Trivia: Howard Hesseman's early credits have sometimes been hard to trace, mainly because he often billed himself as "Don Sturdy." The mustachioed, prematurely balding Hesseman was a founding member of the San Francisco-based improv troupe The Committee. During his decade-long tenure with this aggregation, he was featured in such films as Petulia (1968) and A Session with the Committee (1970), and showed up on such TV series as The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and The Dick Cavett Show. Through the auspices of his Committee cohort Peter Bonerz, Hesseman played a recurring role on TV's The Bob Newhart Show (1972-78), playing the unsuccessful producer of such TV disasters as "The Nazi Hour." His screen roles in the 1970s included a showy part as a harried TV-commercial director in the opening sequence of The Sunshine Boys. In 1978, Hesseman achieved celebrity in the role of counterculture deejay Dr. Johnny Fever (aka Johnny Caravella) on the popular sitcom WKRP in Cincinnati. Following WKRP's cancellation in 1982, he spent two seasons playing Ann Romano's third (and presumably final) husband Sam Royer on the weekly One Day at a Time. From 1986 to 1990, he starred as urbane high school teacher Charlie Moore in TV's Head of the Class. During all this activity, Howard Hesseman continued showing up in feature films, playing such roles as smarmy promoter Terry Ladd in This is Spinal Tap (1984) and child star Patty Duke's manipulative manager/guardian John Ross in the TV biopic Call Me Anna (1989). Over the following several years, Hessman would remain active on screen, appearnig on shows like That 70's Show and Crossing Jordan, and in movies like The Rocker.

Trivia: Gen-X'ers will almost invariably recall actor Brian Robbins; he began his career by starring in a multi-season run as Eric Mardian, a self-styled slickster forced into the same high-school class with a group of nerdy brainiacs, in the Howard Hesseman ABC sitcom Head of the Class (1986-1991). Robbins also appeared in other projects at around the same time, including episodes of Growing Pains, the sci-fi exploitation outing C.H.U.D. 2: Bud the C.H.U.D. (1989) and the family-friendly telemovie Camp Cucamonga (1990). Around 1993, Robbins abandoned acting by stepping behind the camera, as a director, producer, and eventually, executive-level Hollywood studio producer -- and thus achieved far greater success in that venue than he did as a young star. Among other endeavors, Robbins was responsible for such blockbuster series as Smallville, What I Like About You, and One Tree Hill, and features such as the Eddie Murphy comedy Norbit (2007).

Trivia: Straight out of finishing school, American actress Elaine Stritch laid the groundwork for her career by studying drama at New York's New School. Stritch's first stage appearance was in 1944, and her Broadway bow was in 1946. A superlative dramatic actress, Ms. Stritch also excelled in musical comedy, a genre she returned to off and on into the '90s. After her film debut in The Scarlet Hour (1956), Stritch contributed a compelling performance to the 1957 remake of A Farewell to Arms, but wouldn't make another truly worthwhile film (worthwhile to her, that is) until the French-filmed Providence in 1970. On television, Stritch starred in the the pioneering 1948 domestic comedy Growing Paynes, the short-lived 1960 sitcom My Sister Eileen, and costarred as the star's mother in The Ellen Burstyn Show (1986). She was also a member of the supporting comedy troupe on the 1949 TVer Jack Carter and Company, a comic switchboard operator on the bi-weekly 1956 variety series Washington Square, and Peter Falk's secretary on the one-season Trials of O'Brien (1965). In 1972, Ms. Stritch moved to London as a cast member of the Broadway hit Company and remained there to work for several years. In the last decade, Elaine Stritch has appeared in such films as September (1988) and Cocoon (1990), and has won additional critical plaudits for her role as Parthy Hawkes in the lavish 1994 Broadway revival of Show Boat. Her on-screen work included projects such as Krippendorf's Tribe, Autumn in New York, Screwed, and the working-class musical Romance & Cigarettes. She was part of Jane Fonda's comeback vehicle Monster-In-Law, and in 2012 she lent he voice to the animated family film ParaNorman. She had a recurring role as Colleen Donaghy, Jack's mother, on 30 Rock, which earned her an Emmy Award in 2007. She died in 2014 at age 89.