Trivia: His mother is from Norway; his father is Nigerian. Won the Martin Steele Prize for play production during university. Was President of the Cambridge University Footlights Dramatic Club between 1997 and 1998. Nominated for a Perrier Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival for Garth Marenghi's Fright Knight in 2000. Won a Perrier Comedy Award for Garth Marenghi's Netherhead in 2001. Won Best Video for "My Mistakes" by The Last Shadow Puppets at the 2007 NME Awards. Nominated for both Best Director and Best Rock Video at the 2008 UK Music Video Awards. Published his first book Ayoade on Ayoade: A Cinematic Odyssey in 2014, satirising the documented work of film directors. Helped write The Mighty Book of Boosh with Noel Fielding and various others. Published his second book The Grip of Film in 2017, an 'A-Z of film' with rankings and detailed footnotes.

Trivia: Even those who don't know Kevin Michael Richardson's face will frequently remember his voice. The actor's unique baritone has made him a memorable presence in many projects, including several voices on the animated series Family Guy. A classically trained performer, Richardson was one of eight students selected for the 1982 National Foundation for the Arts program, leading to a full scholarship for Syracuse University. He would go on to become a successful actor and voice actor, wracking up a long list of roles on everything from Pokemon to The New Batman Adventures. Othyer shows featuring Richardson's distinctive voice include Transformers Prime, Ultimate Spider-Man, and Green Lantern: The Animated Series. Real-life voices Richardson has portrayed include Bob Hope (in a 2006 Malcolm in the Middle episode), Bill Cosby (a number of Family Guy episodes) and Plato (PBS's Adventures From the Book of Virtues, 1996-98).

Trivia: Is of African-American and Guyanese descent.Co-starred in the sitcom A Different World from 1987 to 1992, playing Jaleesa Vinson.Composed A Different World's theme song with Bill Cosby and Stu Gardner.Played Deloris Van Cartier, the Whoopi Goldberg role, in Peter Schneider's Sister Act the Musical before its Broadway run.Has lent her voice to a number of animated television series such as The Simpsons, Futurama, The Cleveland Show and The Boondocks, as well as to Pixar films Monsters University and Inside Out.

Trivia: The slightly diminutive and gap-toothed comedian Paul Scheer burst onto the scene in the early 2000s as a standup comic and producer of television specials, usually for the stations HBO and Comedy Central. Scheer also appeared frequently on the VH1 program Best Week Ever and guested as an occasional commentator on NBC's seminal Today Show. He is best known, however, for his acting and writing collaborations with fellow schtickmeisters Rob Huebel and Aziz Ansari, with whom he developed, produced, wrote, and appeared in Human Giant. Culling inspiration from such sources as Saturday Night Live, The State, and MADtv, this consistently irreverent collection of outrageous and bawdy comedy sketches reeled in a sizeable audience when it premiered in 2007. Scheer also appeared in the 2006 Billy Bob Thornton comedy School for Scoundrels. In addition to parts in Meet Dave, Bride Wars, and Piranha, Scheer co-hosts the movie-related podcast How Did This Get Made?

Trivia: Born in the Soviet Union and immigrated with his family to Lexington, MA, when he was 4 years old. Acted as a spokesperson for the Food Network by dressing as a potato. Ranked by Village Voice as the Best New York City Comedian in 2009. Authored a comedic self-help book titled The Will to Whatevs: A Guide to Modern Life. Hosts the annual Eugene Mirman Comedy Festival.

Trivia: A student of mime artist Marcel Marceau, LA-born Laraine Newman utilized her artistic training in the cause of comedy. In 1972, she joined the Groundlings improvisational troupe (spawning ground for such major comic talents as Phil Hartman and Paul "Pee-wee Herman" Reubens), making her film debut with several fellow improvvers in the 1975 pastiche Tunnelvision. She went on to work as an ensemble player on the 1975 summer-replacement TV variety series Manhattan Transfer. From 1975 through 1980, Laraine was a regular on the ground-breaking weekend comedy series Saturday Night Live. While her contributions were always well-received, Laraine tended to play third banana to the other SNL ladies Gilda Radner and Jane Curtin, reportedly because of her acute shyness. Her best moments on the series occurred when she played alien teenager Laarta in the "Coneheads" sketches; her particular low point was the time she nearly drowned during a "witch-hunt" sketch starring Steve Martin. Free of her SNL duties in 1980, Laraine played a supporting role in Woody Allen's Stardust Memories, and was featured in such "comedy salads" (Ms. Newman's own term for feature films overloaded with TV comedians) as Wholly Moses (1980) and Yellowbeard (1982). The world first saw Ms. Newman's new nose job when she co-starred in the 1985 John Travolta-Jamie Lee Curtis starrer Perfect. The following year, Laraine hosted a syndicated "bad movie" TV anthology, Canned Film Festival. Laraine Newman's screen appearances of the 1990s have included the role of Susan Rock in 1993's The Flintstones and a revival of Laarta in the like-vintage The Coneheads.

Trivia: Of Irish, Dutch, French and Mexican descent.Was raised by her maternal grandmother.Graduated high school in the same class as actor and host Mario Lopez.Was interested in goth bands like The Cure, but her mother forbade her to listen to goth music.Started performing stand-up comedy in her late teens.A casting director watched her imitating voices in her comedy routine and advise she try voice acting.In 2002, along with Murry Hammond, participated in the documentary series A Wedding Story.

Trivia: The fifth of 11 children. Attended Southwest Minnesota State University on a football scholarship; tried out for The Crucible after injuries sidelined him. Studied at the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco after college. Made his Broadway debut in the play Mastergate in 1989. Received the 2002 Lucille Lortelle Award for Outstanding Featured Actor for the off-Broadway play Four. Supports a scholarship for SMSU, the Isiah Whitlock Jr. Fine Arts Theatre Endowment.

Trivia: Actor, comedian, novelist, columnist, noted wit, vocal gay rights advocate, and general bon vivant, Stephen Fry is nothing if not one of the more versatile and outspoken talents to come along in the latter half of the 20th century. Since beginning his creative partnership with Hugh Laurie in 1981, Fry has become a fixture on British television with programs such as A Bit of Fry and Laurie and Jeeves and Wooster. In addition, he has made a number of films and established himself as a respected commentator on the various happenings in British society.Born in London on August 24, 1957, Fry was the second of three children born to a homemaker mother and physicist/investor father. The family moved to Norfolk when Fry was very young and he was sent off for a public school education at the age of eight. Over the course of his education, first at Uppingham and then at Stout's Hill, Fry got into lavish amounts of trouble thanks to his tendency to lie, cheat, and steal, a habit that would land him in jail for three months when he was 18. After serving time at Pucklechurch prison for credit card fraud, Fry began to turn his life around, beginning with an acceptance to Queens College, Cambridge. It was at Cambridge that he began doing comedy, performing with the legendary Cambridge University Footlights Club (previously home to various Monty Python members, among others). Other Footlighters at the time included Emma Thompson, Tony Slattery, and Hugh Laurie, the last of whom was introduced to Fry by Thompson. Fry and Laurie began their collaboration in 1981, performing Footlights revues at various venues around Great Britain, including the Edinburgh Festival, and doing a three month tour of Australia. In 1984, after making occasional television appearances for a couple of years (including a hilarious send-up of the Oxbridge set on an episode of The Young Ones), Fry found great critical and financial success when he was asked to rewrite Noel Gay's Me and My Girl. The stage production, which starred Fry's Cambridge friend Emma Thompson, won wide acclaim, eventually garnering Fry a 1987 Tony nomination. Throughout the remainder of the decade, Fry won fame in his native country for his work on various television and radio shows, and in supporting roles in a number of films. Some of his more notable television work included A Bit of Fry and Laurie (1987) and Rowan Atkinson's Black Adder series, while he made appearances in films such as A Fish Called Wanda (1988) and the same year's A Handful of Dust. Meanwhile, Fry was also gaining recognition for his columns for The Daily Telegraph, as well as a certain amount of notoriety for various well-publicized statements he made in the press. Two of the more memorable of these were a magazine article in which he declared his celibacy and a television appearance where he claimed the U.K. record for saying "f***" the most times in one live broadcast.The 1990s brought more film and television work for Fry, as well as the publication of three best-selling novels The Liar, The Hippopotamus, and Making History, as well as Paperweight, a collection of his columns, and Moab Is My Washpot, his autobiography. In addition to the transatlantic recognition he received for his books, some of the films he appeared in gave him fame beyond the PBS set (who had become further acquainted with him via the acclaimed series Jeeves and Wooster, in which he starred with Laurie). Most memorable of these were: Peter's Friends (1992), in which Fry co-starred with Thompson, Kenneth Branagh, and various members of the Footlights set; John Schlesinger's Cold Comfort Farm (1995); Wilde (1997); Spice World (1998); and A Civil Action (1998). He got particular attention for his work in Wilde, owing both to the filmmakers' decision not to gloss over the details of the Victorian playwright's sex life and to Fry's uncanny physical resemblance to Oscar Wilde, something that no doubt helped to enhance the actor's performance.The following decade found the next generation getting acquainted with Fry as the narrator of the popular Harry Potter series of audiobooks and videogames, with film roles on The Life and Death of Peter Sellers (as famed British clairvoyant and astrologer Maurice Woodruff), MirrorMask, and V for Vendetta keeping him a familiar face on the big screen. And despite candidly detailing his struggle with bipolar disorder in the 2006 documentary Stephen Fry: The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive, it was Fry's role as host of the long-running comedy panel show QI, which debuted in 2003, that provided his fans with the kind of witty and irreverent social commentary they had come to expect from the multi-talented star. With four new comedians gathering each week to share personal anecdotes, answer trivia questions, and quip about the latest headlines, QI was always fresh and relevant even after being on the air for nearly a decade.Fry continued to work in all forms of media, and expanded his fan base by taking high-profile roles like Mycroft Holmes in Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011) and playing the Mayor of Laketown two of the three Hobbit movies, The Desolation of Smaug (2013) and The Battle of the Five Armies (2014). He also had a recurring role in the series 24: Live Another Day, playing the British Prime Minister.

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: Early stand-up appearances in Minnesota often found her performing with a shaved head and playing a violin while cracking jokes. While attending Scotland's University of Edinburgh, was part of improvisational-comedy group the Improverts, whose alumni include Ewen MacIntosh (BBC's The Office) and Kevin McKidd (Rome). Named to Variety's 10 Comics to Watch list in 2000. Received the Barry Award for best performer at the 2004 Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Has lent her voice to the Nickelodeon animated series CatDog, as well as feature films Stuart Little 2 (2002) and Barnyard (2006).

Trivia: Grew up on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, New York. Made her acting debut in the second grade when she was selected by Marlo Thomas to appear in the ABC special Free to Be... A Family. Became the youngest photographer to ever shoot the cover of New York Magazine, at age 15, and also shot the entire eight-page cover story about prep school gangsters, which was published in December 1996. Was previously the voice of Nickelodeon's educational channel block Noggin while she was in college. Joined the cast of Cartoon Network show Adventure Time in its season three finale, voicing the recurring role of Flame Princess. Has lent her voice to a number of video games, such as Kingdom Hearts II, DC Super Hero Girls: Intergalactic Games, The Lego Movie Videogame, Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII, Pimp My Ride and Tarzan Untamed.

Trivia: While at Cambridge, she was a member of the Footlights, where she met Mel Giedroyc. Wrote for French and Saunders. In 2002 she appeared in Celebrity Big Brother in the aid for various charities. Made notable appearances for Armando Iannucci's The Saturday Night Armistice. Guest-conducted the London Lesbian/Gay Symphony Orchestra on 11 October 2009. Was a judge for the 2009 Man Booker Prize. Is a panel member of BBC Radio 4's The News Quiz.

Trivia: Born in Bombay, India, he was raised primarily in San Jose, CA, but traveled frequently to India and Singapore during his childhood. While attending San Jose's Bellarmine College Preparatory High School, cofounded the Indian-American theater company A'shore Productions, which was the first of its kind on the West Coast. After appearing as an extra on NBC's The West Wing, landed his first credited TV role in a 2005 episode of CBS's CSI: NY. While still attending UCLA, made his feature-film debut with a lead role in 2006 drama American Blend.

Trivia: Was one half of American hip-hop duo Kid 'n Play with Christopher "Play" Martin in the late eighties and early nineties.Recorded three albums and starred in a number of feature films, notably the House Party movies and Class Act, with Christopher Martin.Appeared in the music video for LMFAO's song "Sorry for Party Rocking" in 2012.Lent his voice to the video game Spec Ops: The Line as First Lieutenant Alphonso Adams in 2012.Outside of his hip-hop and acting careers, he has worked as a librarian, theatrical stage worker, free-lance journalist, filing clerk, nanny and tutor.