Trivia: Born June 9th, 1961, Michael J. Fox made his television debut in Vancouver at the age of 15. Three years later, he moved to the U.S., living in spartan conditions until he was able to get his green card. Things started breaking for Fox in 1980, when he made his simultaneous American TV and movie bow, winning a regular role on the weekly series Palmerstown, U.S.A. and a supporting part in the theatrical film Midnight Madness. Previously billed as Michael Fox, the actor was compelled by the Screen Actors Guild to add the "J" to his name to avoid confusion with an older character actor who went by the same name. At 5'4", the baby-faced Fox was able to play adolescents and teenagers well into his twenties; during the early stages of his career, however, his height lost him as many roles as he won. Fox had sold all his furniture and was subsisting on macaroni and cheese at the time he won his star-making role as junior conservative Alex P. Keaton on the long-running (1982-1989) sitcom Family Ties. Before the series ran its course, Fox had won three Emmys, one of them for an unforgettable "one-man show" in which his character soliloquized over the suicide of a close friend. Fox's movie career caught fire after he replaced Eric Stoltz in the role of time-traveling teen Marty McFly in Back to the Future (1985), an enormous hit which spawned two sequels. Not all of Fox's subsequent movie projects were so successful -- although several of them, notably The Secret of My Success (1987) and Casualties of War (1989), were commendable efforts that expanded Fox's range. In later years, the actor seemed to be have difficulty finding the vehicle that would put him back on top, although he continued to keep busy. In the fall of 1996, Fox returned to television in the ABC sitcom Spin City, in which he starred as Michael Flaherty, the Deputy Mayor of New York City. That same year, he could also be seen in Tim Burton's Mars Attacks! and Peter Jackson's The Frighteners. In 1999, the diminutive actor lent his talents to another wee character, voicing the title role of Stuart Little for the film adaptation of E.B. White's beloved children's book about a walking, talking mouse. Married to actress Tracy Pollan since 1988 -- she played his long-time girl friend on Family Ties -- Fox credited her with helping him survive his battle with Parkinson's Disease, with which he was diagnosed in 1991. Fox voiced a variety of animated characters throughout the 2000s, and appeared on TV shows including CBS' The Good Wife and the FX drama Rescue Me,

Trivia: New York native Justine Bateman was 16 when she originated the role of Mallory, the eternally underachieving daughter of former student radicals Elyse (Meredith Baxter-Birney) and Steven Keaton (Michael Gross) on the TV sitcom Family Ties (1982-1989). Bateman would make a memorable turn in the band movie Satisfaction in 1988, but found more success on the small screen on shows like Men Behaving Badly, Men in Trees, and Desperate Housewives. Bateman would also come find success as a producer on the comedy series Easy to Assemble with Illeana Douglas.

Trivia: A product of a blue-collar Chicago neighborhood, actor Michael Gross spent the first two years of high school as (by his own admission) a "greaser" and gang member. He straightened himself out in his last two years, graduating as senior class president and National Honor Society member. Gross played guitar with a folksinging group before gravitating to the theatre. He attended the Yale School of drama (one of his classmates was Meryl Streep), then worked in regional theatre before landing in New York. In 1982, Gross was cast as Steven Keaton, ex-radical patriarch of a clan that included Michael J. Fox and Justine Bateman, in the long-running sitcom Family Ties. Perhaps chafing a bit at the press attention given to his co-star Fox, Gross took every available opportunity to play an image-busting role, notably the scuzzy, cold-blooded killer in the 1985 TV movie In the Line of Duty: The FBI Wars. Michael Gross is the brother of comedienne and former Saturday Night Live regular Mary Gross. In the years to come, Gross would prove to be a truly prolific actor, appearing in films like El Sonoma, Broken Windows, and Stay Cool, as well as TV shows like Tremors, How I Met Your Mother, The Young and the Restless, and ER.