Trivia: Actor Billy Zane kicked off his stage career in his hometown of Chicago. Able to harness his spoiled-brat countenance and quirky gestures to invoke either sympathy or repulsion, Zane has been seen principally in secondary roles in such films as Back to the Future (1985), Memphis Belle (1990), Orlando (1992), and Posse (1993). His most flamboyant role was as the young drifter who -- obvious to everyone but the hero and heroine -- is not what he seems in the Australian thriller Dead Calm (1989). Zane had a rare starring role in the filmization of the once popular comic strip The Phantom (1996), in which he showed off his lithe, muscular physique in a form-fitting purple body suit and performed many of the stylish film's daring stunts himself. The following year he had a lead role in the most successful film of his career, playing Kate Winslet's vile fiancé in Titanic. Zane is the younger brother of film and TV actress Lisa Zane.

Trivia: If you're a fan of movies, you've no doubt seen William Sadler's face countless times. With a versatile career that has spanned from long-haired, small-town rock star to banjo-plucking entertainer to Shakespearean actor to his role as Death in Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey (1991), William Sadler attacks all roles with equal gusto with his characters never ceasing to leave an impression on viewers, even if they can't recall the name of "that guy in that movie."Born in April of 1950 in Buffalo, NY, Sadler's imagination was fueled from a young age on his family's sprawling farm where he would pass the time with friends reenacting scenes from their favorite television and radio programs. Around the age of eight, Sadler's father's interest in music sparked a passion in the young boy as well with his father's gift of a ukulele. The two frequently performed at family functions together: Sadler Sr. on the guitar and Jr. on the uke. Later taking interest in a number of stringed instruments, after following in his father's footsteps and taking up the guitar, Sadler quickly learned that the mystique of the musician's life was difficult to resist. Forming a cover band with his Orchard Park High schoolmates, he began to gain popularity and a surprising amount of attention from the opposite sex. Armed with a banjo and a fistful of jokes, Sadler soon took on the persona of "Banjo Bill Sadler" for the school's annual variety show, and the result was an instant success. The students and teachers loved the performance, and English teacher Dan Larkin soon persuaded Sadler to audition for a role in Harvey, the senior play. Winning the lead and igniting a fire within the young performer, Sadler would soon follow his dreams and enroll in the drama program at State University College in Geneseo, NY. After spending two intense years in Cornell University's Fine Arts following his tenure at State University College, Sadler was finally prepared to be humbled in the grueling trials of the aspiring actor.Sadler took his first post-school role in Florida and soon relocated to Boston, moving in with his sister while scrubbing the floors of a lobster boat by day and cutting his acting chops at night. Slowly working up the nerve to take a shot at the big time in New York, a chance meeting with an old schoolmate on a trip into the city resulted in Sadler's casting in an off-off-Broadway production of Chekhov's Ivanov. After a brief turn at the Trinity Square Repertory Company in Providence, RI, Sadler moved back to New York and rented an apartment in the East Village, beginning a grueling 12 years in which he appeared in over 75 productions. It was here that Sadler would meet Marni Bakst, the woman who would soon become his wife, and a young actor named Matthew Broderick, in a Broadway production of Neil Simon's Biloxi Blues, who would kick-start Sadler's film career with a role in Project X (1987).After memorable turns in such films as Die Hard 2 (1990), Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey, and The Shawshank Redemption (1994), Sadler found himself becoming one of the most sought-after character actors working in Hollywood. His friendly demeanor and warm sense of humor standing in stark contrast to his usually villainous onscreen antics, Sadler has gained a reputation among actors as a helpful and good-natured craftsman, always willing to offer advise and assistance without being pushy or overbearing. Increasingly busy in both television and films in the latter '90s, Sadler gained widespread recognition with his film roles in Disturbing Behavior (1998) and The Green Mile (1999) and on television with his role as Sheriff Jim Valenti on Roswell.

Trivia: Standing merely five feet tall, Jada Pinkett Smith is known for her high-energy charm, receiving attention for the spunky role she played in her friend Keenan Ivory Wayans' Low Down Dirty Shame in 1994. She was born on September 18, 1971, in Baltimore, MD, where she grew up and went on to study dance at Baltimore School for the Arts. She then attended North Carolina School of Arts, but dropped out when Wayans found her an agent to launch her acting career.Real notice came when she worked on Bill Cosby's series A Different World starting in 1991. Thereafter she appeared in several films including her more serious roles as the single mother in Menace II Society and the girlfriend in Jason's Lyric (1994). Eddie Murphy's 1996 rendition of The Nutty Professor brought her back to comedy, and the extensive hype around the film allowed her fame to swell. In 1997, she married fellow actor (and former rap star) Will Smith; the following year, she appeared in Woo and Return to Paradise, and gave birth to son Jadan. Pinkett Smith made a cameo in Spike Lee's Bamboozled in 2000, and then returned to a serious lead role in Doug McHenry's Kingdom Come (2001) with Whoopi Goldberg, which was shot while she was pregnant with daughter Willow.Her film career later ramping up with roles in the two Matrix sequels, the Tom Cruise thriller Collateral, and with vocal work in the Madagascar series, Pinkett Smith made the leap to television as a compassion head of nursing on TNT's Hawthorne, which debuted in 2009 and ran for three seasons. An ardent supporter of Barack Obama, Pinkett Smith also fronts the heavy metal band Wicked Wisdom, which released their first CD in 2006, and performed on the Ozzfest tour in 2009.

Trivia: Born in Guyana on December 25, 1952, actress CCH Pounder made her first film appearance as a nurse in Bob Fosse's All That Jazz (1979). Pounder went on to play a small part in Prizzi's Honor before her first big role as truckstop owner Brenda in Bagdad Cafe. Her first TV-series assignment was as husband-murderer Dawn Murphy in the short-lived FOX sitcom Women in Prison. Many dramatic TV movies followed, including Leap of Faith, Third Degree Burn, Murder in Mississippi, and the two-part CBS miniseries Common Ground. On the big screen, she had supporting parts in Postcards From the Edge, Kurt Baker's version of The Importance of Being Earnest, and the romantic comedy Benny & Joon. After appearing in Sliver and Robocop 3, she returned to television for the role of Dr. Angela Hicks on ER, earning her an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress. She left the show in 1997 and went on to countless TV movies (Final Justice, Netforce, A Touch of Hope, just to name a few), as well as a couple feature films (Face/Off, End of Days) and TV miniseries (House of Frankenstein, To Serve and Protect). In 2001, she narrated the PBS documentary series Race: The Power of an Illusion and played a judge in Allison Anders' independent drama Things Behind the Sun. In 2002, she was back on television as Detective Claudette Wynn on the FOX police drama The Shield.Pounder continued to work on The Shield until the series concluded in 2007, and was nominated for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series by the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for her role as Detective Wynn. The actress appeared in 2009's psychological horror The Orphan, and voiced Mo'at, the spiritual leader of the Omaticaya clan, in James Cameron's mega-blockbuster Avatar the same year. 2009 would prove a rewarding year for Pounder, as her guest appearances on the BBC/HBO series No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency would earn her an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series.

Trivia: Bakke is a lead actress onscreen from the late '80s.

Trivia: Large and muscular at an early age, American actor Dick Miller entered the Navy during World War II while still a teenager, distinguishing himself as a boxer. He attended CCNY, Columbia University and New York University, supporting himself with semi-pro football jobs, radio DJ gigs and as a psychological assistant at Bellevue. At age 22, he was host of a Manhattan-based TV chat show, Midnight Snack. Stage and movie work followed, and Miller joined the stock company/entourage of low-budget auteur Roger Corman. His first great Corman role was as the hyperthyroid salesman in Not of this Earth (1956); a handful of rock-and-roll quickies followed before Miller received his first sci-fi lead in War of the Satellites (1958). In Corman's Bucket of Blood (1959), Miller originated the role of Walter Paisley, the nebbishy sociopath who "creates" avant-garde sculpture by murdering his subjects and dipping them in plaster. He was then cast in the immortal Little Shop of Horrors (1960); Miller not only makes a terrific entrance by buying a bouquet of flowers and then eating them, but also narrates the picture. Miller stayed with Corman into the 1970s, at which time the director was in charge of New World Pictures. Seldom making a liveable income in films, Miller remained an unknown entity so far as the "big" studios were concerned -- but his teenaged fans were legion, and he was besieged on the streets and in public places for autographs. When the adolescent science-fiction fans of the 1950s became the directors of the 1980s, Miller began receiving some of the best roles of his career. In Joe Dante's Gremlins (1984), Miller was paired with his Little Shop costar Jackie Joseph, as a rural couple whose house is bulldozed by a group of hostile gremlins. Miller and Joseph returned in the sequel Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1989), in which the actor heroically helped squash the gremlins' invasion of New York. Miller's most Pirandellian role was as the "decency league" activist in Matinee (1993) who is actually an actor in the employ of William Castle-like showman John Goodman. Directed again by longtime Miller fan Dante, Matinee contains a wonderful "in" joke wherein Miller is identified as a fraud via his photograph in a Famous Monsters of Filmland-type fanzine -- the very sort of publication which canonized Miller throughout the 1970s.

Trivia: By the time actor Thomas Haden Church earned an Oscar nomination for his unforgettable supporting role as a womanizing, has-been actor heading out on one last fling before tying the knot in director Alexander Payne's critically acclaimed road drama Sideways (2004), many film and television viewers may have assumed (and not without merit) that the former Wings star had all but abandoned his career in front of the cameras. It had, after all, been nearly a decade since Church had endeared himself to television viewers as lovably dunderheaded mechanic Lowell Mather on the aforementioned hit television series, and though he did remain fairly active onscreen after Wings went off the air in 1995, his career took something of a back seat to his familial commitments and life on his Texas cattle ranch. Coupled with a conscious decision to move away from acting and try his talents behind the camera, Church's fading devotion to acting still made his nomination at the 2005 Oscars feel like something of a comeback even though he had remained fairly active in show business all along. A Texas native whose early career included a stint as a radio disc jockey and voice-over announcer, Church first got a taste for acting with an appearance in the independent feature Gypsy Angels, and a move to Los Angeles followed shortly thereafter. It didn't take long for the handsome, young aspiring actor to land his defining role in Wings, and aside from supporting roles in the features Tombstone and Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight, it was his role in Wings and the subsequent television series Ned and Stacey for which he was best remembered for some time. Following the cancellation of Ned and Stacey, Church turned his attention primarily to feature films with supporting roles in One Night Stand, 3000 Miles to Graceland, Monkeybone, and Lone Star State of Mind serving to at least pay the bills. Dejected by a somewhat stifled acting career and determined to spend more time with his wife and children, Church opted to step behind the scenes to write and direct the independent comedy Rolling Kansas. A lighthearted road movie concerning a trio of brothers' quest to find a seemingly-mythical marijuana field in the sprawling plains of Kansas, Rolling Kansas made a brief appearance at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival before making its debut on Comedy Central the following year. Just when it seemed that the rest of Church's onscreen career may have been relegated to appearances in George of the Jungle sequels, acclaimed independent filmmaker Payne had recalled his auditions for his previous two films, Election and About Schmidt. Though Church hadn't quite made the cut on either of those films, Payne had taken note of his talent and thought the former Wings star the perfect candidate to play a formerly popular television star and down-on-his-luck actor having trouble adjusting to the prospect of marriage in Payne's upcoming comedy drama Sideways. Cast opposite American Splendor's Paul Giamatti, Church's alternately desperate and sad performance proved the heart of the film many considered to be the year's -- not to mention director Payne's -- best. The movie earned Church an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He followed up that success with appearances in the comedy Idiocracy and the western Broken Trail opposite Robert Duvall. In 2007 he was cast as one of the two-villains in Spider-Man 3, and the year after that he starred in the biting drama Smart People. His deep, recognizable voice led him to voiceover work in a variety of projects such as Aliens in the Attic, Charlotte's Web, and Over the Hedge. In 2010 he had a part in the sleeper hit Easy A, and he played Matt Damon's brother in Cameron Crowe's We Bought a Zoo. In 2012 he was cast in the Disney flop John Carter.

Trivia: One was always reminded of a startled chipmunk when viewing the work of American actor John Schuck. After theatre and improv-comedy work, Schuck was cast as Painless Pole in the irreverent Robert Altman comedy M*A*S*H (1970). Midway through the film, Schuck's character contemplates killing himself, which segues into the film's famous "Last Supper" sequence and a full rendition of the M*A*S*H theme song Suicide is Painless. Schuck appeared in a few other Altman projects, then in 1971 was hired for the role of Sgt. Charles Enright on the TV series McMillan and Wife. Enright's function was to keep the plot wheels turning while stars Rock Hudson and Susan St. James battled for the best camera angles. Schuck left McMillan and Wife in 1975 to play a robot cop (that's what we said) in the short-lived Holmes and Yoyo. Later, equally brief TV series assignments of John Schuck included Turnabout (1979) and The New Odd Couple (1982); there was also a more widely seen performance as Ordell in the groundbreaking miniseries Roots (1977).

Trivia: American Indian supporting and lead actor Gary Farmer first appeared onscreen in the late '80s. He is probably best known for his co-starring role as affable Indian activist Philbert in Powwow Highway (1989). In 1995 he co-starred with Johnny Depp as sapient Indian mystic Nobody in Dead Man.

Trivia: Lead actress, onscreen from the late '80s.

Trivia: Made her screen debut in a music video for "Good Vibrations" by Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch. Major breakthrough role was as Jordan Tate, Baywatch's first African-American cast member (and was based on real-life lifeguard Ingrid Walters). Has appeared on four separate reality shows: The Surreal Life, Celebrity Big Brother, Surreal Life: Fame Games, and Gimme My Reality Show! A decade after starring on Baywatch with David Hasselhoff, she participated in Comedy Central's Roast of David Hasselhoff. Is a long-time member of PETA, and participated in their "I'd Rather Be Naked Than Wear Fur" promotional campaign.

Trivia: American actor John Larroquette began gaining public attention as a disc jockey. For several years, he paid the bills with TV and movie voiceovers, notably as the (uncredited) narrator of Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974). Larroquette started getting on-camera assignments in the mid 1970s, making his network TV bow in the role of Dr. Paul Herman in the prime time weekly Doctors' Hospital (1975-76); this was followed by a two-year stint as Robert Anderson on the Robert Conrad TV vehicle Black Sheep Squadron (1976-78). From 1984 through 1992, Larroquette portrayed assistant DA and self-styled ladies man Dan Fielding on the popular sitcom Night Court, a role which won him four Emmy awards. In 1994, the actor starred in his own series, The John Larroquette Show, playing an erudite recovering alcoholic who manages a St. Louis bus depot.His film career never quite matched the success he found on the small- screen, but he had small parts in The Twilight Zone Movie and Choose Me before he reached the height of his Night Court Fame. He was a friend to Bruce Willis in the Blake Edwards comedy Blind Date and appeared opposite his fellow NBC sitcom star Kirstie Alley in the flop Madhouse. He was one o the adult leads in the 1994 version of Richie Rich. As the '90s came to a close he returned to the small-screen in Payne, an attempt to update the classic British series Fawlty Towers. As the new century began, Larroquete could be seen in The 10th Kingdom, and a few years later he lent his voice as the narrator of the remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - just as he did for the original thirty years before. He appeared in diverse projects such as Beethoven's 5th, and the 2006 Southland Tales. He scored a recurring role for a couple of seasons on Boston Legal.