Trivia: Born to a well-to-do Southern family, Joseph Cotten studied at the Hickman School of Expression in Washington D.C., and later sought out theater jobs in New York. He made his Broadway debut in 1930, and seven years later joined Orson Welles' progressive Mercury Theatre company, playing leads in such productions as Julius Caesar and Shoemaker's Holiday. He briefly left Welles in 1939 to co-star in Katharine Hepburn's Broadway comeback vehicle The Philadelphia Story. Cotten rejoinedWelles in Hollywood in 1940, making his feature-film debut as Jed Leland in Welles' Citizen Kane (1941). As a sort of private joke, Jed Leland was a dramatic critic, a profession which Cotten himself had briefly pursued on the Miami Herald in the late '20s. Cotten went on to play the kindly auto mogul Eugene Morgan in Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons in 1942, and both acted in and co-wrote Journey Into Fear, the film that Welles was working on when he was summarily fired by RKO. Cotten remained a close friend of Welles until the director's death in 1985; he co-starred with Welles in Carol Reed's The Third Man (1949) and played an unbilled cameo for old times' sake in the Welles-directed Touch of Evil (1958). A firmly established romantic lead by the early '40s, Cotten occasionally stepped outside his established screen image to play murderers (Alfred Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt [1943]) and surly drunkards (Under Capricorn [1949]). A longtime contractee of David O. Selznick, Cotten won a Venice Film Festival award for his performance in Selznick's Portrait of Jennie (1948). Cotten's screen career flagged during the 1950s and '60s, though he flourished on television as a guest performer on such anthologies as Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Fireside Theatre, The Great Adventure, and as host of The 20th Century-Fox Hour (1955), The Joseph Cotten Show (1956), On Trial (1959), and Hollywood and the Stars (1963). He also appeared in several stage productions, often in the company of his second wife, actress Patricia Medina. In 1987, Cotten published his engagingly candid autobiography, Vanity Will Get You Somewhere. He died of pneumonia in 1994 at the age of 88.

Trivia: Darren McGavin dropped out of college after one year and moved to New York, where he trained for the stage at the Neighborhood Playhouse and the Actors Studio. In the mid '40s he began landing small roles in occasional films, but worked primarily onstage. He first made an impression onscreen as a painter in David Lean's Summertime and a drug pusher in Otto Preminger's The Man with the Golden Arm (both 1955); nevertheless, his subsequent film work tended to occur in intermittent spurts, with long periods off-screen between roles. He is best known as a TV actor; he starred in the TV series Crime Photographer, Mike Hammer, Riverboat, The Outsider, and Kolchak: The Night Stalker, and also appeared in a number of TV movies. He occasionally directed episodes of his TV shows, and directed and produced the film Happy Mother's Day, Love George (1973), whose title was later changed to Run, Stranger, Run.

Trivia: Beefy, muscular leading man Philip Carey entered films in 1951, shortly after his hitch in the Marines was up. Cutting quite a dashing figure in a 19th-century military uniform, Carey was most often cast as an American cavalry officer. In a similar vein, he appeared as Canadian-born Lt. Michael Rhodes on the 1956 TV series Tales of the 77th Bengal Lancers. Curiously, he never appeared in any of director John Ford's cavalry films, though he did co-star in Ford's Mister Roberts (1955) and The Long Gray Line (1955). In 1959, Carey starred in a TV series based on Raymond Chandler's hard-boiled private eye Philip Marlowe. While no one could fault his performance in the role, the Philip Marlowe series survived but a single season. He is best known for his four subsequent TV assignments: as spokesperson for the regionally aired Granny Goose potato chips commercials, as forever-flustered Lt. Parmalee on the comedy Western Laredo (1966-1968), as narrator of the documentary series Untamed World (1968-1975), and, from 1980-2007, as eternally scheming patriarch Asa Buchanan on the daytime soap opera One Life to Live. One of Philip Carey's least typical TV appearances was on a 1971 All in the Family episode, in which he played Archie Bunker's macho-man bar buddy -- who turns out to be a homosexual.

Trivia: Alternately blonde and brunette, American actress Nancy Kovack entered films with a Columbia contract in 1960. She had several good scenes as an imbibing suburbanite in Strangers When We Meet (1960), was killed off after an elaborate strip-tease in the Dean Martin spy spoof The Silencers (1966) and at one point even got to play Medea, albeit briefly, in the juvenile-oriented adventure film Jason and the Argonauts (1963). One of Nancy's oddest (but best remembered) Columbia assignments was as Annie Oakley in the Three Stooges' western comedy The Outlaws is Coming (1965) - in which her leading man, a gun-shy Easterner, was a pre-Batman Adam West. Despite the seductive nature of many of her screen roles, Ms. Kovack offscreen was well known for her sturdy moral values and her unwillingness to be sucked in by the Hollywood "swingers" scene. Nancy Kovack married Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra conducter Zubin Mehta early in the '70s, briefly maintaining her career under her married name but ultimately giving up acting to become a charming and highly respected social leader in New York and Los Angeles musical circles.

Trivia: While maintaining his whole life that he was part Cree and part Cherokee, actor Iron Eyes Cody was in fact born Espera DeCorti, a second generation Italian-American. He started out as a Wild-West-show performer, like his father before him. His earliest recognizable film appearances date back to 1919's Back to God's Country. While his choice of film roles was rather limited in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, Cody made himself a valuable Hollywood commodity by offering his services as a technical advisor on Indian lore, customs, costuming and sign language. In between his TV work and personal appearances with the Ringling Bros. Circus and other such touring concerns, Iron Eyes continued accepting supporting roles in Hollywood westerns of the 1950s; he played Chief Crazy Horse twice, in Sitting Bull (1954) and The Great Sioux Massacre (1965). Far more erudite and well-read than most of his screen characters, Iron Eyes has in recent years become a popular interview subject and a fixture at western-movie conventions and film festivals. His famous appearance as the tear-shedding Indian in the "Keep America Beautiful" TV campaign of the 1970s recently enjoyed a "revival" on cable television. In 1982, Cody wrote his enjoyably candid autobiography, in which several high-profile movie stars were given the "emperor has no clothes" treatment. As well as being an actor, Cody owns an enormous collection of Indian artifacts, costumes, books and artwork; has written several books with Indian themes; is a member of the board of directors of the Los Angeles Indian Center, the Southwest Museum and the Los Angeles Library Association; is vice-president of the Little Big Horn Indian Association; is a member of the Verdugo Council of the Boy Scouts of America; and has participated as Grand Marshal of Native American pow-wows throughout the U.S.

Trivia: Active in Australian radio and stage productions from childhood, Sydney native Michael Pate made his first film in 1949 on his home turf. Pate then moved to Hollywood, where he settled into villainous or obstreperous roles. He is best remembered for his portrayal of Indian chief Vittoro in John Wayne's Hondo (1953), a part he recreated for the 1966 weekly TV adaptation of Hondo, which top-billed Ralph Taeger. Other career highlights include the 1954 TV adaptation of Ian Fleming's James Bond novel Casino Royale, wherein Pate became the first actor to play CIA agent Felix Leiter (though both the character's name and nationality were changed), and PT 109 (1963), in which Pate played the Australian mariner who harangued future President John F. Kennedy (Cliff Robertson).During his Hollywood stay, Pate occasionally dabbled in screenwriting, collaborating on the scripts of Escape from Fort Bravo (1953) and The Most Dangerous Man Alive (1961). In 1968 he returned to Australia where, with such rare exceptions as the weekly TVer Matlock Police, he curtailed his performing activities to concentrate on producing, writing and directing. He produced the 1969 feature film Age of Consent, and later was put in charge of production of Amalgamated Television in Sydney. He made his feature-film directorial debut with the TV movie Tim (1979), which boasted an impressive early starring performance by Mel Gibson. He also adapted the screenplay of Tim from the novel by Colleen McCullough, earning the Australian equivalent of the Emmy Award for his efforts. Michael Pate is the author of two instructional books, The Film Actor and The Director's Eye.

Trivia: Having made her feature film debut in Sex and the College Girl (1964), blonde actress Julie Sommars went on to appear in television movies of the '70s and in the occasional feature film through the mid-'80s. Fans of the television drama Matlock (1986-1995) will recognize her for playing Julie March.

Trivia: A top athlete at Brown University, Don Haggerty performed military service and did stage work before his movie-acting debut in 1947. Free-lancing, Haggerty put in time at virtually every studio from Republic to MGM, playing roles of varying sizes in films like Sands of Iwo Jima (1949) The Asphalt Jungle (1951), Angels in the Outfield (1951) and The Narrow Margin (1952). Most often, he was cast as a big-city detective or rugged westerner. During the first (1955-56) season of TV's The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp, Haggerty showed up semi-regularly as Marsh Murdock. Don Haggerty was the father of Grizzly Adams star Dan Haggerty.

Trivia: Busy character actor Frank Ferguson was able to parlay his pinched facial features, his fussy little moustache, and his bellows-like voice for a vast array of characterizations. Ferguson was equally effective as a hen-pecked husband, stern military leader, irascible neighbor, merciless employer, crooked sheriff, and barbershop hanger-on. He made his inaugural film appearance in Father is a Prince (1940) and was last seen on the big screen in The Great Sioux Massacre (1965). Ferguson proved himself an above-average actor by successfully pulling off the treacly scene in The Babe Ruth Story (1948) in which Babe (William Bendix) says "Hi, kid" to Ferguson's crippled son--whereupon the boy suddenly stands up and walks! Among Franklin Ferguson's hundreds of TV appearances were regular stints on the children's series My Friend Flicka (1956) and the nighttime soap opera Peyton Place (1964-68).

Trivia: Canadian-born actor Stacy Harris was a fixture on American radio and television for decades, with occasional movie roles breaking up those small-screen engagements. Born in Big Timber, Quebec in 1918, he turned to acting full-time after the Second World War. With his authoritative voice, he was a natural for heroic roles and established himself on radio with an eight-year stint on This Is Your FBI. His big-screen debut came in 1951 in Appointment With Danger, an Alan Ladd starring vehicle in which one of the other key players was Jack Webb who, at the time, was also doing his show Dragnet on the radio and about to bring it to television. Harris became a memorable presence in the Dragnet stock company, appearing four times in the series' original 1950s run, as well as in the 1954 feature film of the same name -- these were interspersed with work in hundreds of television episodes across the 1950s and early 1960s. It was in the revived 1960s Dragnet series, however, that he got some of his best screen time, dividing his portrayal between portrayals of criminals and those on the side of the law -- in the former capacity, with his courtly good looks, finely chiseled features and authoritative voice, all a little reminiscent of an older Robert Ryan, he was a regular reminder to viewers that not all criminals look like or comport themselves as criminals. His best work of the series, however, was the last episode in which he appeared, "Forgery: The Ranger." The role of Clifford Ray Owens aka Barney Regal was a tour-de-force for the actor, playing a felon (who was, astoundingly, masquerading as a forest ranger) who is driven as much by serious psychiatric problems as greed. In 25 minutes of screen time, Harris dominates every moment and evokes a huge range of emotions, including sympathy and pity, which was unusual in the writing approach of the series.Harris appeared regularly in Webb's other series in the years before his death in 1973, at age 54.

Trivia: Like Dick Wilson (Mr. Whipple) and Jan Miner (Madge), actor House Peters, Jr. attained most widespread recognition via his iconic role in American television commercials, plugging a domestic product -- in his case, Procter & Gamble's "Mr. Clean" line of household cleaners. Peters set himself apart from the pack, however, for actually playing the brand's nominal character, replete with his barrel chest, bald pate (courtesy of a latex cap and makeup), and trademark gold earring. The New Rochelle, NY, native also built up a fairly substantial litany of dramatic roles alongside his promotional work. After growing up in Beverly Hills, CA, Peters signed for roles in such projects as the television series Flash Gordon and the features Public Cowboy No. 1 and Hot Tip. After a brief service in the Army Air Corps during World War II, he hearkened back to Los Angeles, commenced occasional stage work, and resumed work in features, specializing in supporting roles in dozens of westerns such as Oklahoma Badlands (1948) and Cow Town (1950). Small portrayals in the Hollywood classics The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) and Rebel Without a Cause (1955) represented a significant step up for Peters in terms of profile and recognition, though he continued to be most commonly associated with Mr. Clean, an assignment held from the late '50s into the early '60s. As the years rolled on, Peters did additional television work via guest spots on shows including The Twilight Zone and Perry Mason, then retired in the late '60s and spent the next four decades off-camera. Peters died of pneumonia in 2008, at the age of 92.

Trivia: The son of veteran vaudeville headliner Julius Tannen and the brother of actor Charles Tannen, William Tannen entered films as a Columbia contractee in 1934. Along with several other young stage-trained performers, Tannen was "discovered" by MGM in 1938's Dramatic School. During his subsequent years at MGM, he was briefly associated with three top comedy teams: He played Virginia Grey's brother in the Marx Brothers' The Big Store (1941), a Nazi flunkey in Laurel and Hardy's Air Raid Wardens (1943), and a "hard-boiled" assistant director in Abbott and Costello in Hollywood (1945). On TV, William Tannen was seen in the recurring role of Deputy Hal on the weekly Western Wyatt Earp (1955-1961).