Trivia: A dancer from childhood, Buddy Ebsen headlined in vaudeville in an act with his sister Velma. In 1935, Ebsen was signed by MGM as a specialty performer in The Broadway Melody of 1936, wherein he was shown to good advantage in several solos. He worked in a number of subsequent musicals, including Shirley Temple's Captain January (1936), teaming with Shirley for the delightful number "At the Codfish Ball." MGM assigned Ebsen to the role of the Scarecrow in 1939's The Wizard of Oz, but Ray Bolger, who'd been cast as the Tin Man, talked Ebsen into switching roles. The move proved to be Ebsen's undoing; he found that he was allergic to the silver makeup required for the Tin Man, fell ill, and was forced to bow out of the film, to be replaced by Jack Haley (however, Ebsen's voice can still be heard in the reprises of "We're Off to See the Wizard").Ebsen then returned to the stage, taking time out to provide the dancing model for a electronically operated wooden marionette which later was used at Disneyland. In 1950 Ebsen returned to films as comical sidekick to Rex Allen, gradually working his way into good character parts in "A" pictures like Night People (1955). Walt Disney, who'd remembered Ebsen from the dancing marionette, offered the actor the lead in his 1954 three-part TV production of Davy Crockett, but at the last moment engaged Fess Parker as Davy and recast Buddy as Crockett's pal George Russel. Ebsen continued to pop up in films like 1961's Breakfast at Tiffany's (as Audrey Hepburn's abandoned hometown husband), and in TV westerns, where he often cast his image to the winds by playing cold-blooded murderers. Comfortably wealthy in 1962 thanks to his film work and wise business investments, Ebsen added to his riches by signing on to play Jed Clampett in the TV sitcom The Beverly Hillbillies, which ran for nine years to excellent ratings. A millionaire several times over, Ebsen planned to ease off after Hillbillies, but in 1972 he was back in TV in the title role of Barnaby Jones. Few observers gave this easygoing detective series much of a chance, but they weren't counting on Ebsen's built-in popularity; Barnaby Jones lasted until 1980. The actor now confined himself to special events appearances and occasional guest-star roles, though he did play the recurring part of Lee Horsley's uncle in the final season of the TV mystery show Matt Houston (1983-85). One of Buddy Ebsen's final roles was in the 1993 theatrical film version of The Beverly Hillbillies -- not as Jed Clampett but in a cameo as Barnaby Jones!

Trivia: For as long as she could remember, Irene Ryan was performing on some stage or other. From the 1920s onward, she and her husband Timothy Ryan formed the popular vaudeville duo Tim and Irene. They carried over their song, dance and snappy patter into a brief series of two-reel comedies and several radio programs. During her first burst of filmmaking activity in the 1940s, Ryan played comedy relief parts in a number of B pictures scripted by her husband. Her standard characterization at this time was the traditional wisecracking, man-hungry spinster. During and after her divorce, Ryan continued accepting roles of varying sizes in such pictures as Woman on the Beach (1948), My Dear Secretary (1948), Mighty Joe Young (1949), Bonzo Goes to College (1952) and Blackbeard the Pirate (1952). By the early 1960s, Ryan was (as she would later cheerfully admit) pretty much washed up in show business. All this changed when she was invited to audition for an upcoming sitcom about a family of mountaineers who suddenly come into a fortune. Ryan read one single line and was hired on the spot: she played Granny on The Beverly Hillbillies from 1962 through 1971, never missing an opportunity to express gratitude for her involvement in so popular a project. No sooner had Hillbillies folded than Irene Ryan was cast in a show-stopping role in the 1971 Broadway musical Pippin, scoring yet another personal success--which, sadly, turned out to be her last.

Trivia: Gloria Swanson may not have been the world's best actress, but she was certainly one of the screen's greatest personalities. The daughter of a peripatetic army officer, she was educated in public schools from Chicago to Puerto Rico. While visiting Chicago's Essanay studios in 1913, the 15-year-old Swanson was hired as an extra and it was in this capacity that she met her first husband, Wallace Beery, then starred in the studio's Sweedie comedies. Not long after making a brief appearance in Charlie Chaplin's first Essanay starrer His New Job (1915), she accompanied her husband to Hollywood, where he'd been signed by Mack Sennett's Keystone studios. Often teamed with diminutive leading man Bobby Vernon, Swanson earned a measure of fame as the deadpan heroine of such comedies as Teddy at the Throttle (1916) and The Pullman Bride (1916) (she later claimed that she had no sense of humor at the time and thus played her roles seriously, which made them all the funnier to the audience). Divorced from Beery in 1917, Swanson also left Keystone that same year to accept an offer to appear in dramatic roles for Triangle Pictures. She then went to work for Cecil B. DeMille, who admired her courage and tenacity and cast her as the glamorously (and provocatively) garbed heroines of such lavish productions as Don't Change Your Husband (1918), Male and Female (1919), and The Affairs of Anatol (1920). A full-fledged superstar by the early '20s, Swanson carefully controlled every aspect of her career, from choosing her leading men and directors to approving her publicity layouts. She also remained in the public eye via her succession of high-profile husbands, including the Marquis de la Falaise de Coudray. Though at her best in tear-stained romantic dramas, she could still deliver a top-notch comedy performance, as witness her portrayal of a dowdy, gum-chewing working girl in Allan Dwan's Manhandled (1924). In the late '20s she set up her own production company with the sponsorship of her then-lover, financier Joseph P. Kennedy. After a successful start with 1928's Miss Sadie Thompson, Swanson's company went bankrupt as a result of her benighted association with the Erich Von Stroheim-directed fiasco Queen Kelly (1929). Contrary to popular belief, she made a successful transition to sound, displaying her fine singing voice in films like Tonight or Never (1931) and Music in the Air (1934). But the public had adopted new favorites and no longer flocked to Swanson's films as they once had. She retired in the mid-'30s, briefly returning in 1941 to star with Adolphe Menjou in the undistinguished comedy Father Takes a Wife. Her next film appearance in 1949 turned out to be one of the finest achievements in anybody's career: Her Oscar-nominated virtuoso performance as faded, self-delusional silent screen star Norma Desmond in Billy Wilder's vitriolic Hollywood melodrama Sunset Boulevard. So convincing was Swanson in this role that many of her fans believed that she was Norma Desmond, though nothing could have been further from the truth. Unfortunately, her attempts to follow up this triumph proved unsuccessful, prompting her to turn her back on filmmaking for the third time in her career. She did rather better on television in the 1950s, emceeing her own local New York TV talk show and hosting the syndicated anthology Crown Theatre Starring Gloria Swanson (1954). She also dabbled in scores of business enterprises, with mixed but generally satisfying results. Her most successful business venture was a line of organic cosmetics, "Essence of Nature;" she was also very active in the burgeoning health food movement of the 1960s, her ageless beauty and boundless energy serving as the best arguments in favor of proper nutrition. In the 1970s, she appeared on Broadway and on tour in Butterflies Are Free, and made her final screen appearance in Airport 74 (1974), more or less playing herself. Still active right up to her death, Gloria Swanson was survived by her sixth husband and several grandchildren.

Trivia: American actor Milton Frome made an unlikely film debut as the cowboy star of Grand National's Ride 'Em Cowgirl (1939)--unlikely in that the tall, bald actor spent the rest of his career playing nervous corporate types and "second bananas" for some of show business' greatest clowns. After touring with the USO during World War II, the vaudeville-trained Frome was an early arrival on the television scene: he worked as a straight man and foil on Milton Berle's variety series, and also functioned as the hapless target of the antics of Martin and Lewis on The Colgate Comedy Hour. The actor was also busy in live and filmed detective and action series (he frequently appeared in Superman with his good friend George Reeves) as well as in two-reel comedies with The Three Stooges. After Jerry Lewis broke away from Dean Martin, Frome continued to function as one of Lewis' stock company in such films as The Delicate Delinquent (1957), The Nutty Professor (1963) and Disorderly Orderly (1964). TV sitcom buffs remember Milton Frome best as Lawrence Chapman, the hapless mogul who ran a film studio owned by rustic millionaire Jed Clampett on The Beverly Hillbillies.

Trivia: George Neise played character roles on stage, screen, and television. Born and raised in Chicago, Neise became an actor following service as a colonel in the Army Air Corps during WWII. Neise made his feature-film debut in They Raid by Night (I942). Though he would specialize in action-dramas and Westerns, Neise appeared in a wide range of roles ranging from comedy to drama to romance. Neise made his final film appearance in The Barefoot Executive (1971). On television, Neise has appeared on The Jackie Gleason Show, The Red Skelton Show, and The Loretta Young Show. Neise passed away in his Hollywood home on April 14, 1996.

Trivia: American actor Lennie Bremen began his career acting in theater groups such as the Works Progress Administration; he also appeared on Broadway before signing with Warner Bros in 1942. He debuted in Pride of the Marines (1945), and went on to play character roles through the late 1960s.

Trivia: American character actor Frank Sully worked as a vaudeville and Broadway comedian before drifting into movies in 1935. Often typecast as musclebound, doltish characters, the curly-haired, lantern-jawed Sully was seen in a steady stream of hillbilly, GI and deputy sheriff roles throughout the '40s and '50s. He was prominently cast as Noah in John Ford's memorable drama The Grapes of Wrath (1940), one of the few times he essayed a non-comic role. During the '50s, Sully accepted a number of uncredited roles in such westerns as Silver Lode (1954) and was a member in good standing of the Columbia Pictures 2-reel "stock company," appearing as tough waiters, murderous crooks and jealous boyfriends in several short comedies, including those of the Three Stooges (Fling in the Ring, A Merry Mix-Up etc.) Frank Sully's last screen appearance was a bit as a bartender in Barbra Streisand's Funny Girl (1968).