Trivia: A black belt in seven karate styles who made his feature debut in The Toxic Avenger II and has appeared in numerous off-Broadway plays, Michael Jai White has a curiously eclectic career and is likely a recognized face to action movie aficionados. A Brooklyn, NY, native who was raised in the sometimes harsh limbo between the impoverished Bridgeport and well-to-do Westport, CT, Jai White grew from an introverted youth to a man comfortable in multiple surroundings. Eventually gaining a reputation as a fearsomely tough street fighter by the age of 14, the strikingly mature-appearing youngster earned his keep by offering karate lessons at the YMCA before graduating high school with honors and setting his sights on college. Bouncing from school to school unsure of what direction to take in life, Jai White took a few acting classes but eventually ended up as a junior high school teacher specializing in emotionally disturbed children. Soon auditioning for roles in Manhattan with the blessing of his students, Jai White would rise through the ranks and eventually land roles in such features as Universal Soldier (1992) and Full Contact (1993). After appearing as Mike Tyson in the 1995 television movie Tyson, the tough actor was cast in the role of a double-crossed assassin who seeks vengeance from the fiery depths of Hell in the eagerly anticipated film adaptation of the cult comic book Spawn. Later appearing in such features as Breakfast of Champions (1999) and Exit Wounds (2001), Jai White gained solid footing as a reliable supporting action figure.

Trivia: John Leguizamo is a Colombian-born comedian and actor best known for his memorable, often sharply satirical, characterizations of Latinos on stage and in films. He began his career as a stand-up comedian in New York clubs and as a performer in small independent feature films. These engagements led to his playing small roles in major features such as Casualties of War (1989) and Die Hard 2 (1990) where he was typically cast as a violent, unsavory fellow; none of these films seemed to utilize his talents and potential on film. Leguizamo has fared better in smaller films such as Time Expired (1991). His stage career also continues to grow. For his one-man show Mambo Mouth, a scathing look at Hispanic stereotypes, he won awards and great acclaim. His follow-up play Spic-o-Rama is equally funny and thought provoking. Leguizamo played his first leading film role in Super Mario Brothers. (1993). That year he also played an important and acclaimed role in De Palma's Carlito's Way. In 1995 he finished two movies, A Pyromaniac's Love Story and To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar where he played the lovely drag queen Miss Chi Chi Rodriguez. That year, Leguizamo also created, scripted, executive produced and starred in a sketch comedy show on Fox, House of Buggin. Done in the style of Fox's smash hit series In Living Color, Leguizamo's show was billed as the first show of its kind to feature an all Latino cast. Unfortunately, though the show received good ratings, it failed to attract an audience and was cancelled after only a few months. The Colombian funnyman has since returned to feature films. In 1996, he starred, wrote and co-produced another showcase for his talents, The Pest.

Trivia: Martin Sheen has appeared in a wide variety of films ranging from the embarrassing to the sublime. In addition to appearing in numerous productions on stage, screen, and television, Sheen is the father of a modern dynasty of actors and a tireless activist for social and environmental causes, particularly homelessness. Born Ramon Estevez on August 3, 1940, he was the seventh of ten children of a Spanish immigrant father and an Irish mother. Growing up in Dayton, OH, Sheen wanted to be an actor so badly that he purposely flunked an entrance exam to the University of Dayton so he could start his career instead. With his father's disapproval, he borrowed cash from a local priest and moved to New York in 1959. While continually auditioning for shows, Sheen worked at various odd jobs and changed his name to avoid being typecast in ethnic roles. "Martin" was the name of an agent/friend, while he chose "Sheen" to honor Bishop Fulton J. Sheen; until his early twenties, the actor had been a devoted Catholic. He joined the Actor's Co-op, shared a loft, and with his roommates prepared showcase productions in hopes of attracting agents. For a while he worked backstage at the Living Theater alongside aspiring actor Al Pacino, and it was there that he got his first acting jobs. Around that time, Sheen married, and in 1963 broke into television on East Side West Side; more television would follow in the form of As the World Turns, on which he played the character Roy Sanders for a few years. In 1964, Sheen debuted on Broadway in Never Live Over a Pretzel Factory, and that same year won considerable acclaim for his role in The Subject Was Roses, which in 1968 became a film in which he also starred. After making his feature film debut as a subway punk in The Incident (1967), Sheen moved to Southern California in 1970 with his wife and three children. During the beginning of that decade, he worked most frequently in television, but occasionally appeared in films as a supporting actor or co-lead. His movie career aroused little notice, though, until he played an amoral young killer (based on real life murderer Charles Starkweather) in Terrence Malick's highly regarded directorial debut, Badlands (1973). Further notice came in the mid-'70s, when the actor was cast by Francis Ford Coppola to star in a Vietnam War drama filmed in the Philippines. Two years and innumerable disasters later -- including a near-fatal heart attack for Sheen -- the actor's most famous film, Apocalypse Now (1979), was complete, and it looked as if he would finally become a major star. Although the film won a number of honors, including a Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival, and Sheen duly gained Hollywood's respect, he never reached the heights of some of his colleagues. This was possibly due to the fact that during the 1970s and 1980s, he appeared in so many mediocre films. However, Sheen turned in memorable performances in such films as Ghandi (1982) -- from which the actor donated his wages to charity -- and Da (1988), in which he took production and starring credits. He also did notable work in a number of other films, including Wall Street (1987), The American President (1995), and Monument Ave. (1998). In 1999, he could be seen in a number of projects, including Ninth Street and Texas Funeral, which premiered at the Venice Film Festival that year; O, a modern-day adaptation of Othello; and The West Wing, a television series that cast him as the President of the United States (a role for which he would win the Best TV Series Actor in a Drama Award at the 2000 Golden Globe Awards).Sheen took a supporting role in legendary director Martin Scorsese's crime drama The Departed, and joined the cast of Talk to Me, a 2007 comedy drama directed by Don Cheadle. In 2009, Sheen starred in The Kid: Chamaco, a boxing drama following a father (Sheen) and son's attempt to reconcile their differences to turn a fierce streetfighter into a boxing champion. The following year he would join son Emilio for The Way, an adventure drama featuring Sheen as a grieving father determined to make the pilgrimage to the Pyrenees in honor of his late son. The actor took on yet another lead role in Stella Days (2011), a drama that takes place in the 1950s and stars Sheen as a progressive Irish priest who causes a stir by opening a local movie theater.In 1986, Sheen made his directorial debut with the Emmy-winning made-for-TV movie Babies Having Babies. All three of his sons, Emilio Estevez, Ramon Estevez, and Charlie Sheen (whom he directed in 1991's Cadence), as well as his daughter, Renee Estevez, are movie and television actors. His brother, Joe Estevez, also dabbles in acting.

Trivia: Though American actress Theresa Randle has only been in films since 1990, she has already worked with some of the biggest names in Hollywood. She made her debut with a small role in Maid to Order (1987) and appeared sporadically in films such as Easy Wheels (1989), but first gained national notice when director Spike Lee cast her as an aspiring actress who works for a phone sex service in Girl 6 (1996). Prior to that, Randle had played small roles in two other Lee films, Jungle Fever (1991) and Malcolm X (1992). Other notable directors with whom she has worked include Robert Townsend and John Landis. In 1996, she starred opposite basketball superstar Michael Jordan and the stars of the old Warner Bros.' cartoons in the b-ball fantasy Space Jam. In 1997, Randle played a major role in the film adaptation of Todd McFarlane's popular comic Spawn (1997).

Trivia: Trained at the RSC, Scottish actor Nicol Williamson made his professional bow with the Dundee rep in 1960. The following year, he performed with the Arts Theatre at Cambridge, and also made his London debut. His first major success came in 1964 with John Obsorne's Inadmissible Evidence. He won a Tony award for his performance in the Osborne play when it transferred to Broadway in 1965, and three years later repeated his characterization for the film version. Williamson's 1968 staging of Hamlet, which like Evidence played in both London and New York, was immensely popular and enormously controversial; some recall the night when, halfway through a soliloquy, Williamson brusquely apologized for his "bad" performance and stormed offstage. In films from 1964, Williamson played a cocaine-benumbed Sherlock Holmes in The 7 Percent Solution (1977), an introspective Little John in Robin and Marian (1978) and an eccentric Merlin in Excalibur (1981). His TV credits on both sides of the Atlantic included such roles as Lennie in Of Mice and Men, Lord Mountbatten in The Last Viceroy, King Ferdinand in the 1995 TV movie Christopher Columbus, and Richard Nixon in a 1974 dramatization of the White House Tapes. Williamson also appeared in a number of one-man shows, including the off-Broadway Nicol Williamson's Late Show and a 1994 play based on the life of John Barrymore. Nicol Williamson was married to actress Jill Townsend.

Trivia: Empire State native D.B. Sweeney attended both Tulane and New York University. Though he had trouble getting sizeable roles in student productions, upon his graduation he was immediately cast in the Broadway revival of The Caine Mutiny Court Martial. He went on to guest-star stints on such TV series as The Edge of Night and Spencer: For Hire before entering movies, where he scored with the critics for his portrayal of an idealistic, gung-ho Vietnam enlistee in Francis Ford Coppola's Gardens of Stone (1987). While he has accrued several noteworthy screen assignments (including the starring role of a nasty hockey player in 1992's The Cutting Edge), D.B. Sweeney is best remembered for his even-keel portrayal of the tragic Shoeless Joe Jackson in Eight Men Out (1988); if he looked like a "natural" on the ballfield, it was because Sweeney had once actually played minor league baseball with the Kenosha Twins, hanging up his spikes after a knee injury. In addition to his film roles, Sweeney continues working on television. He played Dish Boggett in the miniseries Lonesome Dove (1989) and in 1996 starred in the unfortunately short-lived Fox series Strange Luck in which he played an amnesiac freelance photographer with strange powers that resulted from his being the sole survivor of an airline disaster. Sweeney also still appears in theatrical productions. In the years to come, Sweeney would remain active on screen, appearing in films like Taken 2.

Trivia: California native Melinda Clarke was born into show business. With an actor father and a ballet dancer mother, it was only a matter of time before Clarke grew up and headed for L.A. to follow in her parents' footsteps. She spent the late '90s paying her dues with appearances on shows like Seinfeld and Xena: Warrior Princess before being cast as Julie Cooper on the smash-hit series The O.C. She stayed with the show for its entire run from 2003 to 2007. Clarke continued to find success in television, with high-profile recurring gigs on CSI as Lady Heather and as herself on Entourage. She joined the cast of Nikita in 2010; once that show ended in 2013, Clarke resumed making her guest star rounds on shows like Vegas and Dallas.

Trivia: Making his screen debut at the age of three in Pet Cemetary (1989), juvenile actor Miko Hughes has gone on to appear in major Hollywood productions ranging from Kindergarten Cop (1990), Jack the Bear (1993), Apollo 13 (1996), and Spawn (1997). Hughes is also a veteran of television shows, was a guest on The Tonight Show, and has made guest appearances in such shows as Picket Fences, The Nanny, and Beverly Hills 90210. When not acting, Hughes actively participates in Native American ceremonies across the country as a dancer at powwows. He is half Chickasaw and in 1990 was the grand marshal of the Chickasaw Festival in Tishominso, OK.

Trivia: Actor, stuntman, and college baseball player Michael Papajohn got his start in show business while he was attending Louisiana State University, where he played for the LSU Tigers. After having the opportunity to perform some stunts in the sports movie Everybody's All American in 1988, Papajohn began pursuing stunt and acting roles, appearing in movies like The Last Boy Scout and Mr. Baseball. He would find consistent acting work over the coming years, frequently making small appearances. He played an unnamed thug in 2000's Charlie's Angels and a security guard in the 2002 comedy The Hot Chick, and continued to take on several roles per year throughout the 2000s, notably appearing in I Know Who Killed Me, Spider-Man 3, and Terminator Salvation.

Trivia: Actor and screenwriter Jack Coleman began his show business career playing Jake Kositchek on the daytime soap One Life to Live in the early '80s. He also replaced Al Corley in the role of Steve Carrington on the tawdry series Dynasty, which he stayed with until 1988. He then made a series of prominent guest appearances on shows like CSI and Without a Trace, before taking on the starring role of Noah Bennet on the smash hit Heroes.