Trivia: The celebrated "pin-up girl" of World War II, American actress Betty Grable was the daughter of a stockbroker and an aggressive "stage mother." When her older sister Marjorie balked at a show business career, Grable was taken in hand by her mother and trained to sing, dance, tell jokes and play the ukulele and saxophone. Despite her father's objections, Grable begged her mother to take her to Los Angeles for a movie career, preparing herself with a two-girl musical act while attending Hollywood Professional School. Lying about her age, 13-year-old Grable was hired as a chorus girl for short subjects, getting her first important exposure as the energetic blonde "cowgirl" who sings the first chorus of the first song in the Eddie Cantor film musical Whoopee! (1930). Grable played supporting parts in two-reelers and bits in features for the next couple of years, attaining her first major role in Hold 'Em Jail (1932), a comedy starring the comedy team of Wheeler and Woolsey. Bert Wheeler had promised Grable's mother several years earlier that he'd get the girl a break in pictures if she came to Hollywood, and with this film, Wheeler kept his word. More bits and indifferent supporting roles followed until Grable was signed by Paramount, who loaned her to 20th Century-Fox for Pigskin Parade (1936), which established her with the public. Grable finally landed top billing in Paramount's Million Dollar Legs (1939)--the title referred not to the star but to a college athletic team--which co-starred her first husband, Jackie Coogan. Grable's career stalled at Paramount, but a Broadway appearance in the Cole Porter musical DuBarry Was a Lady led to a contract with 20th Century-Fox, where she remained a number-one box-office attraction from 1940 through 1955. Fox wisely allowed Grable to shed her "college co-ed" image for a more salable screen persona as a wholesomely sexy musical comedy star, emphasizing her greatest attributes: her shapely figure and shapelier legs. After a misfire attempt at heavy dramatics in I Wake Up Screaming (1941), Grable insisted that she be required only to sing and dance, not act, and Fox complied with a string of nonsensical but lavish Technicolor musicals. Grable was enormously popular with American GIs during the war, most of this popularity resting on her famous "pin-up" picture in which, dressed in a one-piece bathing suit and with her back to the camera, Grable glanced saucily over one shoulder. This rear-view image was borne not out of a desire to titillate but from necessity: she was several months pregnant when the picture was taken! Grable furthered her acceptance with the overseas troops when she married trumpeter-bandleader Harry James in 1943. Her popularity undimmed by war's end, Grable continued making Technicolor frolics, though her frequent tiffs with the Fox executives led the studio to try out any number of potential replacements, including Vivian Blaine, June Haver, and even Marilyn Monroe. A few miscalculated breakaways from her accepted screen image--Mother Wore Tights (1947), The Beautiful Blonde From Bashful Bend (1949) and The Shocking Miss Pilgrim (1949)--hurt Grable's box-office status, even though these films hold up better than some of her wartime hits. Free-lancing after her last film, the lackluster How to Be Very, Very Popular (1955), Grable inadvertently offended producer Sam Goldwyn, thereby losing out on the chance of playing the plum role of Adelaide in Goldwyn's Guys and Dolls (1955); this and a few disappointing TV appearances prompted the actress into semi-retirement, save for a few nightclub appearances. After divorcing Harry James in 1965, Grable made a triumphal return to Broadway as Carol Channing's replacement in Hello, Dolly. Her later foray into musical comedy, Belle Starr, was less satisfying, closing its London run after two weeks. Shortly before her death, Grable appeared in advertisements for a number of low-calorie food products, her alluring figure and beautiful "gams" belying her age.

Trivia: Rugged, handsome, stalwart, taciturn leading man George Montgomery (born George Montgomery Letz) began appearing under his given name in low-budget films as an extra, stuntman, and bit player in 1935. He changed his name in 1940 when he began getting lead roles, going on to a busy screen career primarily in westerns and action films. For a time Montgomery was very popular, receiving much publicity for his offscreen romances with such stars as Ginger Rogers, Hedy Lamarr, and Dinah Shore; he and Shore were married from 1943-62. Service in World War II interrupted his career, and after the war he was assigned mostly to minor productions. He starred in the late '50s TV series Cimarron City. In the early '60s Montgomery directed, produced, and wrote several low-budget action films shot in the Philippines. He was rarely onscreen after 1970.

Trivia: Born in New York City to parents of Cuban extraction, American actor Cesar Romero studied for his craft at Collegiate and Riverdale Country schools. After a brief career as a ballroom dancer, the tall, sleekly handsome Romero made his Broadway debut in the 1927 production Lady Do. He received several Hollywood offers after his appearance in the Preston Sturges play Strictly Dishonorable, but didn't step before the cameras until 1933 for his first film The Shadow Laughs (later biographies would claim that Romero's movie bow was in The Thin Man [1934], in which he was typecast as a callow gigolo). Long associated with 20th Century-Fox, Romero occasionally cashed in on his heritage to play Latin Lover types, but was more at home with characters of indeterminate nationalities, usually playing breezily comic second leads (whenever Romero received third billing, chances were he wasn't going to get the girl). Cheerfully plunging into the Hollywood social scene, Romero became one of the community's most eligible bachelors; while linked romantically with many top female stars, he chose never to marry, insisting to his dying day that he had no regrets over his confirmed bachelorhood. While he played a variety of film roles, Romero is best remembered as "The Cisco Kid" in a brief series of Fox programmers filmed between 1939 and 1940, though in truth his was a surprisingly humorless, sullen Cisco, with little of the rogueish charm that Duncan Renaldo brought to the role on television. The actor's favorite movie role, and indeed one of his best performances, was as Cortez in the 1947 20th Century-Fox spectacular The Captain From Castile. When his Fox contract ended in 1950, Romero was wealthy enough to retire, but the acting bug had never left his system; he continued to star throughout the 1950s in cheap B pictures, always giving his best no matter how seedy his surroundings. In 1953 Romero starred in a 39-week TV espionage series "Passport to Danger," which he cheerfully admitted to taking on because of a fat profits-percentage deal. TV fans of the 1960s most closely associate Romero with the role of the white-faced "Joker" on the "Batman" series. While Romero was willing to shed his inhibitions in this villainous characterization, he refused to shave his trademark moustache, compelling the makeup folks to slap the clown white over the 'stache as well (you can still see the outline in the closeups). As elegant and affluent-looking as ever, Romero signed on for the recurring role of Peter Stavros in the late-1980s nighttime soap opera "Falcon Crest." In the early 1990s, he showed up as host of a series of classic 1940s romantic films on cable's American Movie Classics. Romero died of a blood clot on New Year's Day, 1994, at the age of 86.

Trivia: Born with show business in his blood, Charles Winninger was nine years old when he joined his parents' vaudeville act, the Winninger Family Novelty Company. The troupe appeared at the Chicago World's Fair of 1893, then spent the next sixteen years touring the provinces. Going out as a "single" in 1909, Winninger trod the boards as a monologist, dialectician, singer, dancer, dramatic actor and master of ceremonies. He made his Broadway debut as a German comic in 1912's Yankee Girl Company. Three years later, he launched his film career at the L-KO comedy studios. The character-actor phase of his Hollywood years began in 1924, though at the time he was still more committed to the stage than film. In 1927, he scored one of his biggest Broadway successes as Cap'n Andy in Showboat, a role he repeated with gusto in the 1936 film version. Except for occasional Dutch-comic turns in such films as Soup to Nuts (1930) and Friendly Enemies (1945) Winninger was generally seen in talkies in "foxy papa" or roguish-reprobate roles. His own favorite screen part was Deanna Durbin's roving-eyed millionaire father in Three Smart Girls (1936) and its three sequels. Winninger's performance as the drink-sodden, grudge-bearing general practitioner in Nothing Sacred (1937) is perhaps his finest cinematic hour, with his portrayal of Iowa farmer Abel Frake in State Fair (1945) running a close second. Usually billed at the top of the supporting cast list, Winninger was afforded a rare starring role as Judge Priest in John Ford's wonderful The Sun Shines Bright (1953). On TV, Winninger co-starred in the 1956 sitcom The Charles Farrell Show as Farrell's dad, and guested as Fred Mertz' down-and-out vaudeville partner in the "Mertz and Kurtz" episode of I Love Lucy. Charles Winninger was at one time married to Broadway favorite Blanche Ring, meaning that he was briefly the brother-in-law of silent screen star Thomas Meighan and comedienne Charlotte Greenwood.

Trivia: Growing up in the squalid Brownsville section of Brooklyn, Phil Silvers used his excellent tenor voice and facility for cracking jokes to escape a life of poverty. He was discovered as a young teen by vaudevillian Gus Edwards who hired him to perform in his schoolroom act. Silvers' singing career ended when his voice changed at 16, whereupon he took acting jobs in various touring vaudeville sketches. During his subsequent years in burlesque, he befriended fellow comic Herbie Faye, with whom he would work off and on for the rest of his career. While headlining in burlesque, Silvers was signed to star in the 1939 Broadway musical comedy Yokel Boy. This led to film work, first in minor roles, then as comedy relief in such splashy 1940s musicals as Coney Island (1943) and Cover Girl (1944). Silvers became popular if not world famous with his trademark shifty grin, horn-rimmed glasses, balding pate, and catchphrases like "Gladda see ya!" He returned to Broadway in 1947, where he starred as a turn-of-the-century con man in the Jule Styne-Sammy Cahn musical High Button Shoes. In 1950, he scored another stage success as a Milton Berle-like TV comedian in Top Banana, which won him the Tony and Donaldson Awards. From 1955 through 1959, Silvers starred as the wheeling-dealing Sgt. Ernie Bilko on the hit TV series You'll Never Get Rich, for which he collected five Emmy awards. Upon the demise of this series, Silvers stepped into another success, the 1960 Styne-Comden-Green Broadway musical Do Re Mi. The failure of his 1963 sitcom The New Phil Silvers Show marked a low point in his career, but the ever scrappy Silvers bounced back again to appear in films and TV specials. In 1971, he starred in a revival of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (nine years after turning down the original 1962 production because he felt the show "wouldn't go anywhere."). He collected yet another Tony for his efforts -- then suffered a severe stroke in August of 1972. While convalescing, Silvers wrote his very candid autobiography, The Laugh Is on Me. He recovered to the extent that he could still perform, but his speech was slurred and his timing was gone. Still, Silvers was beloved by practically everyone in show business, so he never lacked for work. Phil Silvers was the father of actress Cathy Silvers, best known for her supporting work on the TV series Happy Days.

Trivia: When American actor Paul Hurst became the comedy sidekick in the Monte Hale western series at Republic in the early '50s, he came by the work naturally; he had been born and bred on California's Miller and Lux Ranch. While in his teens, Hurst attained his first theatre job as a scenery painter in San Francisco, making his on-stage debut at age 19. In 1911, Hurst ventured into western films, wearing three hats as a writer, director and actor. He worked ceaselessly in character roles throughout the '20s, '30s and '40s, most often in comedy parts as dim-witted police officers and muscle-headed athletes. He also showed up in leading roles in 2-reelers, notably as a punchdrunk trainer in Columbia's Glove Slingers series. On at least two memorable occasions, Hurst eschewed comedy for villainy: in 1943's The Ox-Bow Incident, he's the lynch-mob member who ghoulishly reminds the victims what's in store for them by grabbing his collar and making choking sounds. And in Gone with the Wind, Hurst is Hell personified as the Yankee deserter and would-be rapist whom Scarlet O'Hara (Vivien Leigh) shoots in the face at point blank range. Paul Hurst kept busy into the early '50s; at the age of 65, he ended his career and his life in suicide.

Trivia: Moonfaced American actor Frank Orth came to films from vaudeville, where he was usually co-billed with wife Ann Codee. Orth and Codee continued appearing together in a series of two-reel comedies in the early '30s, before he graduated to features with 1935's The Unwelcome Stranger. From that point until his retirement in 1959, Orth usually found himself behind a counter in his film appearances, playing scores of pharmacists, grocery clerks and bartenders. He had a semi-recurring role as Mike Ryan in MGM's Dr. Kildare series, and was featured as a long-suffering small town cop in Warners' Nancy Drew films. Orth was an apparent favorite of the casting department at 20th Century-Fox, where he received many of his credited screen roles. From 1951 through 1953, Frank Orth was costarred as Lieutenant Farraday on the Boston Blackie TV series.

Trivia: Sad-eyed, mustachioed actor Hal K. Dawson appeared in several Broadway productions of the 1920s. During the run of Machinal, Dawson was the roommate of fellow actor Clark Gable; throughout his later Hollywood career, Gable saw to it that Dawson was given parts in such films as Libeled Lady (1936) and To Please a Lady (1951). Even without Gable's help, Dawson enjoyed a long and productive movie and TV career, usually playing long-suffering personal secretaries and officious desk clerks. Hal K. Dawson was a lifelong member of the Masquers Club, and, in the twilight of his life, was made an honorary member of the Pioneers of Radio Club.

Trivia: Excelling in baseball while at Phillips-Exeter academy, American comic actor Andrew Tombes determined he'd make a better living as an actor than as a ballplayer. By the time he became a headliner in the Ziegfeld Follies, Tombes had performed in everything from Shakespeare to musical comedy. He received star billing in five editions of the Follies in the '20s, during which time he befriended fellow Ziegfeldite Will Rogers. It was Rogers who invited Tombes to Hollywood for the 1935 Fox production Doubting Thomas. An endearingly nutty farceur in his stage roles, Tombes' screen persona was that of an eternally befuddled, easily aggravated business executive. The baldheaded, popeyed actor remained at Fox for several years after Doubting Thomas, playing an overabundance of police commissioners, movie executives, college deans, and Broadway "angels." Tombes' problem was that he arrived in talkies too late in the game: most of the larger roles in which he specialized usually went to such long-established character men as Walter Catlett and Berton Churchill, obliging Tombes to settle for parts of diminishing importance in the '40s. Most of his later screen appearances were unbilled, even such sizeable assignments as the would-be musical backer in Olsen and Johnson's Hellzapoppin' (1941) and the royal undertaker's assistant in Hope and Crosby's Road to Morocco (1942). Still, Tombes was given ample opportunity to shine, especially as the secretive, suicidal bartender in the 1944 "film noir" Phantom Lady. Andrew Tombes last picture was How to Be Very Very Popular (1955), which starred a colleague from his busier days at 20th Century-Fox, Betty Grable.

Trivia: A veteran of vaudeville and Broadway, Harry Seymour came to films with extensive credits as a composer and musical-comedy star. Unfortunately, Seymour made his movie debut in 1925, at the height of the silent era. When talkies came in, he was frequently employed as a dialogue director with the Warner Bros. B-unit. From 1932 to 1958, Harry Seymour also essayed bit roles at Warners and 20th Century Fox, most often playing pianists (Irish Eyes Are Smiling, Rhapsody in Blue, A Ticket to Tomahawk, etc.).

Trivia: In the 1959 Twilight Zone episode "Walking Distance," Gig Young comments that he thinks he's seen drugstore counterman Byron Foulger before. "I've got that kind of face" was the counterman's reply. Indeed, Foulger's mustachioed, bespectacled, tremble-chinned, moon-shaped countenance was one of the most familiar faces ever to grace the screen. A graduate of the University of Utah, Foulger developed a taste for performing in community theatre, making his Broadway debut in the '20s. Foulger then toured with Moroni Olsen's stock company, which led him to the famed Pasadena Playhouse as both actor and director. In films from 1936, Foulger usually played whining milksops, weak-willed sycophants, sanctimonious sales clerks, shifty political appointees, and the occasional unsuspected murderer. In real life, the seemingly timorous actor was not very easily cowed; according to his friend Victor Jory, Foulger once threatened to punch out Errol Flynn at a party because he thought that Flynn was flirting with his wife (Mrs. Foulger was Dorothy Adams, a prolific movie and stage character actress). Usually unbilled in "A" productions, Foulger could count on meatier roles in such "B" pictures as The Man They Could Not Hang (1939) and The Panther's Claw (1943). In the Bowery Boys' Up in Smoke (1957), Foulger is superb as a gleeful, twinkly-eyed Satan. In addition to his film work, Byron Foulger built up quite a gallery of portrayals on television; one of his final stints was the recurring role of engineer Wendell Gibbs on the popular sitcom Petticoat Junction.

Trivia: In films from 1935, Scottish character actor Alec Craig perpetuated the stereotype of the penny-pinching Highlander for nearly 15 years. Craig's wizened countenance and bald head popped up in quite a few mysteries and melodramas, beginning with his appearance as the inept defense attorney in the embryonic "film noir" Stranger on the Third Floor. He essayed small but memorable roles in a handful of Val Lewton productions, notably the zookeeper in Cat People (1942). Later, he was a general hanger-on in Universal's horror films and Sherlock Holmes entries. Craig's showiest assignment was his dual role in RKO's A Date with the Falcon. The legions of fans of Lubitsch's To Be or Not to Be know Alec Craig best as the Scottish farmer who, upon being confronted by Hitler look-alike Tom Dugan, mutters to his fellow farmer James Finlayson "First it was Hess...now it's him."