Trivia: Noted for playing quirky and shy guys in his youth and charming leading men in his adult life, contemporary American actor Patrick Dempsey became a rising star in Hollywood during the late '80s and '90s. A state downhill skiing champion in high school, he began performing nonprofessionally as a juggler, magician, and puppeteer. He would soon parlay his performing skills onto the screen, becomming well known for the role of a loveable geek in the 1987 teen romcom Can't Buy Me Love.He would go on to appear in a number of films over the coming years, like With Honors, Outbreak, and Sweet Home Alabama. Dempsey would find his most definitive role in 2005 however, when he was cast as Dr. Derek Shepherd on the medical drama Grey's Anatomy. Dempsey's portrayal of the handsom doctor made him so popular, he became regularly referred to by the nickname "Dr. McDreamy," and he would stick with the series for many seasons to come.

Trivia: Michelle Monaghan enjoyed a successful modeling career with plans to pursue a career in journalism before a full-time acting career became an option. She'd made some minor appearances on TV shows such as Young Americans and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, as well as some nationally run commercials, but it was a recurring role on the acclaimed series Boston Public in 2002 that really opened doors for the young actress. Over the next few years, she scored big-screen parts in It Runs in the Family, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, and The Bourne Supremacy. She shortly thereafter scored a role alongside Charlize Theron and Frances McDormand in North Country and a starring role in the black comedy Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang with Robert Downey Jr. and Val Kilmer. In 2005, she appeared as the love interest of Tom Cruise in the hotly anticipated Mission: Impossible III, making her a far more familiar face and name. She immediately signed on to next appear in the Ben Affleck film Gone, Baby, Gone, which she followed with a starring role in the critically acclaimed independent film Trucker. She would go on to keep up her interest in the thriller genre, with roles in Eagle Eye in 2008 and Source Code in 2011.

Trivia: A Scottish actor whose heritage is betrayed as much by his pale skin and red hair as it is by his accent, Kevin McKidd first earned recognition in 1996 with parts in Trainspotting and Small Faces, two films that helped to put the Scottish film industry on the world cinema map. Born and raised in Elgin, a town in the northeast of Scotland, McKidd developed an interest in acting early on and was active with the Moray Youth Theatre throughout his childhood and adolescence. His time as an engineering student at the University of Edinburgh produced little in the way of engineering but did allow McKidd to rack up experience as part of the university's Bedlam Theatre. Finally deciding to chuck his course of study in order to pursue acting full-time, he enrolled in the Queen Margaret Drama School, where he trained until he graduated in 1994. Immediately after his graduation, McKidd auditioned for and won the lead role in The Silver Darlings, which was staged by Robert Carlyle's Rain Dog Theatre Company. This was followed by his casting as a vicious Glasgow gang leader in Gillies MacKinnon's Small Faces (1995) and his role as Tommy, an Iggy Pop-worshipping, AIDS-stricken heroin addict in Danny Boyle's Trainspotting (1996). The huge success of the latter film got McKidd noticed, although his performance was largely overshadowed by those of co-stars Ewan McGregor and Robert Carlyle. However, the actor soon found more work headed in his direction and spent the rest of the decade appearing in a steady stream of small art house pictures. Among the films he appeared in were Gilles MacKinnon's Hideous Kinky (1998), in which he had a cameo as a massively stoned traveler in Morocco and Rose Troche's Bedrooms and Hallways (1998), in which he starred as a gay man grappling with bisexual urges. In addition to his work on the screen, McKidd remained active on the stage, portraying the title character in the Almeida Theatre production of Jean Racine's Britannicus and starring alongside Jude Law in director Jonathan Kent's Albery Theatre production of John Ford's 'Tis Pity She's a Whore. He worked steadily throughout the next decade in projects like Anna Karenina, Dog Soldiers, and the biopic De-Lovely. In 2005 he appeared in Ridley Scott's epic Kingdom of Heaven, and that same year he was cast in the historical series Rome. Two years later he had a major role in the Silence of the Lambs prequel Hannibal Rising. The following year, in 2008, McKidd joined the ensemble cast of Grey's Anatomy, which scaled back his film work. In 2010 he was cast as Poseidon, the father of the young hero in Percy Jackson & The Olympians. He joined the Pixar family in 2012 giving voice to Lord MacGuffin in Brave.

Trivia: After limited stage experience, 19-year-old Kathleen Quinlan made her film debut in American Graffiti. The first stage of her movie career peaked with the starring role as a schizophrenic in I Never Promised You a Rose Garden (1977). She then spent most of the 1980s in secondary roles. Kathleen Quinlan reentered the consciousness of the American filmgoing public with her Oscar-nominated performance as Mrs. James Lovell in Apollo 13 (1995), directed by her American Graffiti co-star Ron Howard. Over the coming decades, Quinlan would prove she'd cemented herself as a bankable force on screen, appearing in such films as A Civil Action, Breach, Poundcake, and Made of Honor. She would also star on the series Family Law and Prison Break.

Trivia: Sydney Pollack was born to first generation Russian-Jewish Americans on July 1, 1934. After graduating from his Indiana high school, he went to New York and became a student at the Neighborhood Playhouse, a celebrated Greenwich Village school, where he studied under Sanford Meisner. He served two years in the army before returning to the Neighborhood Playhouse in 1958 as a teacher, and began appearing as an actor in live television dramas. His appearance in a John Frankenheimer-directed television production led him to a job as dialogue coach in the filmmaker's 1961 crime drama The Young Savages. He quickly moved into television, directing on programs such as "The Defenders," "The Naked City," "The Fugitive," "Dr. Kildare," and "Ben Casey" during the early and mid 1960s, and in 1965 made his feature film debut in the director's chair with The Slender Thread.Pollack established himself as a competent, if unexceptional, director in such works as This Property Is Condemned, and one sequence of the Frank Perry-directed drama The Swimmer (based on a work of John Cheever). However, his real breakthrough came in 1969 with the downbeat period drama They Shoot Horses, Don't They?, a brutal Depression-era piece set against the backdrop of a dance marathon contest, starring Jane Fonda and Gig Young. Young won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor while Pollack and Fonda were nominated for Best Director and Best Actress, respectively. (Fonda was said to have lost only because of the controversy surrounding her anti-Vietnam War activities.) Pollack again proved his skill at handling period drama four years later with The Way We Were, a romantic drama starring Barbra Streisand and Robert Redford that became one of the most popular serious movies of the decade. During the mid 1970s, Pollack also delved into the action genre with The Yakuza, about a kidnapping committed by Japanese gangsters. He achieved much greater success in 1975 with Three Days of the Condor, a post-Watergate suspense thriller starring Redford, Cliff Robertson and Faye Dunaway that proved an enduring favorite among genre fans as well as a hit with general audiences. Four years later, The Electric Horseman united his two top leads, Fonda and Redford, in a predictable but very successful update of the '30s screwball comedy, while Absence of Malice (1981), starring Paul Newman and Sally Field, took a much more serious tone in dealing with a story of an innocent man whose career is ruined by an ambitious reporter. In 1982, Pollack returned to comedy in top form with Tootsie, the story of an out-of-work actor (Dustin Hoffman) who achieves success by masquerading as a woman. The film scored a Best Director Oscar nomination for Pollack, as well as a win in the same category from the New York Critics Film Circle, and became the second highest grossing film of its year after E.T.. More success followed for the director with Out Of Africa (1985); starring Redford, it was one of a dwindling number of serious romantic dramas aimed at middle-class, middle-brow, middle-aged audiences that scored big at the box office. Unfortunately, another such outing with Redford, the 1990 Havana, was a notorious failure. Pollack was back on top in 1993 with The Firm, a wildly successful adaptation of John Grisham's thriller that starred Tom Cruise. However, mirroring the unpredictable fluctuations of fortune in Hollywood, his next directorial effort, a 1995 remake of Sabrina starring Harrison Ford, proved to be a colossal critical and financial flop. In 1999, Pollack and Ford reunited to make Random Hearts, a drama about a man and a woman Kristin Scott Thomas who discover that their respective spouses--who died in a plane crash--were lovers.In addition to directing, Pollack has also served as a producer on a number of films (including The Fabulous Baker Boys, Presumed Innocent, Dead Again and Sense and Sensibility) and frequently appears as an actor, both in his own films and those of other directors (he had a starring role in Woody Allen's Husbands and Wives). In 1999, he could be seen portraying a wealthy man with some questionable pastimes in Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut.The 21st century found Pollack working far more often as a producer than as a director thanks in part to the production company he ran with director Anthony Minghella, Mirage. Those credits include such award-winning films as Iris, The Quiet American, and the big-screen adaptation of the novel Cold Mountain. After a layoff of over five years, Pollack returned to the director's chair twice in 2005. He created both his first documentary, Sketches of Frank Gehry about the famous architect, and The Interpreter, an old-fashioned political thriller with Sean Penn and Nicole Kidman. In 2006 Pollack handled the producing duties on Anthony Minghella's drama Breaking & Entering, which reunited them with Cold Mountain star Jude Law. Pollack died of cancer at age 73 in May 2008.

Trivia: Best known as slightly geeky would-be ladies' man Dwayne Wayne on the television series A Different World, actor Kadeem Hardison's engaging onscreen persona and easy flair for comedy has earned him steady work as a supporting player in both film and television. Born in Brooklyn, NY, in 1965, Hardison became interested in acting when he was in his early teens, and he began studying theater at New York's Eubie Blake Theater, where one of his instructors was Earle Hyman, who later portrayed Grandpa Huxtable on The Cosby Show. Hardison's work with Hyman helped win the young actor a guest spot on a 1984 episode of The Cosby Show, playing opposite Lisa Bonet; the same year, Hardison made his big-screen debut with a small role in the hip-hop musical Beat Street. Hardison made a handful of appearances in movies and television projects over the next two years, but his debut appearance on The Cosby Show earned him a major dividend in 1987, when Denise Huxtable, Lisa Bonet's character on The Cosby Show, was spun-off into her own series, A Different World, and Hardison was cast as fellow student Dwayne Wayne. While Bonet left the show after its first season, Hardison remained in the cast for its entire seven-season run, and directed several during the show's final two seasons. During his down time from A Different World, Hardison continued to work in motion pictures, with supporting roles in I'm Gonna Git You Sucka and School Daze and a leading role in the independent horror film Def By Temptation. After A Different World went off the air in 1993, Hardison concentrated on film work, with roles ranging from the horror/comedy Vampire in Brooklyn to the political drama Panther. In 1997, he took another stab at series television on the short-lived sitcom Between Brothers, and began adding more TV guests spots to his resumé, appearing on Touched By an Angel, Just Shoot Me, and the revived Fantasy Island, while still maintaining a busy schedule of film work. In 2008 he played a small role in the romantic comedy Made of Honor, and co-starred in the 2011 horror Ashes, which followed a doctor who unintentionally releases a deadly plague.

Trivia: A character-oriented actor who specialized in playing American everymen, Chris Messina emerged in the mid-'90s, landing guest appearances on series programs such as Law & Order and mounting supporting parts in Hollywood features including You've Got Mail and Rounders (both 1998). Messina gained even more exposure when he joined the cast of the quirky HBO comedy drama Six Feet Under during that program's fifth and final season. On that series, Messina played Ted Fairwell, a Republican attorney smitten with Claire Fisher (Lauren Ambrose) who (as the program reveals) will eventually marry her. After Six Feet wrapped, Messina hearkened back to feature portrayals, this time as a lead, in director Jennifer Westfeldt's (Kissing Jessica Stein) critically praised sophomore effort Ira & Abby (2006). The actor proved he could hold his own with a multilayered turn as a neurotic therapist's son who rushes headlong into marriage only to watch his confidence fall to pieces when he learns of his new wife's two ex-husbands. In 2008, Messina took on a supporting role in Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona, opposite Penélope Cruz and Scarlett Johansson. In the years to come, Messina would enjoy continued success as an established actor, appearing in films like Ruby Sparks and Argo, as well as on TV series like The Mindy Project and The Newsroom.

Trivia: With her memorable performance as tough but sympathetic rebel teen Kim Kelly in the critically praised but criminally short-lived series Freaks and Geeks, actress Busy Philipps crafted one of the most compelling young characters in contemporary television. In addition to later serving as something of a life-support system for the rapidly expiring teen drama Dawson's Creek, Philipps has gone on to make a name for herself in such features as the Columbine-influenced Home Room and the 2004 comedy White Chicks as well. Born Elizabeth Jean Philipps in Oak Park, IL, the active youngster was quickly dubbed "Busy" for her seemingly boundless energy and sociability. A role as Wilber the Pig in a grade-school production of Charlotte's Web eventually lead to Philipps being voted Best Actress of her class in her senior yearbook. The ambitious screen prospect went on to take classes at the Acting Lab of Arizona, where she would write and produce a pair of successful plays. Philipps subsequently refined her skills by studying at England's Oxford School of Drama before making a name for herself in community theater around the Scottsdale area, with her first professional gig coming with a role as a real-life Barbie doll at Mattel's Toy Fair convention in New York. Philipps role in Freaks and Geeks did wonders for her exposure, regardless of the endearing show's remarkably short lifespan, and in the years that followed, she continued to impress in such features as Anatomy of a Hate Crime and Home Room. Many viewed Philipps' involvement with Dawson's Creek as something of a breath of fresh air for the somewhat stale series, with simultaneous appearances in the Freaks and Geeks follow-up series Undeclared proving a welcome opportunity to work with old friends. In 2004, Philipps took a supporting role opposite Jaime King in the Shawn and Marlon Wayans comedy White Chicks. In 2009 she was cast in the TV series Cougar Town, and in 2011 she appeared in the Sarah Jessica Parker vehicle I Don't Know How She Does It.

Trivia: Comedian, actress and writer Whitney Cummings first caught audience's attention as a cast member on the reality prank series Punk'd. The former model began cutting her teeth as a stand-up comic in the early-2000's, and soon began appearing on shows like The Tonight Show and Chelsea Lately. Without at doubt, Cummings' career hit a new high in 2011, when two shows she produced and wrote, 2 Broke Girls and Whitney, both were picked up by major networks, with Cummings also starring in the latter.

Trivia: Studied acting with Uta Hagen. Had a recurring role on The Big Bang Theory starting with its second series, and was promoted to series regular in 2012 for the sixth series. Plays the owner of a comic-book shop in The Big Bang Theory, and once worked at a similar establishment in New York City. Both of his parents are schoolteachers. Has appeared in more than 30 US adverts, including Eggos and FedEx.

Trivia: Raised in the Santa Monica Mountains area of Topanga Canyon, CA. Was an accomplished competitive horseback rider as a child. Discovered by a modeling scout at a shopping mall, and subsequently modeled for Guess. Appeared in the 2004 music video for "Cold" by hard-rock band Crossfade. Made her big-screen debut in the box-office disappointment Turistas (2006); went on to appear in the blockbuster sequels 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007) and Tron: Legacy (2010). Landed her first series-regular role on Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior, playing Gina LaSalle, a character she debuted on a 2010 episode of the original Criminal Minds.

Trivia: Striking Minnesota native Kelly Carlson first launched her career in show business as a model, leveraging her blonde hair and jaw-dropping good looks in campaigns for brands like Miller Lite and Rembrandt toothpaste. A stage actress by training, Carlson also appeared in numerous stage productions before landing the guest-starring role of Kimber Henry on the controversial FX series Nip/Tuck. The character proved extremely popular, and soon Carlson joined the main cast of the show. She continued to work on other projects, however, appearing in 2007's Made of Honor. Over the coming years, Carlson would appear on shows like Supernatural and Ghostfacers.

Trivia: Scottish-born Clive Russell is six and a half feet of bone and sinew. Add to his imposing stage presence his impressive acting skill and you have a colossal acting machine that can cry, bend steel, and recite Shakespeare. Russell has used his attributes to play Helfdane the Large in The Thirteenth Warrior, Ajax the Great in Troilus and Cressida, and blacksmith Joe Gargery in Great Expectations. For his portrayal of a gigantic but gentle ex-coal miner in the acclaimed Margaret's Museum, Russell earned a Canadian Academy Award nomination for best actor. Russell's appetite for acting is as big as he is. Between 1997 and 2001, he completed 24 films in addition to TV and other projects, including such high-profile productions as The Mists of Avalon (TV miniseries), Oliver Twist (TV miniseries), and Oscar and Lucinda. No, he probably won't replace Sean Connery as Scotland's most famous actor. But he certainly deserves recognition as one of Scotland's best actors -- right up there among Connery, Ewan McGregor, Dougray Scott, and Robert Carlyle.Russell first performed before an audience in 1960 on the Shari Lewis Show. But it was not until 1980 that he got his first real acting job -- performing on the London stage as the superintendent in Nobel Prize-winner Dario Fo's satire The Accidental Death of an Anarchist, about police corruption in Italy. The reviews were good, and he reprised that role for television in 1983. After further honing his skills in various British TV productions and a handful of films -- including Jute City, The Power of One, The Hawk, and Seconds Out -- Russell received exposure before international audiences as Caleb Garth in the celebrated BBC miniseries Middlemarch, based on the George Eliot novel of the same name. A year later, he fell in love on the movie screen with Helena Bonham Carter in Margaret's Museum, earning laudatory reviews worldwide. Clive Russell had arrived. After more TV roles and another film, Russell played Ralph Fiennes' father in another critically acclaimed film, Oscar and Lucinda. Growing recognition of his acting skills then brought him plum roles in four major TV miniseries: Great Expectations, Oliver Twist, The Railway Children, and The Mists of Avalon. In the same year that he made Mists, Russell also performed in The Emperor's New Clothes, starring Ian Holm as Napoleon. In 2002, his career reached new heights when he took on a role in a BBC/Columbia Tristar production about a mountain-rescue team in Scotland.

Trivia: Created and performed a one-woman stage show based on the behind-the-scenes life of Judy Garland called Judy Speaks. Appeared as a correspondent on The Daily Show With Jon Stewart and was a regular on the short-lived Comedy Central satire Crossballs. Lead singer for country/indie pop band Cottonhead. Provided her voice for the video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. Portrayed bumbling Dep. Kimball on Reno 911 in 2007. Was a member of the Broadway cast of Hairspray in 2008. Appears in the 2011 George Clooney film The Descendants.

Trivia: Born May 28th, 1977, Elisabeth Hasselbeck was known as Elisabeth Filarski when her bubbly personality caught viewers' attention on the show Survivor in 2001. She'd graduated from Boston College in 1999, where she'd played softball, but her popularity on the reality show focused her career toward the small screen. She nabbed a gig hosting a Style Network show about high fashion on a low budget called The Look for Less, and she stayed with the show for two years. In 2002, Elisabeth married her college sweetheart, professional football player Tim Hasselbeck, and took his name. The next year, she joined the cast of The View, providing a youthful voice for the show's round-table discussions when Lisa Ling left the show. Hasselbeck's conservative political and cultural views frequently clashed with those of co-host Rosie O'Donnell, especially on the topics of terrorism and the war in Iraq. The two became embroiled in many heated debates on the show, fueling rumors that the two feuded off screen as well -- though both denied them.

Trivia: Began modeling at age 14; career took off after winning a Mossimo clothing model-search contest in 1999. Sang in Europe with the Kentucky Ambassadors of Music, a 200-member band and chorus composed of high-school students. Signed with Eileen Ford modeling agency in 2001. Was a series regular on Quintuplets (2004-5), 7th Heaven (2006-7) and The Loop (2007). Starred in the 2006 made-for-MTV volleyball comedy All You've Got.

Trivia: Michigan native Jaime Ray Newman explored her love of performing through many avenues over the years, singing with a jazz band and founding her own theater company in addition to regularly appearing in movies and on TV. Her onscreen career began in 2001, when she landed the role of Kristina Cassadine on the soap opera General Hospital. She stayed with the series until 2003, and subsequently began making guest appearances on numerous TV shows like Bones, Supernatural, Stargate Atlantis, and many more. She also regularly took on a recurring roles on multiple episodes of Veronica Mars, Nip/Tuck, Eureka, and Mental. In the years to come, Newman would find herself appearing on still more shows, like Drop Dead Diva, NCIS, Castle, and CSI: NY.