Career: Duvall's first professional work came on stage. His TV debut was in a 1959 episode of Armstrong Circle Theatre, while his first film was 1962's To Kill a Mockingbird. Other early movies were The Chase, Bullitt, True Grit and MASH. In 1972, he received his first Oscar nomination for The Godfather. Nominations since have been for Apocalypse Now, The Great Santini, The Apostle (which he also wrote and directed) and A Civil Action. He won the Best Actor award for Tender Mercies in 1983. Other films include The Godfather: Part II, Sling Blade, Open Range, Secondhand Lions, Thank You for Smoking, Crazy Heart and Get Low.

Career: Leoni went on to star in a number of high-profile Hollywood movies, including A League of Their Own (1992), Wyatt Earp (1994), Bad Boys (1995), Deep Impact (1998), Jurassic Park III (2001) and Fun with Dick and Jane (2005). She has also worked extensively on TV, notably in the sitcoms Flying Blind and The Naked Truth. More recently, she has starred in Ghost Town (2008), The Smell of Success (2009) and Tower Heist (2011).

Career: Freeman's first credited big-screen appearance was in 1971's Who Says I Can't Ride a Rainbow?, before he landed a regular role on children's show The Electric Company. In the mid-1980s, Freeman started getting more prominent roles in movies. Among his biggest hits have been Driving Miss Daisy, The Shawshank Redemption, Se7en, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Glory, Amistad, Deep Impact and Bruce Almighty. He is also an in-demand voice-over artist, lending his dulcet tones to sci-fi blockbuster War of the Worlds and the Oscar-winning documentary March of the Penguins. Freeman received an Academy Award of his own for his supporting role in Clint Eastwood's Million Dollar Baby. A prolific actor, he has more recently appeared in Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy and always has several films in pre-production.

Career: Redgrave's first professional job was at Frinton Summer Theatre. She made her West End debut opposite her father in A Touch of the Sun, and starred alongside him in 1958's Behind the Mask, her film debut. She became a face of the 1960s thanks to movies such as Blowup, Isadora and Camelot before winning a Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 1977 for Julia. Redgrave has continued to appear on the big screen in productions such as Agatha, Yanks, Wetherby, Howards End, Mission: Impossible, Wilde, Venus, Atonement, Song for Marion and Ralph Fiennes' acclaimed film version of Coriolanus. She's also an activist who works tirelessly for various causes, often creating controversy with her forthright views.

Career: Wood's first film was Back to the Future Part II in 1989, and he quickly gained larger roles in the likes of Avalon, Forever Young, The Adventures of Huck Finn and The Good Son. North was a huge flop in 1994, and Flipper didn't fare much better, but 1997's The Ice Storm enabled him to prove he could make the transition from child roles to more mature projects. Deep Impact and The Faculty followed, but it was The Lord of the Rings trilogy that turned him into a global superstar. Since then he's appeared in such acclaimed productions as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Everything Is Illuminated and Sin City. He appeared in Peter Jackson's The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey as Frodo Baggins in 2012. From 2011 to 2014, he starred in FX TV comedy Wilfred.

Career: He made his first TV appearances in 1974 with roles in long-running sitcom All in the Family and hit detective show The Rockford Files. His first film, Murder by Death, was released two years later. He continued to work in theatre, films and TV, cropping up in The Man with Two Brains, Revenge of the Nerds and Dream West, before landing an Oscar nomination for Babe in 1995. The film made him a famous face, and since then, he's starred in Star Trek: First Contact, The People vs Larry Flynt, Babe: Pig in the City, The Green Mile, Space Cowboys, and I, Robot.

Career: Favreau's first film role was alongside Sean Astin in Rudy (1993). A year later he appeared in an episode of Seinfeld. In 1996, he wrote and starred in Swingers (1996) alongside Vince Vaughn. In 1997 he had a recurring role as Monica Geller's boyfriend Pete Becker in Friends. In 2001, he teamed up again with Vince Vaughn in Made (2001), Favreau's directorial debut. Two years later, he enjoyed his first big success as a director for Elf. Since then, Favreau has continued to act, write and direct. He went on to direct Iron Man (2008), Iron Man 2 (2010), and Cowboys & Aliens (2011). More recently, he wrote, directed and starred in Chef (2014).