Early-life: Russell Ira Crowe was born on April 7, 1964 in Wellington, New Zealand. He moved to Australia at the age of four. The son of movie caterers, Crowe was exposed to the film industry at an early age and made his professional debut at the age of six on the Australian kids' TV show Spyforce. He also appeared in The Young Doctors when he was 12, but later took a number of odd jobs including stints as a fruit-picker, horse-wrangler, bingo-caller and singer before returning to acting.

Early-life: Christian Charles Philip Bale was born in Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire, on January 30, 1974. He has three older sisters. His father was a commercial pilot, his mother a circus dancer. Performing runs in the family - his grandfather was a comedian and children's entertainer, while his great uncle was an actor and John Wayne's stand-in for two movies. Christian was raised in England, Portugal and California, and made his acting debut in a cereal commercial in 1983.

Early-life: Benjamin Foster was born on October 29, 1980 in Boston, Massachusetts to restaurant owners Gillian Kirwan and Steven Foster. His brother, Jon, is also an actor. When he was four years old, his family moved to Fairfield, Iowa, following a robbery at their home. He dropped out of high school and moved to Los Angeles when he was 16 years old to pursue acting.

Early-life: Logan Wade Lerman was born in Beverly Hills on January 19, 1992 to Lisa and Larry. His family owns Lerman & Son, an orthotics and prosthetics company. He has two older siblings, Lindsey and Lucas. He began auditioning for roles in the late 1990s and picked up work in commercials. He made his film debut in The Patriot (2000). Roles followed in What Women Want (2000), Riding in Cars with Boys (2001), The Flannerys (2003), The Butterfly Effect (2004) and TV series Jack & Bobby.

Early-life: Alan Wray Tudyk was born in El Paso, Texas, on March 16, 1971 to Betty and Timothy. He studied drama at the Lon Morris College in Jacksonville, Texas, and it was during this time that he starred in a summer production of Billy the Kid. He went on to study at the Juilliard performing arts conservatory in New York City but left before completing his degree. In 1999, Alan made his Broadway debut in Epic Proportions.

Early-life: Peter Fonda was born in 1940, the second child of Henry Fonda's second marriage to socialite Frances Ford Seymour; the union ended in 1950 when she committed suicide in a mental institution on her 42nd birthday. Peter had an often distant relationship with his father, which was only reconciled in the years prior to Henry's death in 1982. Peter decided to follow in his dad's footsteps at an early age, and began his professional acting career at the Omaha Playhouse - the same place Henry had started out several decades before. After tackling a handful of decent if uninspiring parts, he became known for his roles in such low-budget counterculture classics as The Wild Angels and The Trip. Then came Easy Rider, a project he not only starred in as the laconic Captain America, but also co-wrote and produced.