Trivia: Despite a thick Australian accent in some of his earlier films, actor Mel Gibson was born in Peeksill, NY, to Irish Catholic parents on January 3rd, 1956. One of eleven children, Gibson didn't set foot in Australia until 1968, and only developed an Aussie accent after his classmates teased him for his American tongue. Mel Gibson's looks have certainly helped him develop a largely female following similar to the equally rugged Harrison Ford, but since his 1976 screen debut in Summer City, Gibson has been recognized as a critical as well as physiological success.Though he had, at one point, set his sights on journalism, Gibson caught the acting bug by the time he had reached college age, and studied at the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Sydney, Australia, despite what he describes as a crippling ordeal with stage fright. Luckily, this was something he overcame relatively quickly -- Gibson was still a student when he filmed Summer City and it didn't take long before he had found work playing supporting roles for the South Australia Theatre Company after his graduation. By 1979, Gibson had already demonstrated a unique versatility. In the drama Tim, a then 22-year-old Gibson played the role of a mildly retarded handy man well enough to win him a Sammy award -- one of the Australian entertainment industry's highest accolades -- while his leather clad portrayal of a post-apocalyptic cop in Mad Max helped the young actor gain popularity with a very different type of audience. Gibson wouldn't become internationally famous, however, until after his performance in Mad Max 2 (1981), one of the few sequels to have proved superior to its predecessor. In 1983, Gibson collaborated with director Peter Weir for the second time (though it was largely overlooked during the success of Mad Max 2, Gibson starred in Weir's powerful WWI drama Gallipoli in 1981) for The Year of Living Dangerously, in which he played a callous reporter responsible for covering a bloody Indonesian coup. Shortly afterwards, Gibson made his Hollywood debut in The Bounty with Oscar-winner Anthony Hopkins, and starred opposite Sissy Spacek in The River during the same year. He would also star in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985) alongside singer Tina Turner.After the third installment to the Mad Max franchise, Gibson took a two-year break, only to reappear opposite Danny Glover in director Richard Donner's smash hit Lethal Weapon. The role featured Gibson as Martin Riggs, a volatile police officer reeling from the death of his wife, and cemented a spot as one of Hollywood's premier action stars. Rather than letting himself become typecast, however, Gibson would surprise critics and audiences alike when he accepted the title role in Franco Zeffirelli's Hamlet (1990). Though his performance earned mixed reviews, he was applauded for taking on such a famously tragic script.In the early '90s, Gibson founded ICON Productions, and through it made his directorial debut with 1993's The Man Without a Face. The film, which also starred Gibson as a horrifically burned teacher harboring a secret, achieved only middling box-office success, though it was considered a well-wrought effort for a first-time director. Gibson would fare much better in 1994 when he rejoined Richard Donner in the movie adaptation of Maverick; however, it would be another year before Gibson's penchant for acting, directing, and producing was given its due. In 1995, Gibson swept the Oscars with Braveheart, his epic account of 13th century Scottish leader William Wallace's lifelong struggle to forge an independent nation. Later that year, he lent his vocal talents -- surprising many with his ability to carry a tune -- for the part of John Smith in Disney's animated feature Pocahontas. Through the '90s, Gibson's popularity and reputation continued to grow, thanks to such films as Ransom (1996) and Conspiracy Theory (1997). In 1998, Gibson further increased this popularity with the success of two films, Lethal Weapon 4 and Payback. More success followed in 2000 due to the actor's lead role as an animated rooster in Nick Park and Peter Lord's hugely acclaimed Chicken Run, and to his work as the titular hero of Roland Emmerich's blockbuster period epic The Patriot (2000). After taking up arms in the battlefield of a more modern era in the Vietman drama We Were Soldiers in 2002, Gibson would step in front of the cameras once more for Sixth Sense director M. Night Shyamalan's dramatic sci-fi thriller Signs (also 2002). The film starred Gibson as a grieving patriarch whose rural existence was even further disturbed by the discovery of several crop circles on his property.Gibson would return to more familiar territory in Randall Wallace's We Were Soldiers -- a 2002 war drama which found Gibson in the role of Lt. Col. Hal Moore, commander of the First Battalion, Seventh Cavalry -- the same regiment so fatefully led by George Armstrong Custer. In 2003, Gibson starred alongside Robert Downey Jr. and Robin Wright-Penn in a remake of The Singing Detective. The year 2004 saw Gibson return to the director's chair for The Passion of The Christ. Funded by 25 million of Gibson's own dollars, the religious drama generated controversy amid cries of anti-Semitism. Despite the debates surrounding the film -- and the fact that all of the dialogue was spoken in Latin and Aramaic -- it nearly recouped its budget in the first day of release.The actor stepped behind the camera again in 2006 with the Mayan tale Apocalypto and was preparing to product a TV movie about the Holocaust, but by this time, public attention was not pointed at Gibson's career choices. That summer, he was pulled over for drunk driving at which time he made extremely derogatory comments about Jewish people to the arresting officer. When word of Gibson's drunken, bigoted tirade made it to the press, the speculation of the actor's anti-Semitic leanings that had circulated because of the choices he'd made in his depiction of the crucifixion in Passion of the Christ seemed confirmed. Gibson's father being an admitted holocaust denier hadn't helped matters and now it seemed that no PR campaign could help. Gibson publicly apologized, expressed extreme regret for his comments, and checked himself into rehab. Still, the plug was pulled on Gibson's Holocaust project and the filmmaker's reputation was irreparably tarnished.

Trivia: A precociously talented youngster, Helen Hunt was drawing paychecks as a television actress from the age of ten. Before she was 17, she had appeared as a regular on two series, Swiss Family Robinson (1975) and The Fitzpatricks (1977). Hunt proved she was more than just a workaday child actor with her starring performance in the fact-based 1981 TV movie The Miracle of Kathy Miller, in which she played a high school athlete who overcame severe mental and physical damage brought on by a highway accident. While she had been appearing in films as early as Rollercoaster in 1977, Hunt was never groomed as a star player, and it is possible that her resemblance to another child actress, Jodie Foster, held her back from more important roles.After taking on her first adult role in the 1982 sitcom It Takes Two, Hunt's film assignments improved, with sizable roles in Girls Just Want to Have Fun (1985), Peggy Sue Got Married (1986), Project X (1987), Next of Kin (1989), and The Waterdance (1991). She also gained a small measure of cult status by appearing in a brace of science fiction films, including Trancers II (1991) and Trancers III (1992). That same year, Hunt landed her longest-lasting acting assignment to date, as the co-star of the Paul Reiser-created comedy series Mad About You. During the show's seven-year run, she won both Emmy and Golden Globe awards for her portrayal of Jamie Buchman. In 1996, Hunt had her most successful film role to date in the blockbuster Twister. The following year, she topped that when she received a Best Actress Oscar for playing a caring waitress and single mother who befriends acerbic, obsessive-compulsive author Melvin Udall (Jack Nicholson, who also won an Oscar for his performance) in As Good As It Gets. After Mad About You ended in 1999, Hunt appeared in films by several veteran directors, including Robert Zemeckis (Cast Away [2000]), Robert Altman (Dr. T and The Women [2000]), and Woody Allen (The Curse of the Jade Scorpion [2001]). She starred in Life x 3 on Broadway in 2003.In 2005, Hunt joined the star-studded cast of HBO's two-part miniseries Empire Falls in the role of Janine, ex-wife of Miles (Ed Harris), the story's central character. The actress made her feature directorial debut in Then She Found Me (for which Hunt also starred, produced, and wrote the screenplay), an adaptation of Elinore Lipman's best-selling novel of the same name. The story follows a Philadelphia schoolteacher (Hunt) whose long-lost birth mother (Bette Miller) reappears at just as her daughter is careening into a midlife crisis. Hunt played a supportive mother in Soul Surfer (2011), an inspirational drama based on the true tale of a surfer who returned to the sport after tragically losing an arm. In 2012 she played a sex surrogate helping a man in an iron lung lose his virginity for director Ben Lewin in The Sessions, a part that earned her rave reviews and an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress.

Trivia: Plucky Brooklyn-born actress Marisa Tomei was one year into her college education at Boston University when she was tapped for a co-starring role on the CBS daytime drama As the World Turns. Her role on that show, as well as work on another soap, One Life to Live, paved the way for her entrance into film: In 1984, she made her film debut with a bit part in The Flamingo Kid.Three years later Tomei became known for her role as Maggie Lawton, Lisa Bonet's college roommate, on the sitcom A Different World. Her real breakthrough came in 1992, when she co-starred as Joe Pesci's hilariously foul-mouthed girlfriend in My Cousin Vinny, a performance that won her a Best Supporting Actress Oscar. Later that year, she turned up briefly as a snippy Mabel Normand in director Richard Attenborough's mammoth biopic Chaplin, and was soon given her first starring role in Untamed Heart (1993). A subsequent starring role -- and attempted makeover into Audrey Hepburn -- in the romantic comedy Only You (1994) proved only moderately successful. Tomei's other 1994 role as Michael Keaton's hugely pregnant wife in The Paper was well-received, although the film as a whole was not. Worse luck hit with her participation in the critically thrashed Four Rooms in 1995. Fortunately for Tomei, she was able to rebound somewhat the following year with a solid performance as a troubled single mother in Nick Cassavetes' Unhook the Stars. She turned in a similarly strong work in Welcome to Sarajevo in 1997, and in 1998 did some of her best work in years as the sexually liberated, unhinged cousin of Natasha Lyonne's Vivian Abramowitz in Tamara Jenkins' The Slums of Beverly Hills. Appearing in no less than five movies in 2000, Tomei continued her journey back to the top with a memorable performance in 2001's In the Bedroom. An emotionally wrenching tale of loss and grief, Tomei's performance as a recently separated wife who begins a tragic affair with a college student struck a common cord with critics and filmgoers alike, in addition to earning the talented actress her second Oscar nomination.Tomei's versatility assured her continuous work in a variety of different kinds of films. She played one of the women in the remake of Alfie, co-starred opposite Adam Sandler in Anger Management, and worked in the Charles Bukowski-inspired independent film Factotum. In 2007 she earned strong reviews for her work in Sidney Lumet's Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, and appeared in the box office smash Wild Hogs. In 2008, Tomei enjoyed her largest critical acclaim since In the Bedroom thanks to her supporting turn opposite Mickey Rourke in The Wrestelr. Her performance earned her a number of year-end critics awards, as well as nominations from both the Golden Globes and the Academy.In 2010 she appeared in the Duplass Borthers comedy Cyrus, as the overly clingy mother to a son played by Jonah Hill, and the next year she had memorable turns in Crazy Stupid Love as a teacher who picks an unfortunate partner for a one-night-stand, and The Ides of March as a political reporter who has a hand in shaking up a presidential campaign.

Trivia: The son of actor Robert Alda, Alan Alda grew up around vaudeville and burlesque comedians, soaking up as many jokes and routines as was humanly possible. Robert Alda hoped that his son would become a doctor, but the boy's urge to perform won out. After graduating from Fordham University, Alda first acted at the Cleveland Playhouse, and then put his computer-like retention of comedy bits to good use as an improvisational performer with Chicago's Second City and an ensemble player on the satirical TV weekly That Was the Week That Was. Alda's first film was Gone Are the Days in 1963, adapted from the Ossie Davis play in which Alda had appeared on Broadway. (Among the actor's many subsequent stage credits were the original productions of The Apple Tree and The Owl and the Pussycat.) Most of Alda's films were critical successes but financial disappointments. He portrayed George Plimpton in the 1968 adaptation of the writer's bestseller Paper Lion and was a crazed Vietnam vet in the 1972 movie To Kill a Clown. Alda's signature role was the wisecracking Army surgeon Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce in the TV series M*A*S*H, which ran from 1972 through 1983. Intensely pacifistic, the series adhered to Alda's own attitudes towards warfare. (He'd once been an ROTC member in college, but became physically ill at the notion of learning how to kill.) During his M*A*S*H years, Alda also began auxiliary careers as a director and scriptwriter, winning numerous Emmy awards in the process. He also developed a separate sitcom, 1974's We'll Get By. In 1978, Alda took advantage of an unusually lengthy production break in M*A*S*H to star in three films: California Suite, Same Time, Next Year, and The Seduction of Joe Tynan. He made his theatrical-movie directorial debut in 1981 with The Four Seasons, a semiserious exploration of modern romantic gamesmanship; it would prove to be his most successful film as a director, with subsequent efforts like Sweet Liberty (1986) and Betsy's Wedding (1989) no where close. Long associated with major political and social causes and well-known both offscreen and on as a man of heightened sensitivity, Alda has occasionally delighted in going against the grain of his carefully cultivated image with nasty, spiteful characterizations, most notably in Woody Allen'sCrimes and Misdemeanors (1989) and as death row inmate Caryl Chessman in the 1977 TV movie Kill Me if You Can. Alda later continued to make his mark on audiences with his more accustomed nice-guy portrayals in films such as Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993), Everyone Says I Love You (1996), Flirting With Disaster (1996), and The Object of My Affection (1998).The next several years saw Alda show up in a handful of supporting roles, but in 2004, he had his biggest year in more than a decade. First, he appeared opposite Leonardo DiCaprio in Martin Scorcese's critically-acclaimed Howard Hughes biopic The Aviator. Playing Senator Ralph Owen Brewster, Alda would go on to receive a Best Supporting Actor Oscar-nomination, the first nod from the Academy in his long and impressive career. Meanwhile, on the small-screen, Alda played presidential-hopeful Arnold Vinick on NBC's political drama The West Wing, another Senator and his first regular series role since M*A*S*H. He would also enjoy recurring roles on 30 Rock and The Big C, and would continue to flex his comedy muscles in movies like Tower Heist and Wanderlust.

Trivia: Father was the captain of an exploration ship. Moved with her family to Michigan days after her birth; they returned to California when she was 5. Was cast in Growing Pains when the producers decided to age-jump baby Chrissy from 3 to 7. Appeared in the first season finale of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse; he later cast her in his films The Avengers and Much Ado About Nothing. Won a video game BAFTA Award for her work in The Last of Us.

Trivia: A comic actor who enjoyed his greatest success in television, Mark Feuerstein also made his mark on the legitimate stage. Born June 8, 1971, and raised in New York City, his father was a lawyer and his mother a school teacher. As a teenager, Feuerstein was a gifted wrestler and won a state championship title. After graduating from high school, he enrolled in Princeton, intending to study International Relations. But after being cast in a student drama, Feuerstein decided that acting was his true ambition, changed his emphasis to Theater Arts, and later received a Fulbright scholarship to study his craft at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts. Upon returning to New York, he worked extensively in off-Broadway theater and appeared in a handful of television commercials before landing a recurring role on the daytime drama Loving. In 1996, Feuerstein was cast in an eight-episode run of the situation comedy Caroline in the City as a veterinarian who was dating cartoonist Caroline (Lea Thompson). NBC, encouraged by the enthusiastic response to Feuerstein's performance on the show, cast him as a philosophical bartender on a new sitcom called Fired Up; the show, however, was not well received, and lasted less than half a season. The network gave Feuerstein a third shot at sitcom stardom by giving him the title role on the show Conrad Bloom; but it proved to be an especially high-profile failure, and Feuerstein began to focus his attention elsewhere. He appeared on Broadway in Alfred Uhry's The Last Nights Of Ballyhoo, and made his feature-film debut with a small role in Practical Magic in 1998. Feuerstein balanced film work with recurring roles on Once and Again and The West Wing for several years until he finally struck small-screen gold with his fourth sitcom, Good Morning, Miami, in which he was cast as a television producer brought in to save a hapless morning news show. Feurstein appeared in largely unremarkable television and film roles throughout in the mid-2000s (with the exception of a small part in the war drama Defiance (2008), but he is better known for his role on The USA Network's Royal Pains.

Trivia: American actress Lauren Holly has herself admitted that turning down the female lead in the Jim Carrey vehicle Ace Ventura, Pet Detective (1994) may not have been the wisest career move. Holly was acting on instinct, having co-starred with another highly individual comedian, Andrew Dice Clay, in 1990's forgettable The Adventures of Ford Fairlane. But when profits from Ace Ventura soared, Lauren was more than willing to sign on for the subsequent Carrey vehicle, Dumb and Dumber (1995), during the filming of which she and Carrey became an item. The actress has kept busy ever since her first important TV role as Betty in Archie: To Riverdale and Back Again (1990) and a stint on the ABC soap opera All My Children. Prior to her recent film success, Holly was perhaps best known for her role as Deputy Maxine Stewart on the CBS drama Picket Fences .In 1995 the actress played a doctor in Sydney Pollack's remake of Sabrina, and went a different direction in 1996's comedy Down Periscope, in which she played Lieutenant Emily Lake. Holly took on a supporting role in Any Given Sunday (1999), a rousing sports drama from director Oliver Stone, and joined Mel Gibson and Helen Hunt to play a supporting role in 2000's romantic comedy What Women Want. The following year Holly would voice Chihiro's mother in the US rerelease of the acclaimed anime fantasy Spirited Away the following year, and from 2005 until 2008 became known for her role as Director Jenny Shepard on CBS' long-running police procedural NCIS. Holly voiced the character of Haulie on the Adventures of Chuck & Friends, an animated series for children in 2010, and continues to be active in film and television.

Trivia: In terms of public recognition, the unabashedly voluptuous, raven-haired American actress Delta Burke will ere be tied to her role as Suzanne Sugarbaker, one of the two main proprietors of the Sugarbakers interior design firm, on the blockbuster CBS sitcom Designing Women (a role she carried from 1986-1991). But those who have followed Burke's career diligently know that her experience extends to dozens of additional series roles and telemovies, making her a veritable queen of prime time. Burke claims an enduring off-camera impact on the American fashion world as well, and is a best-selling author.Born in Orlando, FL, on July 30, 1956, Burke never met her biological father; she was raised by her single mother, Jean, and an adoptive dad, Frederick Burke -- an Orlando-area realtor. With an irrepressible beauty and the graciousness and charm of a southern debutante, Burke began working her way up through the pageant circuit, ascending from the Orlando Fire Department's "Miss Flame" contest to that of Miss Florida to the 1974 Miss America pageant -- which she promptly lost by failing to even make the top ten (an event that Burke later regarded as an enormous blessing in disguise). While celebrating her 20th birthday alone at a St. Augustine, FL, motel, a stalker assaulted her.The cumulative impact of this turmoil drove Burke to England, where she put herself through the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (via her pageant winnings) and trained as an actress. When she finally returned to the United States, Burke soon secured an agent, and landed parts in now-forgotten telemovies during the late '70s and very early '80s. The turns began inconspicuously, with a bit role in the Suzanne Somers made-for-TV movie Zuma Beach, but in 1979, Burke shot up to instant first billing, heavily typecast as a Scarlett O'Hara-like "Southern belle" in the made-for-television feature Charleston. Unfortunately, the picture aired to devastating reviews and disappointing ratings.Near the end of her three-season run as the star of the long-running HBO sitcom 1st & Ten from 1984-1987 (a Wildcats-like comedy with Burke as Diane Barrow, the owner of an NFL football team), Burke signed with producers Harry Thomason and Linda Bloodworth-Thomason for the Sugarbaker role. Designing Women cast Burke, Dixie Carter, Jean Smart, and Annie Potts as the aforementioned Atlanta-area interior designers with a distinctly Southern flair. After debuting on September 29, 1986, the program bowed to sensational critical reviews and viewer raves. After flirting with ratings doom, the network ultimately gave the show a permanent slot in its Monday-evening schedule -- one that lasted until late May 1993.Burke's weight fluctuation generated an enormous amount of tabloid fodder, and created friction between her and the Thomasons, which ultimately led to Burke's termination at the end of the 1991 season. Not one to be daunted, the actress attempted to rebound with a 1992 ABC sitcom, Delta, that cast her as a country singer striving for elusive stardom. Yet this program (developed and produced through Burke's production company) failed to connect with a sizeable audience, and folded within one year.After a few starring roles in telemovies Burke landed a tremendous amount of off-camera success by manufacturing and marketing a line of plus-size clothes through her own clothing firm, Delta Burke Designs. Burke also authored and published a best-selling autobiography, Delta Style, in 1998. In the new millenium, the TV queen began to appear in her first big-screen features. She appeared in the Mel Gibson romantic comedy-fantasy What Women Want and voiced a pooch in the 2003 family comedy Good Boy!. The comedic melodrama Sordid Lives found her appearing in a long-running indie success. In 2006, she also returned to series television, in a temporary role as Bella Horowitz, on David E. Kelley's comedy drama Boston Legal. In 2008 she had a major role in the made-for-cable romantic comedy Bridal Fever.Off-camera, Burke famously married to Simon & Simon and Major Dad star (and fellow Southerner) Gerald McRaney in 1989.

Trivia: The daughter of a military officer, Valerie Perrine spent her childhood hopscotching from one country to another. Her early plans to become a psychologist were abandoned when she parlayed her svelte figure and sparkling personality into a brief career as a Las Vegas showgirl. Perrine then settled into a lucrative, active career upon being cast as habitually naked movie queen Montana Wildhack in Slaughterhouse Five (1971). While her talk show persona was that of a typically airheaded starlet, Perrine was in fact a serious, dedicated actress; she won an Oscar nomination for her performance as Honey Bruce in 1974's Lenny, and was no less impressive as Carlotta Monti in 1976's W.C. Fields and Me. Despite her acting accomplishments, Perrine was most often cast on the basis of her top-heavy physical attributes; it is said that she was cast as the leading lady in Can't Stop the Music (1980) in order to attract those "straight" filmgoers that might have otherwise avoided a film starring the Village People. More recently, Valerie Perrine has excelled in eccentric character roles on such TV series as Northern Exposure and ER.

Trivia: Actress Judy Greer went to Winston Churchill High School in Livonia, MI, before studying theater at DePaul University. She made her film debut in Stricken, a low-budget horror movie shot on video in 1998, and, that same year, found her place in romantic comedies with Kissing a Fool, starring David Schwimmer. Continuing with comedies throughout her career, Greer then appeared with Rose McGowan in Jawbreaker and got a starring role in the independent romance The Big Split. In 1999, she showed up briefly as a reporter opposite George Clooney in Three Kings. On television, Greer would prove an uncanny knack for playing particularly memorable roles on shows with particularly rabid cult followings, like Arrested Development, Love Monkey, Mad Love, Miss Guided, Glenn Martin DDS, Archer, and Californication. She would also play a recurring role on the popular sitcom Two and a Half Men, and would appear in a number of feature films as well, like The Wedding Planner, Adaptation, The Village, 27 Dresses, and Love and Other Drugs.

Trivia: A lovely and talented actress with a knack for both comedy and drama, Sarah Paulson was born in Tampa, FL, on December 17, 1975. Her family relocated to Manhattan, where she attended both the LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Paulson made her professional debut at the age of 12 in an off-Broadway production of Amerlia Again, and she worked extensively on the New York stage after completing her education. She made here television debut in a 1994 episode of the series Law & Order, and, in 1995, was cast as Merlyn Temple, a dead woman who can communicate with her living brother, on the fantasy series American Gothic; while the show only ran for a year, it developed a devoted cult following. Following American Gothic's cancellation, Paulson made her feature-film debut in the thriller Levitation, and, in 1999, she appeared in Garry Marshall's comedy drama The Other Sister. She returned to episodic television that same year as Elisa Cronkite on the romantic drama series Jack and Jill, which ran two seasons. During the show's run, she landed a supporting role in the Mel Gibson/Helen Hunt vehicle What Women Want, and after Jack and Jill ran its course, Paulson was cast in the lead role of the short-lived situation comedy Leap of Faith. She later had a supporting role in the 2003 romantic comedy Down With Love.

Trivia: Perhaps most famous for her notorious Saturday Night Live characters, Ana Gasteyer is also recognizable for her Hollywood feature roles and dexterity as a performer. Born May 4, 1967, in Washington, D.C., where she grew up, Gasteyer attended college at Northwestern before joining the L.A.-based sketch group the Groundlings. In 1996, she joined the cast of Saturday Night Live, and spent the late '90s fluttering through various TV series cameos including NYPD, Party of Five, Mad About You, Seinfeld, and Just Shoot Me. In 1999, she appeared in Women on Top and the Nixon-inspired film Dick, and then in 2000 with Mel Gibson in What Women Want. She was then featured in the 2001 comedy What's the Worst That Could Happen with Danny DeVito and Martin Lawrence.She became the first pregnant woman to ever be a cast member on Saturday Night Live, but left the show after giving birth. She worked intermittently in films after that with her most prominent role coming in the comedy Mean Girls. However, she scored a huge hit on the stage when she originated the role of Elphaba in the Chicago production of the phenomenally successful musical Wicked in 2005.

Trivia: Upon her election by The New York Times as a "top celebutante" in 1986 (due to her popularity in N.Y.C.'s club scene), then-19-year-old Lisa Edelstein reportedly grew wary of "fame for fame's sake" and spent years grounding her celebrity in a series of well-respected, if minor, acting assignments. She made a small-scale debut in a prestigious film -- the role of the makeup artist in Oliver Stone's controversial Jim Morrison biopic The Doors (1991) -- and thereafter was often pigeonholed in sitcom appearances, typically as a comically eccentric girlfriend or wife. This typecasting characterized Edelstein's appearances on Seinfeld, Mad About You, Sports Night, Frasier, and a myriad of other programs. There were exceptions, though, as the actress also starred on the short-lived but critically acclaimed drama Relativity in the mid-'90s as Rhonda Roth, a lesbian whose complex, non-sensationalized portrayal marked a step forward for homosexual characters on network TV. Edelstein also garnered recurring roles on such series as The West Wing (playing a law student whom Rob Lowe's character romances until he finds out she moonlights as a call girl), Felicity, and Ally McBeal (appearing as a transsexual who dates a lawyer played by James LeGros). Edelstein would score her biggest break to date with a lead role on the hit medical drama House in 2004. She would stick with the hugely successful show until 2011, in addition to roles on other shows throughout the 2000's, like American Dad!, The Good Wife, House of Lies and Castle.

Trivia: Born in Houston in 1949, actress Loretta Devine rose to fame on-stage in the original Broadway production of Dreamgirls before parlaying her acclaim into a career in film and television. Her first major onscreen role came in 1987, when she was cast as a resident advisor on the Cosby Show-spin-off A Different World. Though she left the series after the first season, it was far from her final gig as a TV series regular.Throughout the early '90s, Devine appeared in small supporting roles in features films such as Class Act and Amos & Andrew as well as a number of TV guest spots on shows ranging from Roc to Picket Fences. In 1995, Devine's career was given a shot in the arm when she was cast as one of the leads in Waiting to Exhale, an ensemble film that proved to be a success with both critics and audiences. More supporting work followed, and in 2000 she was cast as a lead on David E. Kelley's Fox drama Boston Public, a show that would go on to be nominated for multiple Emmys over the course of its four seasons on the air.Devine's career came full-circle in 2006 when she was cast in a small role in the film adaptation of Dreamgirls, the stage musical that launched her career. The following year, she was cast as a regular on ABC's supernatural legal drama Eli Stone.In 2010 she appeared in the American remake of Death at a Funeral, the comedy Lottery Ticket, and Tyler Perry's ambitious For Colored Girls. In 2011 she appeared in Tyler Perry's Madea's Big Happy Family, and the next year she had a role on the TV series The Client List.

Trivia: A role in the Michael Weller play Help! brought her to Los Angeles. Got her start in the late 1990s with guest-star roles on The Pretender, Party of Five and The X-Files. Appeared in producer Steven Bochco's series City of Angels, NYPD Blue and Murder One. Wrote, performed and toured in her one-woman show, Besame Mucho...O.K., That's Enough. Cast alongside fellow West Wing alum Bradley Whitford in The Good Guys.

Trivia: While his standout performance as Gabe, the troubled boyfriend of Claire Fisher (Lauren Ambrose), on the acclaimed HBO series Six Feet Under may have made a striking first impression on many viewers, the truth is that Eric Balfour had been acting in television for nearly a decade following his small-screen debut as a member of Kids Incorporated in 1991. A Los Angeles native whose spiritual family used to hold Lakota Indian sweat lodges in their backyard, Balfour is also a talented musician who once took to the stage with fellow actor Brittany Murphy as members of the band Blessed With Soul. Rising through the television ranks after his debut on Kids Incorporated, Balfour made his feature debut in the 1996 film Shattered Image. A high-profile role in the pilot epsiode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, plus supporting roles in such teen-oriented films as Trojan War (1997) and Can't Hardly Wait (1998) were quick to follow, and a key performance in the 1999 family drama Scrapbook gave audiences their first true look at his dramatic abilities. Though subsequent supporting roles in What Women Want (2000) and America's Sweethearts (2001) didn't find Balfour climbing the credits as much as he may have deserved, his breakthrough role in Six Feet Under gave his feature career a notable shot in the arm. After appearing in the short-lived television series Veritas: The Quest and the feature Secondhand Lions, Balfour could be seen running scared in the Hollywood horror remake The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003). He continued to make supporting appearance in films, but really focused more on television; Balfour had a recurring guest spot on The O.C. and a major arc on 24, plus appearances on shows like Life on Mars and Law & Order: Criminal Intent. In 2010, he joined the cast of the SyFy supernatural series Haven.

Trivia: In terms of chosen material, actor Logan Lerman scored points at an early age for tackling some of the most difficult parts imaginable for a preteenager. His first major role was that of Jason, the put-upon young son of a harried single mother (Drew Barrymore) and a heroin addict (Steve Zahn) in Penny Marshall's coming-of-age period picture Riding in Cars with Boys (2001). Not long after, Lerman signed to portray the eight-year-old version of the central character in the controversial (and critically reviled) sci-fi melodrama The Butterfly Effect (2004) -- a part that found his character strangled, beaten, sexually abused, and fallen prey to a host of other atrocities. Then, after these arresting and emotionally challenging debuts, Lerman dropped down a few notches as far as the intensity of the material he sought out. From 2004-2005, Lerman co-starred in the short-lived drama series Jack & Bobby, playing Bobby, who was destined to one day become President of the United States. He also played an average young boy determined to band together with his buddies and save some rare owls in the family-friendly picture Hoot and portrayed the son of Christian Bale in James Mangold's Western remake 3:10 to Yuma. In the Joel Schumacher thriller The Number 23 (2007), Lerman played Robin Sparrow, the son of a seemingly normal man (Jim Carrey) driven around the bend by a numerical mystery. He went on to appear in Gamer before scoring his most-high profile part taking on the role of Percy Jackson, the hero of a popular series of fantasy novels, in Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief. He followed that up by tackling the role of D'Artagnan in the 2011 version of The Three Musketeers before returning to smaller fare in The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

Trivia: A Boston native whose early work included stints with the Dallas Theater Center and New York's Mint Theater Company, actor T.J. Thyne studied his craft with theaters throughout the United States and British Columbia before receiving his B.F.A. in acting from the USC School of Theater. Numerous television roles were quick to follow after Thyne hit the audition circuit with unusual ferocity, and by the year 2000, Thyne had racked up nearly 50 small-screen credits thanks to appearances on such shows as Home Improvement, Party of Five, Walker, Texas Ranger, and Just Shoot Me. In 2002, Thyne founded the Los Angeles-based Theater Junkies Productions with the aim of producing for both stage and screen; their popular short film Validation subsequently screened at film festivals across the country. Memorable supporting roles in such high-profile features as Erin Brockovich Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Ghost World, How High, and Something's Got to Give made Thyne an increasingly familiar face to movie fans, though it was the actor's casting as bug expert Dr. Jack Hodgins in the hit Fox forensics drama Bones that would transform him into a bona fide television star. Thyne has also done frequent commercial work, with his role as a Shania Twain-singing Chevy truck passenger proving a particularly memorable television spot.

Trivia: Was a member of Chicago's Babes with Blades Theater Company, which showcases women using weapons in stage combat. First big-screen role was a bit part in the Mel Gibson romantic comedy What Women Want (2000). Made her Broadway debut in the Rosie O'Donnell-produced musical Taboo. Performed alongside American Idol Season 8 runner-up Adam Lambert in the touring company of Wicked. Landed her first TV starring role with the Lifetime dramedy series Drop Dead Diva.

Trivia: California native Cristine Rose cultivated an extremely successful onscreen career with a huge number of guest appearances on various TV shows like Moonlighting, St. Elsewhere, and Growing Pains. In 2006, Rose's already familiar face became even more of a fixture in American living rooms when she scored the recurring role of Angela Petrelli on the show Heroes. She was also in the 2011 romantic comedy Take Me Home.

Trivia: Standup comedienne and actress Melanie Good has guest starred on several network television series, including The Nanny, Coach, Seinfeld, and Suddenly Susan. She has also performed in Comic Relief V. Before embarking upon her acting career, Good, a graduate of the University of Utah, was a radio personality. In addition to her verbal talents, the beautiful Good is also a dancer and a model. She has appeared on the covers of fashion and fitness magazines. As a dancer, she led hoofers on Jane's Addiction's Lollapalooza Tour. She made her feature film debut playing the seductive Brittany in Howard Stern's Private Parts (1997).

Trivia: Gloriously flamboyant American entertainer Bette Midler was born in Honolulu, HI, to the only Jewish family in the neighborhood. After dropping out of a drama class at the University of Hawaii, she took a tiny role in the 1966 film Hawaii, playing a seasick boat passenger (though it's hard to see her when viewing the film). Training for a dancing career in New York, Midler made the casting rounds for several months before finally winning a chorus role, and then the featured part of Tzeitel, in the long-running Broadway musical Fiddler on the Roof.It helps to do something well that no one else does, and Midler found her forte by singing at the Continental Baths, a gay hangout in New York. Most bath house performers were painfully bad, but Midler established herself by combining genuine talent with the tackiness expected of her. As the "Divine Miss M," Midler did an act consisting of campy (and dirty) specialty numbers; dead-on imitations of such earlier performers as the Andrews Sisters and Libby Holman; and the most outrageously revealing costumes this side of Bob Mackie. Soon she outgrew the bath houses and went on to nightclub and recording-artist fame, earning a Grammy Award in 1973. After several years of sell-out tours, Midler re-entered films as the star of The Rose, a 1979 film à clef loosely based upon the life and times of Janis Joplin. The film was a success, but it failed to establish Midler as a dramatic actress; audiences, particularly gay fans, still preferred the Divine Miss M. Jinxed (1982), Midler's next film, lived up to its name with well-publicized production squabbles between Midler, the director, producers, and a few of her co-stars. Following the film's failure, Midler wasn't seen onscreen until she signed a contract with Disney in 1986. Establishing a new film identity as a character comedienne, Midler sparkled in Down and Out in Beverly Hills (1986), and was even better as a loudmouthed kidnap victim in Ruthless People (1987). Using her restored film stature, Midler set up her own production company and produced Beaches (1988), a pals-through-the-years saga that proved to be a four-hankie audience favorite. Once again attempting to establish herself as a tragedian, Midler starred in Stella (1989), a poorly-received remake of 1937's Stella Dallas. For the Boys (1992), offered Midler in tons of old-age makeup as a Martha Raye-style USO star (Raye responded to this "tribute" by suing the studio). The subsequent Scenes From a Mall (1991), which paired Midler with Woody Allen, and witchcraft fantasy Hocus Pocus (1993) also failed to truly showcase her talents. She rebounded somewhat in 1995 with a role in the wildly acclaimed Get Shorty, and had even greater success the following year co-starring with Diane Keaton and Goldie Hawn in The First Wives Club. In 1999, Midler played herself in two films: the TV mockumentary Jackie's Back and Get Bruce!, a big-screen documentary about legendary comic writer Bruce Vilanch. In addition to her film work, Midler still performs live concerts to sold-out crowds and continues to release albums, including Bathouse Bette, a tribute to her early singing days. In 1993, she scored an enormous success in a superb TV adaptation of the Broadway musical Gypsy. And, in 2000, Midler extended her talents to television, starring as herself in the aptly-named sitcom Bette. Though she would only appear in a handful of films over the next decade, Midler remained quite active on stage and television, even earning an Emmy nomination for Bette Midler: The Showgirl Must Go On in 2011.