Trivia: Although Matthew Broderick has built a solid reputation as one of the stage and screen's more talented and steadily working individuals, he will forever be associated with the role that gave him permanent celluloid infamy, the blissfully irresponsible title hero of John Hughes's 1986 Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Thanks to his association with the character, as well as his own boyish looks, Broderick for a long time had trouble obtaining roles that allowed him to play characters of his own age. However, with the success of films like Election (1999) and a 1994 Tony Award for How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, audiences finally seemed ready to accept the fact that Broderick had indeed graduated from high school.The son of late actor James Broderick and playwright/screenwriter Patricia Broderick, Broderick was born in New York City on March 21, 1962. With the theatre a constant backdrop to his childhood, Broderick's entrance into the entertainment world seemed a natural outcome of his upbringing. He began appearing in theatre workshops with his father when he was seventeen, and was soon acting on Broadway in plays like Neil Simon's Biloxi Blues and Brighton Beach Memoirs and Harvey Fierstein's Torch Song Trilogy. Broderick played Fierstein's adopted son in Torch Song; in the Simon plays, he portrayed the playwright's alter ego, winning a Tony Award for his 1983 performance in Brighton Beach Memoirs. The same year, Broderick made his film debut in WarGames, playing a young man who unwittingly plants the seeds of a nuclear war; the film was a success and launched the actor's onscreen career. Films like Max Dugan Returns and Ladyhawke followed, as did an acclaimed television adaptation of Athol Fugard's Master Harold and the Boys, but it was the 1986 Ferris Bueller's Day Off that made Broderick a star. As a then-23-year-old playing a 17-year-old, Broderick became a champion of smart-asses everywhere, and in so doing earned a certain kind of screen immortality. The success of the film allowed him to work steadily in films like Project X and the screen adaptations of Biloxi Blues and Torch Song Trilogy (in which Broderick now played Fierstein's lover, instead of his adopted son). Widely publicized tragedy struck for Broderick in 1988 when he and Jennifer Grey were vacationing in Ireland: after losing control of the car he was driving, Broderick crashed into an oncoming car, killing the mother and daughter in it. The actor was hospitalized, and his ensuing legal problems were the subject of much media scrutiny. However, he continued to work, winning critical acclaim for his portrayal of a Civil War colonel in the 1989 Glory. He then kicked off the 1990s with the title role of a naive film student in The Freshman; following that film's relative success, he starred in the poorly received comedy The Night We Never Met, and in 1994, he was cast against type as one of Dorothy Parker's unsympathetic lovers in Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle. That same year, he ventured back to Broadway, where he found acclaim as the lead in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, winning a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical. Over the next few years, Broderick had his hits (The Lion King) and misses (The Road to Wellville, The Cable Guy, Addicted to Love). In 1996, he made his directorial debut with Infinity, which also featured a screenplay by his mother. A love story based on the life of famed physicist Richard Feynman, the film made a brief blip on the box-office radar, although it did garner some positive reviews. In 1997 he wed actress Sarah Jessica Parker who gave birth to their son, James Wilke Broderick, in October of 2002. The same couldn't be said for Broderick's massively budgeted, hyper-marketed 1998 feature, Godzilla. The subject of critical abuse and audience evasion, the film was a disappointment. Fortunately for Broderick, his role as the film's hero was largely ignored by critics who preferred to level their attacks at the film's content. The actor managed to rebound successfully the following year, first playing against type as a high-school teacher caught up in an ethical conundrum in Alexander Payne's hilarious satire Election. The film received positive reviews, with many critics praising Broderick's performance as the morally ambiguous Mr. McAllister. The actor then could be seen as the title character in the giddy action flick Inspector Gadget. It was a role that would have made Ferris Bueller proud: not only did Broderick get to shoot flames from his limbs and sprout helicopter blades from his skull, he also got to defeat the bad guys and, in the end, get the girl. In 2000, Broderick played a supporting role in Kenneth Lonergan's critically acclaimed You Can Count On Me with Laura Linney and Mark Ruffalo, and appeared in a well received television adaptation of The Music Man later that year. Broderick lent his vocal chords for both 2003's The Good Boy and 2004's The Lion King 1/2, and signed on to appear in three hotly anticipated 2004 films; namely, The Last Shot with William H. Macy, Tom Cairns' black comedy Marie and Bruce, and The Stepford Wives with Nicole Kidman, Christopher Walken, and Bette Midler. Of course, Broderick's biggest achievement of the 2000's was not on the silver screen, but on stage with Nathan Lane in Mel Brooks' hugely successful comedy The Producers, which won a record 12 Tony awards in 2001. He reprised the role for a film adaptation in 2005, with Will Ferrell and Uma Thurman joining the cast. 2006 found the actor appearing in the big screen adaptation of Strangers with Candy, as well as the drama Margaret, tough post-production problems kept that film from being released until 2011, and the holiday comedy Deck the Halls. Broderick worked in animated films such as Bee Movie and The Tale of Despereaux, and was also part of the ragtag crew planning the perfect crime in the comedy Tower Heist.

Trivia: As one of the most impressively talented members of the emerging New Hollywood of the early 21st century, Reese Witherspoon has proven that she can do far more than just pose winsomely for the camera. Born March 22, 1976, in Nashville, TN, Witherspoon was a child model and acted in television commercials from the age of seven. She had a part in the 1991 Lifetime cable movie Wildflower before making her 1991 film debut in the coming-of-age story The Man in the Moon (1991). The 14-year-old Witherspoon made an immediate impact on critics and audiences alike, netting widespread praise for her portrayal of a tomboy experiencing love for the first time.While still in high school, Witherspoon completed two more feature films, Jack the Bear (1993), starring Danny De Vito, and Disney's A Far Off Place (1993), which required the actress to spend several months living in the Kalahari Desert. Following a supporting role in the 1993 CBS miniseries Return to Lonesome Dove and a lead in the critically disembowelled S.F.W., Witherspoon temporarily set aside her career to study English literature at Stanford University. She then returned to film as the abused girlfriend of a psychotic Mark Wahlberg in the thriller Fear (1996). In the same year, she had to deal with yet another crazed male in Freeway, a satirical version of Little Red Riding Hood in which Witherspoon co-starred with Kiefer Sutherland, who took on the role of the aforementioned crazed male.Her career began to take off in 1998, with roles in two high-profile films. The first, Twilight, saw her sharing the screen with Gene Hackman, Susan Sarandon, and Paul Newman. The film received mixed reviews and lackluster box office, but Pleasantville, her other project that year, proved to be both a critical and financial hit. The actress won wide recognition for her leading role as Tobey Maguire's oversexed sister, and this recognition -- along with critical respect -- increased the following year with another leading role, in Alexander Payne's acclaimed satire Election. Starring opposite Matthew Broderick, Witherspoon won raves for her hilarious, high-strung portrayal of student-council presidential candidate Tracy Flick. The character stood in stark contrast to the one Witherspoon subsequently portrayed in Cruel Intentions, Roger Kumble's delightfully trashy all-teen update of Dangerous Liaisons. As the virginal Annette, Witherspoon was convincing as the object of Ryan Phillippe's reluctant affection, perhaps due in part to her real-life relationship with the actor, whom she married in June 1999.After turning up in an amusing minor role as serial killer Patrick Bateman's burnt-out yuppie girlfriend in American Psycho (2000), Witherspoon again pleased critics and audiences alike with her decidedly Clueless-esque role in 2001's Legally Blonde. Her star turn as a seemingly dimwitted sorority blonde-turned-Harvard law-school-prodigy unexpectedly shot the featherweight comedy to number one, despite such heavy summer contenders as Steven Spielberg's A.I. and the ominously cast heist thriller The Score. The 18-million-dollar film went on to gross nearly 100 million dollars, proving that Witherspoon had finally arrived as a box-office draw.Though she would test out her chops in the Oscar Wilde adaptation The Importance of Being Earnest, Witherspoon's proper follow-up to Legally Blonde came in the form of 2002's Sweet Home Alabama, a culture-clash romantic comedy as embraced by audiences as it was rejected by critics. As with Drew Barrymore before her, Witherspoon used her newfound standing among the Hollywood elite to start her own production company, Type A Films, as well as to up her asking price to the rarefied 15-million-dollar range for the sequel to Legally Blonde. Though Blonde 2 didn't perform quite as well as the first film, the power player/doting mother of two wasted no time in prepping other projects for the screen, taking the lead in 2004's elaborate costume drama Vanity Fair as Becky Sharp, a woman who strives to transcend class barriers in 19th century England. For all its lavish costumes and sets, Vanity Fair received mixed reviews, but Witherspoon's winning performance still garnered praise.The next year, she appeared in the heaven-can-wait romantic comedy Just Like Heaven with Mark Ruffalo, as well as James Mangold's biopic Walk the Line as June Carter Cash, wife of country music legend Johnny Cash. This role proved to be a pivotal one, earning Witherspoon both a Best Actress Academy Award and a Golden Globe for her performance, and cementing her as an actress whose abilities go far beyond her charm and pretty face.As with others before her, however, the Best Actress statue portended a breakup between her and her husband; in October, 2006, she and Phillippe began their divorce proceedings, shortly after his starring turn in Clint Eastwood's Flags of Our Fathers. Career-wise, however, she didn't miss a beat, continuing to appear in popular romantic comedies like Four Christmases and Just Like Heaven, before getting more serious for the 1930's period drama Water for Elephants in 2011. By the next year, Witherspoon was crossing genres, playing the femme fatale at the center of a love triangle between two deadly secret agents in the action comedy This Means War.She did strong work in a supporting role in Mud, and in 2014 she returned to the Oscar race, garnering a Best Actress nomination for her work in Wild, playing a recovering addict who takes a grueling hike through California and Oregon in order to purge herself of her problems.

Trivia: Possessing the sort of apple-cheeked, translucent-skinned All-American wholesomeness that has made him a natural for the pretty-boy jock roles which began his career, Chris Klein started a minor sensation after appearing in only two films. The actor was born in Hinsdale (Chicago), Illinois on March 14, 1979. After spending the first 13 years of his life there, he moved with his family to Nebraska. It was while he was in high school that Klein was discovered by director Alexander Payne, who was busy casting his upcoming film, Election (1999). Klein won the role of Paul Metzler in Payne's film, which opened to enthusiastic reviews. As Paul, Klein played the dim but sweet football player persuaded by Matthew Broderick's Jim McAllister to run against the unopposed Tracy Flick (Reese Witherspoon) in the school's student council election. Klein played a similar character in his next film, the 1999 summer smash American Pie. As Chris "Oz" Ostreicher, Klein was again seen as a sweetly dim high-school jock, who, rather than wanting to win an election, channeled his energies toward losing his virginity. The success of the film was great enough to lead Klein to drop out of Texas Christian University (where he had been a freshman) to follow an acting career that had certainly gotten off to a serendipitous beginning. His days as a youthful and fresh-faced gentle jock numbered, 2002 found Klein substantially roughing it up with his action debut in director John McTiernan's much delayed and critically panned Rollerball. That same year he was in the indie drama The United States of Leland. He continued to work steadily in projects such as Just Friends, American Dreamz, and Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li. In 2011 he was cast in the American remake of the odd Australian sitcom Wilfred, and he answered the call when the Pie gang got back together for 2012's American Reunion. Klein later had guest spots on shows like Idiotsitter and The Grinder.

Trivia: By any stretch of the imagination, Colleen Camp has enjoyed a diverse film career since her big-screen debut in one of the Planet of the Apes sequels in 1973. She has worked as an actress, dancer, singer, and producer; she was directed by Francis Ford Coppola, Nicolas Roeg, Jack Hill, and Hal Needham; and she was often cast as either a sex symbol or stuffy prude. Born in San Francisco on June 7, 1953, Camp precociously began her acting career in regional theater at the age of three, although her first big break didn't come until more than a decade later, when she was cast as one of the dancing Gold Diggers on The Dean Martin Show. In 1973, the actress landed her first film role with a bit part as a human slave in Battle for the Planet of the Apes; larger roles in The Swinging Cheerleaders and The Last Porno Flick followed, but, in 1975 Camp had the chance to show off her considerable comic talent in Michael Ritchie's satiric comedy Smile. Despite her strong performance, however, her career still failed to catch fire; while she found steady work, she tended to land larger roles in undistinguished films such as The Gumball Rally or Ebony, Ivory and Jade, and smaller parts in more ambitious pictures, such as Apocalypse Now and They All Laughed. (Camp also sang "One Day Since Yesterday" in the latter, a song which briefly grazed the Billboard singles charts.) In time, Camp began to develop something of a cult following, and, while she was still a long way from film stardom, she worked often and landed supporting roles in such hits as Wayne's World, Sliver, Die Hard With a Vengeance, and Election. Married to Paramount executive John Goldwyn, she began working more behind the camera in the '80s, serving as a producer of The City Girl in 1984, and was a part of the production team of a number of other films, including Teenage Caveman, Earth vs. The Spider, and The Day The World Ended.

Trivia: An accomplished character actor most readily at home playing average and undistinguished domestic types (particularly fathers and husbands), Holmes Osborne appeared in scattered projects very occasionally during the 1970s and '80s, but his career only took off at the tail end of the 1990s, culminating with a small role in Alexander Payne's critically worshipped high-school satire Election (1999) -- as the father of class jock Paul Metzler (Chris Klein) and "bad girl" Tammy Metzler (Jessica Campbell). Osborne went on to grace the casts of several key Hollywood and independent films during the next several years, including Donnie Darko (2001), Windtalkers (2002), Cheaper by the Dozen (2003), and Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004), in addition to scattered appearances on such television programs as Ally McBeal, The Drew Carey Show, and Invasion. In 2006, Osborne re-teamed with Darko director Richard Kelly for the filmmaker's epic-sized dystopian black comedy Southland Tales.

Trivia: Made his TV debut in Robert Altman's 1988 political satire Tanner '88, co-starring Sex and the City's Cynthia Nixon. First feature-film appearance was a small role in 1989 dramedy The Unbelievable Truth, which also featured The Sopranos' Edie Falco in a bit part. Has appeared on numerous police-themed shows, including Law & Order, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, NCIS, NYPD Blue, Third Watch and Without a Trace. Wife Cas is an assistant director; the two have worked on several films together.

Trivia: A Minneapolis native, spunky actress Molly Hagan grew up in the Fort Wayne, IN, area. She reportedly exhibited a love of theatrics from early childhood, and later came into her own as a drama major at Illinois' famed Northwestern University. Hagan moved to the Windy City and traveled the path of many an ingénue by supporting herself with waitressing jobs and accepting various roles; her Hollywood break arrived when her Chicago-based agent Joan Ellis decided to relocate to the West Coast, and Hagan followed. Under the management of Ellis, she racked up everything from supporting roles in TV miniseries (Dallas: The Early Years, 1986) to guest roles on a myriad of series (ALF, Dream On, Monk) to supporting turns in big-screen projects. These included the 1985 Chuck Norris action programmer Code of Silence, the 1998 Jerry Springer farce Ringmaster, and Alexander Payne's critically worshipped satire Election (1999). In 2007, Hagan signed for a supporting turn in director Neil Burger's The Lucky Ones (2008), a drama concerning three Iraqi war veterans who undertake a cross-country road trip in the U.S.

Trivia: At first sight, actor Nicholas D'Agosto may give one the impression of a young Robert De Niro -- confident and charismatic seemingly beyond his years -- and with an impressive list of credits, the frequent television actor may be well on his way to becoming as versatile as the seasoned screen veteran himself. It was through competitive speech tournaments and improv classes in grade school that the Omaha native first discovered his passion for acting, and after winning a role in Alexander Payne's critically acclaimed comedy Election while still a senior at Creighton Preparatory School, D'Agosto knew for certain he had found his calling. But while acting was a top priority, D'Agosto was determined to finish his education before committing himself entirely to the craft. Over the course of the next four years, he studied history and theater at Marquette University in Milwaukee, during which time he performed in numerous plays in addition to helping originate the Milwaukee avant-garde acting troupe Theater X. It was toward the end of D'Agosto's stint at Marquette University that he decided to study poverty and race in the Dominican Republic for a semester, and after graduating cum laude, the aspiring star set his sights on Los Angeles. In the following years, D'Agosto landed roles on some of the small screen's biggest dramas, including ER, Six Feet Under, House, and Without a Trace. In 2007, he could be seen in on the big screen in no less than three films: Rocket Science, Drive-Thru, and LA Blues. And D'Agosto's star was most certainly on the rise when he was cast on the hit series Heroes as a new love interest -- with a superpower of his own -- for indestructible cheerleader Claire (Hayden Panettiere).