Peter Ustinov (1921-2004) was two times Academy Award-winning film actor, director, writer, journalist, and raconteur. From 1942-46 Ustinov served as a private soldier with the British Army's Royal Sussex Regiment, during World War II. Ustinov spent most of his service with the Army Cinema Unit, where he worked on recruitment films, wrote plays, and appeared in three films. At that time he wrote and directed his film, The Way Ahead (1944). Eventually, Ustinov made a stellar film career, appearing in more than 100 film and television productions. He was awarded two Oscars for Best Supporting Actor, one for his role in Spartacus (1960) and one for his role in Topkapi (1964); and received two more Oscar nominations as an actor and writer. During the 1970s he had a slowdown in his career, before making a comeback as Hercule Poirot in Death on the Nile (1978) by director John Guillermin. In the 1980s, Ustinov reprized the Poirot role in several subsequent television movies and theatrical films, such as Evil Under the Sun (1982) and Appointment with Death (1988). Later he appeared as a sympathetic doctor in the disease thriller Lorenzo's Oil (1992).

Natividad Vacio (1912-1996) [The Hitch-Hiker (1953); The Milagro Beanfield War (1988)] was born in El Paso, Texas, and grew up in Pasadena, California. In high school he became friends with future actor George Reeves, who encouraged him to join him at the Pasadena Community Playhouse. Vacio appeared in several plays there as an actor and musician. After military service in World War II, he worked as a teacher, but with the encouragement of his best friend Reeves, appeared frequently in films and television. An accomplished guitarist and singer, he made recordings with such greats as Laurindo Almeida, and toured the country with Reeves in a music-&-action stage show publicizing Reeves' "Adventures of Superman" TV series. Vacio was the director of the Commedia del Artistes stage company of Padua Hills, California.

Bobby Van (1928-1980) [Because You're Mine (1952); Lost Horizon (1973)] was born Robert Jack Stein in The Bronx, New York. Living most of his early youth backstage (his parents were vaudevillians), Bobby made his stage bow at the ripe old age of four, when he became a scene-stealing part of his parents' act. Bobby attended New York City schools and took a special interest in music classes. His early interest focused on the trumpet, but a last-minute song-and-dance job as a replacement at a Catskill Mountains resort where he and his band were playing ultimately changed his destiny. A natural on stage, he also told jokes and did impressions. World War II interrupted his nascent career but he eventually regained his momentum and started appearing regularly in nightclubs, on radio and TV.

Conrad Veidt -- who played the despised Nazi Major Strasser in Casablanca -- was actually a German gentile who felt empathy for persecuted Jews. He had been banned from Germany for making a film called, The Wandering Jew. He died suddenly of a heart attack in 1943 without ever returning to Germany.