Irene Cara Escalera was an American singer and actress who rose to prominence for her role as Coco Hernandez in the 1980 musical film Fame, and for recording the film's title song "Fame", which reached No. 1 in several countries. In 1983, Cara co-wrote and sang the song "Flashdance... What a Feeling", for which she shared an Academy Award for Best Original Song and won a Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance in 1984.
Fame is a 1980 American teen musical drama film directed by Alan Parker and written by Christopher Gore. Set in New York City, it chronicles the lives and hardships of students attending The High School of Performing Arts, from their auditions to their freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior years.
"Fame" is a song written by Michael Gore (music) and Dean Pitchford (lyrics) and released in 1980, that achieved chart success as the theme song to the Fame film and TV series. The song was performed by Irene Cara, who played the role of Coco Hernandez in the original film. It was also her debut single as a recording artist. The song won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1980, and the Golden Globe Award the same year. In 2004, it finished at number 51 on AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs survey of top tunes in American cinema.
Susan Victoria Lucci is an American actress. She is best known for portraying Erica Kane on the ABC daytime drama All My Children during that show's entire network run from 1970 to 2011. The character is considered an icon, and she was called "Daytime's Leading Lady" by TV Guide, with The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times citing her as the highest-paid actor in daytime television. As early as 1991, her salary had been reported as over $1 million a year. During her run on All My Children, Lucci was nominated 21 times for the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series. She won only once, in 1999, after the 19th nomination; her status as a perpetual nominee for the award had attracted significant media attention since the late 1980s.
Lloyd Vernet "Beau" Bridges III is an American actor. He is a three-time Emmy, two-time Golden Globe and one-time Grammy Award winner, as well as a two-time Screen Actors Guild Award nominee. Bridges also has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his contributions to television. He is the son of actor Lloyd Bridges and elder brother of fellow actor Jeff Bridges.
Erica Durance is a Canadian actress known for her roles as Lois Lane in the superhero television series Smallville (2004–2011) and as Dr. Alex Reid in the medical drama series Saving Hope (2012–2017). She has also appeared in films such as The Untold (2002), The Butterfly Effect 2 (2006), Final Verdict (2009) and Painkillers (2015).
Deborah Kaye Allen is an American actress, dancer, choreographer, singer, director, producer, and a former member of the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities. She has been nominated 20 times for an Emmy Award, and two Tony Awards. She has won a Golden Globe Award, and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1991.
Anita, Lady May, known as Anita Dobson, is an English actress and singer. She is best known for her role from 1985 to 1988 as Angie Watts in the BBC soap opera EastEnders. In 1986, she reached number four in the UK Singles Chart with "Anyone Can Fall in Love", a song based on the theme music of EastEnders. She is married to Queen guitarist and astrophysicist Sir Brian May.
Ruta Lee is a Canadian-born American actress and dancer of Lithuanian descent. She was born in Montreal, Canada, to Lithuanian immigrant parents. Ruta Lee appeared as one of the brides in the musical Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. She had roles in films including Billy Wilder's crime drama Witness for the Prosecution and Stanley Donen's musical comedy Funny Face, and also is remembered for her guest appearance in a 1963 episode of Rod Serling's sci-fi series The Twilight Zone called "A Short Drink from a Certain Fountain".
Livewire is a kids' talk show on the American television cable network, Nickelodeon that began in September 1980 and ended in 1985. The series was designed for kids of all ages, and the show's main focus discussed true current events and stories during those times. It was taped at the Ed Sullivan Theater in New York through Reeves Teletape Studios of Sesame Street fame. It was filmed "live on tape" with a participating audience of about 20-30 teenagers, and was hosted initially by Mark Cordray, but Fred Newman soon replaced Cordray as host. It was a CableACE Award winner, the first Nickelodeon talk show to achieve that feat. Livewire was the #1 rated show on Nickelodeon in 1982, and never went below #7 in the ratings during the 5-year span of the show. After the last episode aired, the show went into reruns until May 7, 1988.
Gary Portnoy is an American musician and singer-songwriter. He is best known for co-writing and performing the main theme song of the NBC sitcom Cheers, "Where Everybody Knows Your Name".
Erica Fawn Gimpel is an American actress, singer, dancer, and composer. She is best known for her roles on television shows Fame as Coco Hernandez and on Profiler as Angel Brown. She is also known for her recurring roles on the television shows ER as Adele Newman and on Veronica Mars as Alicia Fennel. From 2018 to 2020, Gimpel had a series regular role as Trish on the series God Friended Me.
Leonard Charles "Lee" Curreri is an American actor and musician, most known for his work in the film, Fame (1980) and its television spinoff, Fame (1982–1987).
Bring Back... is a British television series comprising one-off shows where Justin Lee Collins tries to locate people from music, TV, or film backgrounds to reunite them for a one-off performance or get-together. The series was broadcast on Channel 4.
Valerie Landsburg is an American actress, television and film director, screenwriter, and singer-songwriter. She is best known for her portrayal of Doris Schwartz in the 1982 series Fame, interpreting, for television, the role that Maureen Teefy had originated in the film. She was also the lead singer on the UK top five hit "Hi Fidelity". Producer Alan Landsburg was her father, and she appeared in at least one installment of True Confessions, an anthology series program he produced.
Darrin Dewitt Henson is an American choreographer, dancer, actor, and producer. Hensen was a brief member of freestyle music 1980s group Trilogy and was featured on their single "Good Time". He worked as a choreographer for various artists and received the 2000 MTV Video Music Award for Best Choreography for "Bye Bye Bye" by NSYNC.
Fame Looks at Music '83 was a special concert episode for the third season of the hit TV series Fame. The concert took place on December 27, 1983, at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium in Santa Monica, California before a live capacity audience. The broadcast was aired on January 28, 1984. This special features the cast of Fame, billed as "The Kids from Fame," along with the season three regular dancers. The concert is the second of the season, their first concert in the U.S., and their third overall. The concert featured performances of popular music by the cast taking a look back at popular music in the year 1983. Guest starring was Irene Cara, who sang "Fame" — the song an Academy Award winner — originally for the film of the same title in which she also starred as the original Coco.
Anthony Stewart Head is an English actor and singer. Primarily a performer in musical theatre, he rose to fame in the UK in the 1980s following his role in the Gold Blend couple television advertisements for Nescafé, which led to major roles in several television series. He is best known for his roles as Rupert Giles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997–2003), the Prime Minister in Little Britain (2003–2006), Uther Pendragon in Merlin (2008–2012), and Rupert Mannion in Ted Lasso (2020–2023), as well as voicing Herc Shipwright in BBC Radio 4's Cabin Pressure.
The Kids from "Fame" was the group name of several cast members from the American TV series Fame who had a number of hit singles and albums at the height of the show's success in the United Kingdom. This success culminated in tours of Britain, where they performed live in concert. A live album was subsequently released.
Serinda Swan is a Canadian actress, best known for her work in film and television. She stars as Karla Dixon in the second season of the Amazon Prime Video series Reacher. From 2019 to 2022, she starred as Jenny Cooper in the CBC/CW crime drama series Coroner. In 2017, she starred in Marvel's Inhumans and HBO's Ballers, and also portrayed Anne Bancroft in the first season of Feud (2017). Previously, she guest starred on the WB/CW Superman prequel series Smallville as Zatanna Zatara, a DC Comics-inspired recurring character who is an actual magician. She also starred as Paige Arkin in the USA Network action drama series Graceland (2013–2015) and as Erica Reed in the A&E drama series Breakout Kings (2011–2012). She is the director and cofounder of an online education technology company called Blueprint Kids.
