Trivia: A male model-turned-actor, Norman Reedus is almost as recognizable from his hipster, late-'90s print ads for Prada clothes as for his collection of movie psychos. After leaving home at a young age, Reedus lived in London and Japan before landing in California. Supporting himself with various jobs, including fixing motorcycles, Reedus finally got his acting break in 1997. After a bit part in the Mira Sorvino horror film Mimic, Reedus captured critical attention as a creepy hitman in the independent black comedy Six Ways to Sunday. Playing off the sharply scruffy good looks that simultaneously made him the male face for ultra-fashionable clothing designer Prada, Reedus again took a walk on the wild side as a mysterious stranger in the indie Dark Harbor (1998) and as a prisoner in Joel Schumacher's reviled snuff film thriller 8MM (1999). Lead roles in the independent cop movie Boondock Saints (2000), opposite Willem Dafoe, and in the teensploitation movie Gossip (2000), as a malevolent college student, subsequently landed Reedus on Vanity Fair's April 1999 cover featuring young stars to watch. Gossip's poor reception, as well as the low profile of Boondock Saints and Reedus' other indie films -- including I'm Losing You (1999) and Preston Tylk (2000) -- did not make good on the Vanity Fair promise. And although Reedus followed up with three more films with similarly dismal returns, his re-teaming with Mimic director Guillermo Del Toro found Reedus back in blockbuster territory with his turn as a vampire hunter's technical assistant in Blade II (2002). Reedus has a son with Danish supermodel/companion Helena Christensen.

Trivia: Parents are from Zimbabwe; she moved there with them when she was 5. Has written three plays that she says are "a trilogy of Zimbabwe's coming-of-age from a female perspective." Calls herself a Zimerican because of her roots in Zimbabwe and America. Speaks four languages: French, Shona, Xhosa and English. Taught playwriting and acting in Zimbabwe, Liberia and South Africa. Received the Macalester College 2011 Young Alumni Award.

Trivia: Worked behind the scenes as a casting agent while also pursuing a career in acting. Began her professional acting career in 1991 in Atlanta, GA. Made her TV debut on a 1993 episode of Matlock. Working with producer-director Frank Darabont on The Mist (2007) directly led to her role in The Walking Dead. Was the voice-double for Anne Bancroft in the 2008 animated feature Delgo. Has a strong interest in psychology.

Trivia: Many actors know from childhood that acting is the only job they'll ever want, but Jeffrey Dean Morgan is a rare exception. He pursued basketball in high school with tremendous success, until a knee injury ended his sports career, and he then trained and worked as a graphic artist for some time. Eventually, however, his interest in acting became overpowering, and Morgan moved to Los Angeles to pursue acting as a career, rather than just an interest. He found steady work appearing on shows like ER and Angel, eventually scoring a huge break in 2005 when he was cast in recurring roles on three different series: Grey's Anatomy, Weeds, and Supernatural. The shows put him on the map, especially Grey's Anatomy, and oddly enough, his characters died on all three shows. Morgan's career was still alive and kicking, however, and he was soon appearing in the comedy Kabluey opposite Christine Taylor and The Accidental Husband with Uma Thurman and Colin Firth. As the 2000's continued, Morgan would remain a consistant form on screen, appearing memorably as the Comedian in The Watchmen, Texas Killing Fields, and Red Dawn.

Trivia: Got start in comedy at 14, when he called a morning radio show on KMLE in Phoenix hosted by Tim and Willy requesting, in a strange voice, Billy Ray Cyrus' "Achy Breaky Heart"; after more calls in different voices—he eventually revealed his identity—the show hired him, and he worked there as a producer until 2007. Growing up, his family became hot-air balloon enthusiasts after his father received a ride as a birthday present. Was a semifinalist on Season 4 of NBC's Last Comic Standing in 2006. Is a member of a Los Angeles comedy group called Robert Downey Jr. Jr. Is an avid fan of the NFL's Green Bay Packers, and even owns shares in the team. Stand-up routine featured a bit about living with his parents in a retirement community, and then got a supporting role in TV Land's Retired at 35 (2011-12), a sitcom about a man who moves in with his parents—who live in a retirement community.

Trivia: Actress Christian Serratos became a familiar face to tween audiences when she was still just a teenager herself, playing Suzie Crabgrass on the Disney show Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide starting in 2004, when she was just 14. She went on to appear on other shows on the network, like Zoey 101 and Hannah Montana, but Serratos eventually expanded her horizons to include film, appearing in the 2008 movie Twilight as the school-friend of the main character Bella.

Trivia: The handsome supporting actor and S.U.N.Y. graduate Seth Gilliam is most recognizable from gritty crime dramas on HBO. He started acting in the early '90s with small roles in feature films, most notably in the comedy Mad Dog and Glory. Also appearing in made-for-TV movies, his first starring role was in Assault at West Point as Johnson Whittaker, the first African-American cadet admitted to West Point. His next sizable role was in the Merchant Ivory production Jefferson in Paris, the story of Thomas Jefferson's affair with the 15-year-old slave girl Sally Hemmings. After appearing in a few scenes in Courage Under Fire and Starship Troopers, he made a successful move to HBO as Officer Clayton Hughes in the prison drama Oz. A few years later, he played Detective Ellis Carver in the crime series The Wire. He returned to feature filmmaking for the chest-baring role of Marcus in Punks, a comedy about the black gay male scene in West Hollywood. In 2002, he appeared in the third part of Rebecca Miller's Personal Velocity: Three Portraits.

Trivia: After the death of his mother when he was 10, he and his brother chose to live in a children's home in London instead of being sent to America to reside with a relative. He stayed in foster care for eight years. Aspired to be a professional rugby player as a teen. Was introduced to acting after following a girl he was interested in to an audition for a play. Was once employed by the British government's social security office. Penned the autobiographical TV film, Storm Damage, in 2000. Wrote the well-received play The Sons of Charlie Paora, which opened in London's Royal Court in 2004. Landed the role of Robert Hawkins on Jericho after his first audition.

Trivia: Began acting at the age of 9 in church pageants. At the same age, he began doing celebrity impressions as a member of the Boy Scouts of America. Briefly double majored in marketing and acting at the University of Colorado before focusing solely on acting and earning a BFA in theatre. A successful impressionist, voice actor and improv artist, he used those skills to to impress casting directors Sharon Bialy and Sherry Thomas, who cast him as Aaron on AMC's The Walking Dead.

Trivia: A talented and handsome blond actor who has also shown a marked interest behind the camera, Ryan Hurst may have been destined to pursue a career in film considering his father's notable television career and his mother's occupation as an acting coach. Born in Los Angeles, CA, in 1976, Hurst found early commercial work before completing his primary education at Santa Monica High School. After an early appearance in a Spam commercial and a few helpful tips from mom and dad, the youth began to hit his stride on the stage. In addition to role his portrayal of Brutus in Julius Caesar and his work in such familiar plays as Harvey and Guys and Dolls, Hurst staged his own adaptation of the well-loved Cyrano de Bergerac for the Santa Monica Civic Light Opera and received a Best Performance award from Backstage West for his Canon Theater production of The Last Night of Ballyhoo. Television roles in Saved by the Bell: The New Class and Boston Common followed, and in 1997 Hurst made his feature debut in the Kevin Costner epic The Postman. Subsequent roles in such high-profile releases as Saving Private Ryan and Patch Adams (both 1998) continued to find his budding career flourishing; with a small role in 2000's The Rules of Engagement, Hurst also contributed behind the camera (he shot the 16 mm montage) and then turned up in the sports drama Remember the Titans (also 2000). Continuing to rise to the top of the credits with each film role, Hurst's roles in We Were Soldiers and Lone Star State of Mind (both 2002) were a testament to his remarkable versatility.

Trivia: With only a handful of film credits to her name, British actress Samantha Morton earned a reputation as one of the most critically lauded up-and-comers of the late '90s. Small-boned and possessed of almost elfin features, Morton, who was born in Nottingham in 1977, began acting on television at the age of 13. She appeared in a number of series, including the popular crime drama Cracker and such costume extravaganzas as Jane Eyre and Emma.Morton became known to an international film audience in 1997, when she won wide acclaim for her wrenching, fearless portrayal of a young woman driven to promiscuous behavior by the death of her mother in Carine Adler's Under the Skin. The following year, she did starring work in The Last Yellow and Dreaming of Joseph Lees, playing the girlfriend of a small-time crook in the former and a dissatisfied young woman harboring romantic feelings for her long-absent second cousin (Rupert Graves) in the latter. In 1999, Morton's name became an increasingly familiar one to American filmgoers, thanks to starring roles in two very different films. The first, Jesus' Son, cast the actress as a heroin addict, while the second, Woody Allen's Sweet and Lowdown, featured her as a shy, mute woman who gets used and abused by a legendary jazz guitarist (Sean Penn) whose musical talent runs in inverse proportion to his qualities as a human being. Heralded for both films, Morton scored a surprise Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for the latter. Not resting on the laurel, the actress immediately set to work with a pair of venerable cineastes, directors Julien Temple (in Pandemonium) and Amos Gitai (in his first English-language production, Eden). Director Steven Spielberg soon followed Allen's lead, casting Morton in a small but pivotal role as a shivering, near-mute, clairvoyant "Precog" in his Blade Runner-esque mystery Minority Report, which premiered in the summer of 2002. Though the film would introduce Morton to her largest audience yet, it was a pair of independent features released in late 2002 and 2003 that would garner her even more significant critical attention. Teaming with the maverick Scottish director Lynne Ramsay, the actress would essay the enigmatic, directionless title character in Morvern Callar, a dreamy, elliptical adaptation of Alan Warner's cult novel. About a year later, Morton would see the release of In America, Jim Sheridan's acclaimed slice-of-life tale of an Irish family immigrating to New York City's Hell's Kitchen, for which she would receive her second Academy Award nomination, this time for Best Actress.Morton continued to take on challenging assignments such as the futuristic Code 46 opposite Tim Robbins and directed by British helmer Michael Winterbottom, and appearing opposite Johnny Depp in the little-seen The Libertine, and the period drama River Queen. Although Lassie may seem like a unusual film for Morton to appear in, she has a history of working in family friendly fare having provided the voice for Ruby in the Max and Ruby animated television series based on the popular children's books by Rosemary Wells.In 2007 she appeared as Mary Stuart in Elizabeth: The Golden Age, and appeared in the Ian Curtis biopic Control. She had a leading part as a suspected murderer in the superb Longford. She played one of the women in the life of the troubled writer at the center of Synecdoche, New York, and she was a war widow in Oren Moverman's The Messenger. In 2012 she provided one of the voices for the aliens in the big-budget flop John Carter, but also worked with David Cronenberg on his Cosmopolis.