Trivia: With a rangy handsomeness that makes him look as if he would be equally comfortable branding cattle, Matthew McConaughey found fame shortly after making his screen debut in Richard Linklater's 1993 Dazed and Confused. After being cast in two high-profile 1996 films, Lone Star and A Time to Kill, the actor was soon being hailed as one of the industry's hottest young leading men, inspiring comparisons to such charismatic purveyors of cinematic testosterone as Paul Newman and Tom Cruise.A product of Texas, McConaughey was born in Uvalde on November 4, 1969 and raised in Longview. The son of a substitute teacher and a former member of the Green Bay Packers, he excelled in sports as a high school student and was voted "Most Handsome" by his senior class. After graduating, McConaughey spent some time working in Australia and then returned to the States to attend the University of Texas at Austin. It was there that he met producer and casting director Don Phillips, who introduced him to director Linklater, and, after directing from UT in 1993 with a degree in film production, McConaughey was cast in Dazed and Confused. Although his role as Wooderson, a slacker old enough to know better, was relatively small, McConaughey succeeded in winning a degree of immortality with lines like, "That's what I like about high school girls: I keep getting older, they stay the same age." After Dazed, McConaughey took on a number of supporting roles in films of varying quality, appearing in everything from 1994's Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre to 1995's Boys on the Side, in which he was cast as Drew Barrymore's straight-arrow cop boyfriend. The latter film won him some notice, heightened a year later when he was cast in John Sayles' acclaimed Lone Star. McConaughey made a distinct impression in his small but pivotal role as the town's beloved late sheriff, Buddy Deeds, and was duly given his first leading role in Joel Schumacher's 1996 adaptation of John Grisham's A Time to Kill. Although the film met with lackluster reviews, McConaughey managed to attract favorable attention, holding his own against Samuel L. Jackson, Kevin Spacey, and Sandra Bullock.Finding himself elected to the throne of Hollywood Golden Boy, a status cemented by his appearance on the cover of the August 1996 Vanity Fair, McConaughey paradoxically followed his initial success with a string of small, largely unseen films before landing a starring role as a property lawyer in Amistad, Steven Spielberg's 1997 slave epic. The same year, he also starred in Contact, playing a New Age theologian in Robert Zemeckis' adaptation of Carl Sagan's best-selling novel. After again collaborating with Linklater in 1998 on The Newton Boys, in which he starred alongside Ethan Hawke, Skeet Ulrich, and Vincent D'Onofrio as the remarkably photogenic family of titular robbers, McConaughey banded together with off-screen pal Bullock on her directorial debut, the short Making Sandwiches, the same year. For all the hype surrounding the beginning of his career, by the time he was cast in the lead role of Ron Howard's EdTV, McConaughey had receded somewhat from the public eye, with many critics noting that despite his talent and physical attributes, the actor seemed to have trouble finding roles that would do him justice. But McConaughey's turn as the laid-back everyman who becomes an overnight celebrity when he allows his life to be broadcast on TV proved a relative success, with the actor winning praise for his endearingly dopey performance. The film itself garnered a number of positive reviews and gave a decent box office performance, and by the end of that year, McConaughey had his name attached to a number of projects, including those of his own production company, J.K. Livin'. In October 1999, McConaughey achieved notoriety of a different sort, when he was arrested for resisting transport after the Austin, Texas police responded to noise complaints about his late-night naked bongo-playing; drug charges against him were dropped for lack of a proper warrant.After submerging in a tense struggle to find a German Enigma machine in order to defeat the Nazis in the taut World War II thriller U-571 (2000), McConaughey sweetened things up a bit by co-starring alongside Jennifer Lopez in the romantic comedy The Wedding Planner (2002). A lightweight comedy that did little to further his appeal as an actor of dramatic or comic range, the film nevertheless kept McConaughey in the public eye and once again warmed him to a public unsure how to approach him after numerous rumors of bizarre behavior. McConaughey's performance as a cocky lawyer forced to re-evaluate his quest for happiness after a life-altering experience in 2001's 13 Conversations About One Thing forced critics and audiences to re-evaluate their approach to the eccentric actor, and he would next re-team with U-571 co-star Bill Paxton for the nail-biter sleeper Frailty (2001). In late 2001 and early 2002 the eccentric actor at last received favorable press after coming to the aid of both woman who fainted at the Toronto International Film Festival and a sound man who suffered a seizure during McConaughey's Access Hollywood interview for Reign of Fire (2002), and though the aforementioned film fared only moderately well at the box office, its kindly star seemed to be back in the public's good graces. McConaughey next opted to lighten things up a bit by co-starring alongside Kate Hudson in the romantic comedy How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. In 2005, McConaughey and Al Pacino co-headlined D.J. Caruso's gritty gambling thriller Two for the Money. McConaughey stars as Brandon Lang, a onetime collegiate football hero with a knack for picking winners, who unofficially signs on as the protege - and later the nemesis - of Pacino's seedy high-roller. The film brought in only moderate returns and received mixed reviews from the press, but McConaughey fared substantially better with 2006's romantic comedy Failure to Launch. In the latter, he stars alongside Sex and the City star Sarah Jessica Parker as Tripp, a thirtysomething mama's boy whose parents coax him out of the house by setting him up with dreamgirl Paula (Parker). The film shot up to become the primo box office draw on its opening weekend and did incredible business thereafter. McConaughey would spend the 2000's enjoying leading man status, with memorable roels in We Are Marshall, Fool's Gold, Tropic Thunder, and Magic Mike.

Trivia: Is from Baltimore, Maryland.Landed his debut role of Richard Wershe Jr. in the 2018 crime drama White Boy Rick despite having no prior acting experience.Along with winning over the White Boy Rick producers in his audition, he was said to be a good choice for the title role due to having the same socio-economic background as the real-life Wershe, and also grew up as a white kid in an urban environment.

Trivia: Was born to a British father and a Jewish mother. Was talent-spotted at the age of 12 at a youth theatre. First appeared on stage in the West End show Tusk Tusk in 2009. Joined a protest against raising university fees in 2010. Had a place at the University of Manchester, to study History and Politics, in 2011, but decided to accept a role in Arcadia on Broadway instead. Filmed an audition tape in London to send to director Marielle Heller for her part in 2015 film The Diary of a Teenage Girl, which included a personal plea to be in the film. Won the award for Breakthrough Performer at the Hamptons International Film Festival in 2015 for her role as Princess Margaret in A Royal Night Out. Won the award for Best Actress at the Gotham Independent Film Awards for her role as Minnie in The Diary of a Teenage Girl, and the award for Rising Star at the Niagara Integrated Film Festival for the same role in 2015.

Trivia: A professional actor since the age of nine, Jennifer Jason Leigh earned her Screen Actors Guild card at 16 and dropped out of high school to study at the Lee Strasberg Institute and star in seedy made-for-TV movies. Born to actor Vic Morrow and writer/actress Barbara Turner in Hollywood, CA, Jennifer picked up the middle name Jason from family friend Jason Robards Jr. Throughout her career, she has made a name for herself portraying helpless, damaged, or mentally unsound characters, often performing at a higher level than the material. Also known for extensively researching her roles, Leigh dropped down to less than 90 pounds for one of her first features as an anorexic teenager in the TV-movie The Best Little Girl in the World. Never one to shy away from touchy subject matter, her breakthrough role came in 1982 as the naïve high school girl who gets an abortion in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. After a decade of developing a repertoire of various troubled characters, she was nominated for two Critics Circle awards in 1990 for playing prostitutes in both Miami Blues and Last Exit to Brooklyn. She would continue to play vulnerable characters in dangerous situations as the rookie narcotics officer-turned-drug addict in Rush. This was followed by her notorious role as the psycho roommate Hedra who tries to steal the identity of her roommate (Bridget Fonda) in Single White Female. She played a phone sex worker in the ensemble film Short Cuts, her first of three projects involving director Robert Altman. Leigh occasionally stepped out of her down-and-out roles, and in 1994 she shined as Amy Archer in The Hudsucker Proxy. Her comic turn as a plucky undercover journalist was said to recall the work of legendary actresses like Katharine Hepburn and Barbara Stanwyck. She delivered critically acclaimed performances in her next two films, with a Golden Globe nomination for Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle and an Independent Spirit nomination for Georgia. After playing an angry daughter in Dolores Claiborne, a spitfire kidnapper in Kansas City, and a domestic violence survivor in Bastard out of Carolina, she took another dramatic turn toward a period film. In Agnieszka Holland's Washington Square, Leigh proved her range by portraying a shy, clumsy girl as she evolves into adulthood. She returned to more showy roles for two films dealing with Shakespeare's King Lear: A Thousand Acres with Jason Robards Jr. and the fourth Dogme 95 film, The King Is Alive. Not limiting herself to dramas, Leigh appeared as an isolated computer programmer in David Cronenberg's thriller eXistenZ and as an over-the-top mom in the comedy Skipped Parts. Around that time, she also appeared on-stage in Broadway and off-Broadway plays, most notably as dancer Sally Bowles in Cabaret. Testing out new ground in 2001, she and fellow Cabaret star Alan Cumming wrote, directed, and starred in the ensemble comedy The Anniversary Party, a digital video project inspired by Dogme 95. Continuing to evolve as a respected actress, she went on to work in the crime genre, first as a hitman's wife in Road to Perdition, and then in Jane Campion's thriller In the Cut. In the several years to come, Leigh would remain an active force on screen, appearing most memorably in films like Margot at the Wedding, Synecdoche, New York, and on the series Weeds. After several years of quiet films, she made a splash in 2015 with two very different movies - the stop-motion film Anomalisa (directed by Charlie Kaufman and Duke Johnson) and The Hateful Eight, a western homage by Quentin Tarantino. Leigh nabbed an Oscar nomination for her work The Hateful Eight, the first in her career.

Trivia: Played the baritone and mellophone horn in his high school marching band. Got into acting during sophomore year of college after auditioning for the play Joe Turner's Come and Gone on a whim and landing the lead role. Planned to move to Washington D.C. and work in home security after graduation, before being persuaded to audition for the Yale School of Drama. Became friends with Sterling K. Brown when the pair were playing drag queens in Tarell Alvin McCraney's Wig Out at the Sundance Theatre Lab in 2007. Was part of the original Broadway cast of The Book Of Mormon.

Trivia: Supporting actor Rory Cochrane made his film debut with a small role in James Dearden's A Kiss Before Dying (1991). Prior to that, while still enrolled at New York City's LaGuardia High School, he had appeared in the CBS television docudrama Saturday Night With Connie Chung (1989); he then appeared in an episode of the ABC series H.E.L.P. (1990). Cochrane has subsequently earned recognition for playing memorable character roles in independent features. He is best known for playing the constantly zoned-out teenaged stoner Slater in Richard Linklater's ode to adolescence in the 1970s, Dazed and Confused (1993). Other notable roles include a turn as a troubled teen wrangling with a dysfunctional father (Jeff Goldblum) in Fathers and Sons (1992) and Cochrane's multilayered and funny portrayal of a paranoid, gun-loving biker in Love and a .45 (1994). Cochrane continued to work steadily in little-seen independent films like Empire Records, and The Low Life. He did have a major role in James Toback's confrontational Black and White. He appeared in Hats's War opposite fellow Dazed and Confused alum Cole Hauser. Cochrane scored a role on the CSI spin-off CSI: Miami, but his character was killed off. In 2006 Cochrane would be cast again by Richard Linklater in his adaptation of A Scanner Darkly. Cochrane would remain active on screen as the years rolled on, apperaing in movies like Public Enemies and on shows like The Company, CSI: Miami, and 24.

Trivia: Is the youngest of three siblings. Started a dance time with his brother when he was 12. Family relocated from Florida to Los Angeles in 2013 so that he pursue an acting career. Experienced a growth spurt while filming 2017's Power Rangers which would cause complications with his suit.

Trivia: Bruce MacLeish Dern is the scion of a distinguished family of politicians and men of letters that includes his uncle, the distinguished poet/playwright Archibald MacLeish. After a prestigious education at New Trier High and Choate Preparatory, Dern enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania, only to drop out abruptly in favor of Lee Strasberg's Actors' Studio. With his phlegmatic voice and schoolyard-bully countenance, he was not considered a likely candidate for stardom, and was often treated derisively by his fellow students. In 1958, he made his first Broadway appearance in A Touch of the Poet. Two years later, he was hired by director Elia Kazan to play a bit role in the 20th Century Fox production Wild River. He was a bit more prominent on TV, appearing regularly as E.J. Stocker in the contemporary Western series Stoney Burke. A favorite of Alfred Hitchcock, Dern was prominently cast in a handful of the director's TV-anthology episodes, and as the unfortunate sailor in the flashback sequences of the feature film Marnie (1964). During this period, Dern played as many victims as victimizers; he was just as memorable being hacked to death by Victor Buono in Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1965) as he was while attempting to rape Linda Evans on TV's The Big Valley. Through the auspices of his close friend Jack Nicholson, Dern showed up in several Roger Corman productions of the mid-'60s, reaching a high point as Peter Fonda's "guide" through LSD-land in The Trip (1967). The actor's ever-increasing fan following amongst disenfranchised younger filmgoers shot up dramatically when he gunned down Establishment icon John Wayne in The Cowboys (1971). After scoring a critical hit with his supporting part in They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969), Dern began attaining leading roles in such films as Silent Running (1971), The King of Marvin Gardens (1972), The Great Gatsby (1974), and Smile (1975). In 1976, he returned to the Hitchcock fold, this time with top billing, in Family Plot. Previously honored with a National Society of Film Critics award for his work in the Jack Nicholson-directed Drive, He Said (1970), Dern received an Academy Award nomination for his portrayal of an unhinged Vietnam veteran in Coming Home (1978), in which he co-starred with one-time Actors' Studio colleague (and former classroom tormentor) Jane Fonda. He followed this triumph with a return to Broadway in the 1979 production Strangers. In 1982, Dern won the Berlin Film Festival Best Actor prize for That Championship Season. He then devoted several years to stage and TV work, returning to features in the strenuous role of a middle-aged long distance runner in On the Edge (1986).After a humorous turn in the 1989 Tom Hanks comedy The 'Burbs, Dern dropped beneath the radar for much of the '90s. He would appear in cult favorites like Mulholland Falls and the Walter Hill Yojimbo re-make Last Man Standing (both 1996), as well as The Haunting (1999) and All the Pretty Horses (2000). As the 2000's unfolded, Dern would continue to act, apperaing most notably in film like Monster and Django Unchained.Formerly married to actress Diane Ladd, Bruce Dern is the father of actress Laura Dern.

Trivia: Was raised in Dallas, Texas, after moving there with his mother and siblings when he was 5.Grew up in a military household, he and his brother are the only men in his family's generation to haven't served in the armed forces.Attended an alternative education program, where he discovered acting, after an altercation with a classmate and a teacher at his public school.Lived in his car for awhile after being kicked out of his home due to his problematic behavior.Spike Lee offered him the role of David in his film Da 5 Bloods (2020) after a meeting in his office in Brooklyn.In 2020, quarantined in Santa Fe, New Mexico, during the COVID-19 pandemic after the production of The Harder They Fall was stalled.

Trivia: Signed by Universal in 1950, the perky, redheaded Piper Laurie (born Rosetta Jacobs) was a welcome presence in many a musical, situation comedy and costume drama. In later years, she tended to dismiss her ingenue years, noting that she spent most of her time posing for cheesecake layouts. Thanks in great part to her devastating performance as an alcoholic in the 1958 Playhouse 90 TV drama "The Days of Wine and Roses", Laurie completely altered her cuddly image, reinventing herself as a powerful dramatic actress. She earned an Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Paul Newman's neurotic girlfriend in The Hustler (1961), then suddenly retired from acting upon her marriage to movie critic Joseph Morganstern. She made a brilliant return to films with another Oscar-nominated performance, this time as Sissy Spacek's religious fanatic mother in Carrie (1976). Ten years and several topnotch performances later, she was honored with a third Oscar nomination for Children of a Lesser God (1986). Laurie's television work has included a co-starring assignment opposite a very young Mel Gibson in the superb Australian TV movie Tim (1979) and an Emmy-nominated stint on David Lynch's 1990 "cult" series Twin Peaks. Working only when the spirit moves her in recent years, Piper Laurie has been seen in such prestige productions as Wrestling Ernest Hemingway (1993) and White Man's Burden (1995).

Trivia: Has been dancing since she was 2 and has trained at Venice's Katnap Dance Center, Westside Ballet Academy, and the Kirov Academy of Ballet.Began studying under celebrity choreographer Debbie Allen in 2001, and after auditioning for Allen's production of Pearl, she was featured in every musical presented by the troupe from 2001 to 2009.Became a Los Angeles Laker Girl in 2010, and left the professional cheerleading squad after three months to concentrate on her acting career.First major television role is Ahsha Hayes in the VH1 hit sports drama series Hit the Floor.

Trivia: A prolific character actor in his native Britain, Eddie Marsan specialized in challenging and provocative roles, in slightly tough and edgy projects that often took advantage of his unique, immediately identifiable countenance. After debuting as a bit player and guest star in English television series including Casualty, Game On, and The Bill, Marsan took one of his premier big-screen bows in Michael Radford's crime thriller B. Monkey (1998), then effectively played one of Tammany Hall's minions opposite Daniel Day-Lewis and Leonardo DiCaprio in Martin Scorsese's period crime epic Gangs of New York (2002). On a much different note, Marsan subsequently teamed up with English cause célèbre director Mike Leigh in the abortion-themed character study Vera Drake (2004) -- in which the actor ushered in a partly improvised portrayal of a kindly road worker who romances the title character's daughter. Drake brought Marsan an upsurge of attention, and thereafter, assignments rolled in quickly and furiously from both sides of the Atlantic. These included supporting roles in Isabel Coixet's gentle, atmospheric drama The Secret Life of Words, Neil Burger's period supernatural drama The Illusionist, and the mega-budgeted action extravaganza Mission: Impossible III. 2008 marked a busy period for Marsan; that year, he both tackled a supporting part opposite Will Smith and Charlize Theron in the superhero comedy Hancock, and -- on a much-anticipated note -- re-teamed with Mike Leigh for a prominent role as an angsty teacher in the slice-of-life comedy Happy-Go-Lucky.