Trivia: Educated at Yale and the Sorbonne, Sam Waterston, born November 15th, 1940, is far more than the "general purpose actor" he was pegged to be by one well-known film historian. A respected player on the stage, screen, and television, Waterston has cultivated a loyal following with his quietly charismatic, unfailingly solid performances. After beginning his career on the New York stage -- where he has continued to perform throughout his long career -- Waterston made his film debut in The Plastic Dome of Norma Jean in 1966. For a long time, his film career was not nearly as remarkable as his work on the stage and television, although non-New York audiences were made acutely aware of the depth and breadth of Waterston's talents when, in 1973, he starred in the television adaptation The Glass Menagerie (appearing alongside Katherine Hepburn) and -- also on TV -- in Tony Richardson's A Delicate Balance. The following year, the actor further impressed television audiences when he starred as Benedick in the CBS TV adaptation of Joseph Papp's staging of Much Ado About Nothing. Also in 1974, Waterston proved to be the best of the screen's Nick Carraways when he was cast in that expository role in the The Great Gatsby; subsequent films ranged from the midnight-movie favorite Rancho Deluxe (1975) to the unmitigated disaster Heaven's Gate (1981). In the late '70s, Waterston was "adopted" by Woody Allen, joining the director's ever-increasing unofficial stock company for such films as Interiors (1978), Hannah and Her Sisters (1986), September (1987), and Crimes and Misdemeanors. Waterston was nominated for an Academy award for his powerful portrayal of a conscience-stricken American journalist in The Killing Fields (1984); three years later he appeared in Swimming to Cambodia, Spalding Gray's acclaimed documentary about the making of the film. Subsequent film appearances included a turn as Kathleen Turner's hilariously timid husband in Serial Mom (1994) and a role in Ismail Merchant's The Proprietor in 1996.However, Waterston has continued to make his greatest mark on television, starring in the acclaimed The Nightmare Years in 1989 and in the similarly lauded series I'll Fly Away and Law & Order. In addition, he has gained a certain amount of fame playing Abraham Lincoln multiple times: In 1988, he starred in Gore Vidal's Lincoln on television, while he won a Tony nod playing him in the Lincoln Center production of Abe Lincoln in Illinois and supplied the president's voice for Ken Burns' documentary The Civil War.Though Waterson is most recognizable for his work in Law & Order, he took on a variety of other television roles throughout the 1990s and 2000s, among them including a turn as the District Attorney Forrest Bedford in I'll Fly Away (the role would win him an Golden Globe). In 2012, Waterson joined the cast of HBO's The Newsroom.

Trivia: Jesse L. Martin is proof that talent and popularity are not mutually exclusive. When the award-winning stage actor joined the cast of NBC's Law and Order in its tenth season, the program's already high ratings increased by 40 percent. Martin's debut episode drew the largest audience in Law and Order's history and positive press attracted more viewers throughout the season. The once starving artist is now both a critic's darling and one of T.V. Guide's "Sexiest People on Television," confirming that he is an actor with genuinely wide appeal. Martin was born Jesse Lamont Watkins on January 18, 1969, in Rocky Mountain, VA. He is the youngest of five sons. Martin's parents, truck driver Jesse Reed Watkins and college counselor Virginia Price, divorced when he was a child. Ms. Price eventually remarried and the boys adopted their stepfather's surname. When Martin was in grade school, the family relocated to Buffalo, NY, and the move was not an immediate success: Martin hated to speak because of his thick Southern accent and was often overcome with shyness. A concerned teacher influenced him to join an after-school drama program and cast him as the pastor in The Golden Goose. Being from Virginia, the young Martin played the character the only way he knew how: as an inspired Southern Baptist preacher. The act was a hit, and Martin emerged from his shell. The actor attended high school at Buffalo School for the Performing Arts, where he was voted "Most Talented" in his senior class. He later enrolled in New York University's prestigious Tisch School of the Arts Theater Program. After graduation, Martin toured the states with John Houseman's Acting Company. He appeared in Shakespeare's Rock-in-Roles at the Actors Theater of Louisville and The Butcher's Daughter at the Cleveland Playhouse, and returned to Manhattan to perform in local theater, soap operas, and commercials. Finding that auditions, regional theater, and bit parts were no way to support oneself, Martin waited tables at several restaurants around the city. He was literally serving a pizza when his appearance on CBS's Guiding Light aired in the same eatery. Martin made his Broadway debut in Timon of Athens, and then performed in The Government Inspector with Lainie Kazan. While employed at the Moondance Diner, he met the late playwright Jonathan Larson, who also worked on the restaurant's staff. In 1996, Larson's musical Rent took the theater world by storm -- with Martin in the part of gay computer geek Tom Collins. The '90s update of Puccini's La Bohème earned six Drama Desk Awards, five Obie Awards, four Tony Awards, and the Pulitzer Prize. Martin soon landed roles on Fox's short-lived 413 Hope Street and Eric Bross' independent film Restaurant (1998). Ally McBeal's creator, David E. Kelly, attended Rent's Broadway premiere and remembered Martin when the show needed a new boyfriend for Calista Flockhart's Ally. The actor's performance as Dr. Greg Butters on Ally McBeal caught David Duchovny's eye, who then cast Martin as a baseball-playing alien in a 1999 episode of The X-Files that he wrote and directed. While still shooting Ally McBeal, Martin heard rumors that actor Benjamin Bratt planned to leave the cast of Law and Order. Martin tried out for the show years before and won the minor role of a car-radio thief named Earl the Hamster, but decided to wait for a bigger part. With the opportunity presenting itself, Martin begged Law and Order producer Dick Wolf for Bratt's role. Wolf hoped to cast him, and upon hearing that CBS and Fox both offered Martin development deals, he gave the actor the part without an audition. During his first year on Law and Order, Martin co-produced the one-man show Fully Committed, about the amusing experiences of a waiter at an upscale restaurant. A skilled vocalist -- he sang in Rent, on Ally McBeal, and The X-Files -- Martin later appeared in the Rocky Horror Picture Show anniversary special and hopes to star in a big-screen biography of his mother's favorite singer, Marvin Gaye. Over the coming decade, Martin would appear in several more pictures, like The Cake Eaters, the big screen adaptation of Rent, and the TV series The Philanthropist.

Trivia: S. Epatha Merkerson is a Tony-nominated and Obie-winning, African-American stage actress, but is best known for her portrayal of detective squad chief Lt. Anita Van Buren in the series Law and Order. Born and raised in Detroit as the youngest of five children, she was a fine arts graduate of Wayne State University and began her New York theater career in the late 1970s. Merkerson was nominated for a Tony award for Best Actress for her performance as Berniece in The Piano Lesson and won an Obie award in 1992 for her work in I'm Not Stupid. Her screen credits include Jacob's Ladder and Loose Cannons and, perhaps most visibly, her role as Joe Morton's terrified wife in James Cameron's Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Merkerson made her television debut as Reba, the Mail Lady on Pee Wee's Playhouse, and has appeared on The Cosby Show, among other series, but her most important single television appearance may have been in the first season Law and Order show "Mushrooms," in which she portrayed the grief-stricken mother of an 11-month-old boy who is shot accidentally. Her work was not only memorable to the audience during that key first season, but also to the producers, who later picked Merkerson for the role of the new detective squad chief in the series' fourth season--a role she continued to play for over ten years. Merkerson's talent on the small screen led to roles in numerous TV movies such as Breaking Through and A Mother's Prayer, as well as roles in such films as Radio and The Rising Place. Still, her monumental gifts in both presence and interpretation may not have truly been utilized until she took the part of a strong matriarch who runs a 1960's boarding house in HBO's mini series Lackawanna Blues. Her first leading role in almost twenty years on screen, her performance earned her an Emmy Award as well as a Golden Globe. After her triumphant turn in Lackawanna Blues she returned to the big-screen in Craig Brewer's follow-up to Hustle & Flow, Black Snake Moan co-starring Christina Ricci and Samuel L. Jackson.Over the coming years, Merkerson would appear in a number of films, like The Six Wives of Henry Lefay and Mother and Child.

Trivia: With film roles ranging from his portrayal of a psychotic satanic killer (Hideaway [1995]) to Jesus (1999), one would not be hard-pressed to give actor Jeremy Sisto the credit of having a fairly impressive range of dramatic abilities. Born in Northern California, Sisto spent his early years living in the rock-built home his parents had made in the lower Sierra Nevada Mountains. Sisto would gain his earliest experiences as an actor after moving to Chicago with his mother and sister (Reedy Gibbs and Meadow Sisto, also actors) at the age of six. Jeremy and Meadow's turn as specters in the Goodman Theater's adaptation of Tennessee William's House Not Meant to Stand earned the young thespians positive notice, and led to theater work with such other Windy City institutions as the Absolute Theater Company and the Cherry Street Theater. After constant auditioning and small roles in commercials and industrial films, Sisto's breakthrough came with his being cast in Lawrence Kasdan's Grand Canyon (1991) after a deceptively discouraging audition. Returning to Chicago to finish school after wrapping up Grand Canyon in Los Angeles, Sisto constantly auditioned and played small roles in theater and independent films before moving to L.A. and finding roles in Clueless (1995) and White Squall (1996). A busy actor in the later '90s, Sisto appeared in the infamous Don's Plum (1998) before his role in the television mini-series The 60s and Jesus (both 1999). The next year Sisto would follow-up as a troubled young filmmaker coming to grips with the death of his wife in This Space Between Us, and with Angel Eyes, a mysterious tale of fate and urban isolation starring Jennifer Lopez.Subsequent roles in Lucky McKee's well-received feature debut May, the popular backwoods slasher flick Wrong Turn, and the 2004 horror-comedy Dead and Breakfast served well to increase Sisto's street credibility among genre buffs, but when he wasn't running from inbred killers in the forest or falling under the spell of mentally disturbed waifs, Sisto was gaining positive notice for his role as a delusional man who believes his life is the subject of a film in Movie Hero, and returning to the small screen in shows like the hit crime drama Law & Order or the ABC comedy Suburgatory.

Trivia: Started modeling at age 13. Studied acting at JoAnna Beckson Studios in Manhattan. Breakthrough role was as Rosa Santos on All My Children. Appeared in the Brooks and Dunn music video "Ain't Nothing 'Bout You." Played series regular Connie Rubirosa on two editions of the Law & Order franchise.

Trivia: Possessing a wistful handsomness and vulnerable charisma, British actor Linus Roache first gained recognition -- and controversy -- as a gay Catholic priest in Antonia Bird's 1994 Priest. A native of Manchester, where he was born in 1964, Roache is the son of actor William Roache, best known for his long-running role on the popular TV series Coronation Street. It was on that show that the younger Roache made his debut at the age of nine, playing his father's son. Following his debut, he spent much of the next decade on stage, performing with the likes of the Royal Shakespeare Company.Following the success of Priest, as well as a role in the popular BBC TV series Seaforth that same year, Roache took some time off to recuperate from the grueling experience of making Priest. When he returned to the screen, it was in Iain Softley's adaptation of Henry James' The Wings of the Dove (1997). Roache won acclaim for his complex portrayal of Merton Densher, an impoverished journalist who becomes caught up in a disastrous scheme involving his girlfriend (Helena Bonham Carter) and a dying heiress (Alison Elliott). The film itself was roundly praised and helped put Roache back in the spotlight that he had rejected just two years earlier.The actor could subsequently be seen doing work in a number of diverse films, including Shot Through the Heart (1998), which cast him as a Yugoslavian marksman caught up in the horrors of war; and The Venice Project (1999), a drama in which he played both a 17th-century Italian count and a member of the 20th-century California art world.

Trivia: Is the child of two former stage actors who met while acting in New York City, but who both gave up the profession to start a family. Studied dance as a child, training in ballet, jazz and tap. Became interested in acting as a teenager, when he switched his focus from dance to drama. Worked at a casting agency while in high school. Auditioned for the roles of both Lip and Ian on Shameless before being cast as Lip, a character he describes as being very different from himself.

Trivia: Miles Chandler kicked off his career as a child star; he was cast on numerous occasions as the younger versions of adult characters in projects such as the TV miniseries Empire Falls (2005) (channeling Ed Harris) and the theatrical release The Education of Charlie Banks (2007) (channeling Jason Ritter). Chandler also made inroads as a series performer, with guest appearances on Law & Order and a recurring role as Max Caseman on Six Degrees. In 2008, Chandler signed for a small supporting role as a high school football player in the Ice Cube-headlined sports drama The Longshots (2008).

Trivia: Though he specialized urban-oriented roles onscreen, actor Tristan Wilds lacked an edgy intensity and instead ushered in a soft, sensitive spirit that suggested a tremendous amount of vulnerability and depth. A star from his mid- to late teens, Wilds gained particularly favorable attention on television, initially for his portrayal of broken home victim Michael Lee on HBO's The Wire (in the fourth season of that program), and for his supporting role in the Queen Latifah/Dakota Fanning drama The Secret Life of Bees. In 2008, Wilds signed to play Southern California high school student Dixon Wilson in 90210, a spinoff of the original Beverly Hills 90210. Four years later he was cast in the WWII fighter pilot drama Red Tails.

Trivia: Worked as a genetic-engineering lab assistant in San Francisco after college; considered going to med school. Pursued acting after a producer noticed her in an L.A. restaurant and offered her a part in the movie Aloha Summer (1988). Her scene was cut. Played a troubled wife, Katie, in the racy 2007 HBO drama Tell Me You Love Me, about three couples who see the same therapist. Appeared in a series of commercials for Clairol. Took on the role of an outspoken ATF agent in the FX drama Sons of Anarchy, which debuted in 2008. Appears in the film Wonderful World, a 2009 drama starring Matthew Broderick.

Trivia: Some actors have such defining traits that they seem to have "leading man" written all over them, while others, like Terry Kinney, succeed with an uncanny ability to drastically alter their appearance at the drop of a hat. Though his chameleon-like skills have helped the actor land numerous roles on the stage and screen, it's his talent that ultimately formed the backbone of his enduring career. After graduating from high school, the Lincoln, IL, native attended Illinois State University. It was there that he befriended aspiring actor Jeff Perry, who invited Kinney to Chicago to watch his best friend perform in a stage production of Grease. Perry's friend was an ambitious young actor named Gary Sinise, and the three soon began planning to open their own regional theater. Though it was founded in 1974, the Steppenwolf Theater wouldn't quite get off the ground until two years later -- when Kinney and Perry graduated from I.S.U. The venture was largely unprofitable at first, so its founders supported themselves and their dream through a series of odd jobs before the theater moved from a Highland Park church basement to the old St. Nicholas Theater building in the early '80s. The change of scenery proved to be just what the theater needed to flourish, and it was soon drawing good crowds. In the years that followed, the company moved once again -- this time to a permanent location in Chicago -- and Kinney served as Steppenwolf's artistic co-director alongside Sinise. During this profitable period, Kinney and his co-founders were nominated for numerous theatrical awards, while their productions made headway on Broadway. Kinney, of course, had aspirations beyond regional theater, and, in 1986, made his film debut with a small part in the romantic comedy Seven Minutes in Heaven. The remainder of the '80s found the actor landing bit parts in No Mercy (1986) and Sinise's Miles From Home (1988), in addition to a brief stint on television with thirtysomething. It wasn't until the following decade, however, that his film career truly began to blossom. Following an appearance in The Last of the Mohicans (1992), Kinney drew favorable reviews for his top-billed turn in Abel Ferrara's Body Snatchers, and his billing remained high with The Firm (1993), Fly Away Home (1996), and Sleepers (1998). In 1997, Kinney landed an extended gig on the acclaimed HBO prison drama Oz. Cast as Cell Block Five Unit Manager Tim McManus, Kinney's hardened performance lent the show both dimension and a certain foundation. Kinney frequently balanced his role on this series with a number of feature performances, including such films as The Young Girl and the Monsoon (1999, his second lead), Luminous Motion (1998), and The House of Mirth (2000). Although the bulk of his work in Save the Last Dance (2001) ended up on the cutting room floor, audiences could still get a good look at Kinney in such features as The Laramie Project (2001) and the 2004 soccer drama The Game of Their Lives.

Trivia: Jerry Orbach often commented, without false modesty, that he was fortunate indeed to have been a steadily working actor since the age of 20. Such was an understatement: graced with not only formidable dramatic instinct but one of American theater's top singing voices, Orbach resisted others' attempts to peg him as a character actor time and again and established himself as one of the most unique talents in entertainment per se. Television producer Dick Wolf perhaps put it best when he described Orbach as "a legendary figure of 20th century show business" and "one of the most honored performers of his generation."A native of the Bronx, Orbach was born to an ex-vaudevillian father who worked full time as a restaurant manager and a mother who sang professionally on the radio. The Orbachs moved around constantly during Jerry's youth, relocating from Gotham to Scranton to Wilkes-Barre to Springfield, Massachusetts and eventually settling in Chicago - a mobility that gave the young Orbach an unusual ability to adapt to any circumstance or situation, and thus presaged his involvement in drama. Orbach later attended Northwestern University, trained with Herbert Berghof and Lee Strasberg, and took his Gotham theatrical bow in 1955, as an understudy in the popular 1955 revival of Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's The Threepenny Opera, eventually playing the lead role of serial killer Macheath. During the Threepenny run, Orbach made his first film appearance in the Manhattan-filmed low budgeter Cop Killer (1958). In 1960, Orbach created the role of flamboyant interlocutor El Gallo in the off-Broadway smash The Fantasticks, and later starred in such Broadway productions as Carnival (1961), Promises Promises (1966), Chicago (1975) and 42nd Street (1983). By day, Orbach made early-1960s appearances in several New York-based TV series, notably The Shari Lewis Show. In the early years, Orbach's film assignments were infrequent, but starting around 1981, with his pivotal role as officer Gus Levy in Sidney Lumet's masterful urban epic Prince of the City, the actor generally turned up in around one movie per year. His more fondly remembered screen assignments include the part of Jennifer Grey's father in Dirty Dancing (1987), Martin Landau's shady underworld brother in Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989) the voice of the Chevalieresque candellabra in the Disney cartoon feature Beauty and the Beast (1990), and Billy Crystal's easily amused agent in Mr. Saturday Night (1992). Orbach perhaps made his most memorable contribution to television, however. After headlining a brief, short-lived detective series entitled The Law and Harry McGraw from September 1987 to February 1988 (a spinoff of Murder, She Wrote), Orbach landed a role that seemed to draw heavily from his Prince of the City portrayal: Detective Lennie Briscoe, a sardonic, mordant police investigator on Wolf's blockbuster cop drama Law & Order.Orbach carried the assignment for twelve seasons, and many attributed a large degree of the program's success to him.Jerry Orbach died of prostate cancer at the age of 69 on December 28, 2004. Three years later, Orbach turned up, posthumously, on subway print advertisements for the New York Eye Bank. As a performer with nearly perfect vision, he had opted to donate his eyes to two women after his death - a reflection on the remarkable humanitarian ideals that characterized his off-camera self.