting parts, often in films with a science fiction or fantasy theme. One of his lengthier assignments was Simms, the seance-busting reporter in Houdini (1953). Douglas Spencer's best-ever film role was bespectacled reporter Ned "Scotty" Scott in the 1951 sci-fi classic The Thing, wherein he closed the film with the immortal cautionary words "Keep watching the skies!"

Trivia: American character actress Edith Evanson began showing up in films around 1941. Cast as a nurse, it is Evanson who appears in the reflection of the shattered glass ball in the prologue of Orson Welles' Citizen Kane (1941). Her larger screen assignments included Aunt Sigrid in George Stevens' I Remember Mama (1948) and Mrs. Wilson the housekeeper in Hitchcock's Rope (1948). Hitchcock also directed her in Marnie (1964). Edith Evanson is best remembered by science fiction fans for her lengthy, uncredited appearance as Klaatu's landlady Mrs. Crockett in The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951).

Trivia: American character actor Paul McVey was a Fox contract player from 1934 to 1939. McVey had a substantial role in the 1934 Will Rogers vehicle Judge Priest, then settled into bit parts as detectives, stage manager and express agents. One of his meatier roles of the 1940s was "The Excellency Zanoff" in the 1941 Republic serial King of the Royal Mounted (1941). Before his retirement in 1953, Paul McVey appeared in a supporting part in the first-ever 3-D feature film, Bwana Devil (1952).

Trivia: Although Brandon DeWilde's mother was an actress and his father a stage manager, the boy didn't express any interest in performing himself until show business was virtually thrust upon him. In 1950, a friend of DeWilde's father, a Broadway casting director, mentioned that he was looking for a sensitive youngster to play a key juvenile role in the upcoming production A Member of the Wedding. DeWilde senior volunteered Brandon; despite a shaky opening night, the 7-year-old boy stayed with the show for well over a year, winning the coveted Donaldson Award for his performance--the first child actor to do so. Brandon was brought to Hollywood in 1952 for the film version of Wedding. One year later, he was Oscar-nominated for his unforgettable performance as a hero-worshipping frontier boy in George Stevens' Shane. In 1954, he was starred in the brief TV sitcom Jamie, holding his own opposite veteran scene-stealer Ernest Truex. DeWilde made a successful transition to teenaged roles as the unwed father in 1959's Blue Denim. He went on to play the younger brother of Warren Beatty in All Fall Down (1961) and the nephew of Paul Newman in Hud (1963)--in both instances displaying his now-familiar character traits of idolatry and disillusionment. While in Denver to appear in a 1972 stage production of Butterflies are Free, 30-year-old Brandon DeWilde was killed in an auto accident.