Michael Andrew Fox, known professionally as Michael J. Fox, is a Canadian-American retired actor. Beginning his career in the 1970s, he rose to prominence portraying Alex P. Keaton on the NBC sitcom Family Ties (1982–1989).
Family Ties is an American sitcom television series that aired on NBC for seven seasons, premiering on September 22, 1982, and concluding on May 14, 1989. The series, created by Gary David Goldberg, reflected the move in the United States from the cultural liberalism of the 1960s and 1970s to the conservatism of the 1980s. This culture was particularly expressed through the relationship between young Republican Alex P. Keaton and his ex-hippie parents, Steven and Elyse Keaton.
Carlos Irwin Estévez, known professionally as Charlie Sheen, is an American actor. He has appeared in films such as Platoon (1986), Wall Street (1987), Young Guns (1988), The Rookie (1990), The Three Musketeers (1993), and The Arrival (1996). In the 2000s, when Sheen replaced Michael J. Fox as the star of ABC's Spin City, his portrayal of Charlie Crawford earned him a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor. He then starred as Charlie Harper on the CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men (2003–11), for which he received multiple Golden Globe and Primetime Emmy nominations, and as Dr. Charles "Charlie" Goodson on the FX series Anger Management (2012–14). In 2010, Sheen was the highest-paid actor on television, earning US$1.8 million per episode of Two and a Half Men.
Two and a Half Men is an American television sitcom that originally aired on CBS for twelve seasons from September 22, 2003, to February 19, 2015. Originally starring Charlie Sheen in the lead role alongside Jon Cryer and Angus T. Jones, the series was about a hedonistic jingle writer, Charlie Harper, his uptight brother, Alan, and Alan's mischievous son, Jake. As Alan's marriage falls apart and divorce appears imminent, he and Jake move into Charlie's beachfront Malibu house and complicate Charlie's freewheeling life.
Josiah Edward "Jed" Bartlet is a fictional character from the American television serial drama The West Wing created by Aaron Sorkin and portrayed by actor Martin Sheen. The role earned Sheen a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Television Series Drama in 2001, as well as two SAG Awards.
A television pilot, in United Kingdom and United States television, is a standalone episode of a television series that is used to sell a show to a television network or other distributor. A pilot is created to be a testing ground to gauge whether a series will be successful. It is, therefore, a test episode for the intended television series, an early step in the series development, much like pilot studies serve as precursors to the start of larger activity.
Alan Douglas Ruck is an American actor. He is best known for portraying Cameron Frye, Ferris Bueller's best friend, in John Hughes's film Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986); Stuart Bondek, a lecherous, power-hungry member of the mayor's staff in the ABC sitcom Spin City; and Connor Roy, the eldest son of a media magnate, in the HBO series Succession. His other notable parts include those in Bad Boys (1983), Three Fugitives (1989), Young Guns II (1990), Speed (1994), and Twister (1996). In 2016, he co-starred with Geena Davis in an updated Fox TV adaptation of William Peter Blatty's best-selling novel The Exorcist.
Picket Fences is an American family drama television series about the residents of the town of Rome, Wisconsin, created and produced by David E. Kelley. The show ran from September 18, 1992, to June 26, 1996, on the CBS television network in the United States. It sometimes struggled to maintain a stable primetime audience and had fluctuating ratings, due in part to its Friday night death slot. In its first season on the air it placed 63rd in the prime-time Nielsen ratings and in its second season it moved to 61st. The show's exteriors were shot in the L.A. suburb of Monrovia, California, with many of the townspeople appearing in the background of episodes.
Jonathan Niven Cryer is an American actor, writer, director and producer. Born into a show business family, he made his motion picture debut as a teenage photographer in the 1984 romantic comedy No Small Affair; his breakout role came in 1986, in the John Hughes-written film Pretty in Pink. In 1998, he wrote and produced the independent film Went to Coney Island on a Mission from God... Be Back by Five.
Politics is a common theme in the animated sitcom The Simpsons, and this phenomenon has had some crossover with real American politics. The local politics of the fictional town Springfield feature prominently in many episodes, and character archetypes represent different political concepts within a community. The show satirizes ideas across the political spectrum, though overall it is described as having left-wing and anti-establishment bias. Politicians have been caricatured in many episodes of The Simpsons, including an episode following President George H. W. Bush in response to his public criticism of the show. References to the show also feature in real-world politics. The Simpsons addresses contemporary issues including substance abuse, the economy, education, environmentalism, gun politics, health politics, LGBT rights, immigration and criminal justice. Episodes of the show have also caused international political dispute for its portrayal of foreign countries.
Marita Covarrubias is a fictional character on the American science fiction television series The X-Files. She was initially introduced as an informant, leaking diplomatic information to FBI Special Agent Fox Mulder to aid his investigation of paranormal cases, dubbed X-Files. However, she was revealed to be an agent of the secretive Syndicate, although ultimately betraying that organization on several occasions. Introduced in the fourth season opener "Herrenvolk", the character remained a recurring presence until the series' finale, "The Truth".
Richard Bruce Kind is an American actor and comedian, known for his roles as Dr. Mark Devanow in Mad About You, Paul Lassiter in Spin City (1996–2002), Andy in Curb Your Enthusiasm (2002–2021), and as Arthur in A Serious Man (2009).
Alex P. Keaton is a fictional character on the American television sitcom Family Ties, which aired on NBC for seven seasons, from 1982 to 1989. Family Ties reflected the move in the United States away from the cultural liberalism of the 1960s and 1970s to the conservatism of the 1980s. This was particularly expressed through the relationship between Young Republican Alex and his hippie parents, Steven and Elyse Keaton. President of the United States Ronald Reagan once stated that Family Ties was his favorite television show.
Michael Patrick Boatman is an American actor and writer. He is known for his roles as New York City mayoral aide Carter Heywood in the ABC sitcom Spin City, as U.S. Army Specialist Samuel Beckett in the ABC drama series China Beach, as 101st Airborne soldier Motown in the Vietnam War movie Hamburger Hill, and as sports agent Stanley Babson in the HBO sitcom Arli$$. He also starred in The Good Fight, the Paramount+ spinoff of The Good Wife.
Charles Michael Lorre is an American film & television director, writer, producer, composer and actor.
Victoria Dillard is an American advocate for Parkinson's disease research. She is also a former television and film actress who is best known for her co-starring roles as Janelle Cooper in the ABC sitcom Spin City, as one of the royal bathers in the 1988 Eddie Murphy romantic comedy Coming to America, and as the wife of Denzel Washington's main character in the 1991 action thriller film Ricochet.
The first season of Two and a Half Men, an American television sitcom created by Chuck Lorre and Lee Aronsohn, aired its pilot episode on September 22, 2003, at 9:30 p.m., ET/PT, on CBS, a U.S. broadcast television network. The pilot received great reviews and an Artios Award nomination for Best Casting for TV, Comedy Pilot. In the week of October 1, 2003, the series was ranked 7th highest in the top ten shows of the week according to Nielsen Research, with an average 12.1/18 rating. Thanks to this, the series was able to air another 23 episodes, and was renewed for a second season in 2004. The DVD set was released on Region 2 on September 12, 2005, and on Region 1 on September 11, 2007. Its bonus material included: a blooper, outtakes, a backstage tour with Angus T. Jones and a behind-the-scenes special, with the cast and crew of Two and a Half Men.
The X-Files is an American science fiction–thriller media franchise created by Chris Carter. The franchise generally focused on paranormal or unexplained happenings. The first franchise release—simply titled The X-Files—debuted in September 1993 and ended in May 2002. The show was a hit for Fox, and its characters and slogans became pop culture touchstones in the 1990s. 1996 saw the premiere of a second series set in the same universe but covering a storyline independent of the X-Files mythology, titled Millennium. In 1998, the first X-Files feature film titled The X-Files was released, eventually grossing over $180 million. A spin-off—The Lone Gunmen—was released in 2001 and abruptly canceled. Six years after the initial television series was canceled, another film—The X-Files: I Want to Believe—was released. In January 2016, a tenth season of The X-Files aired, featuring Carter as executive producer and writer, and starring David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson. An eleventh season premiered in January 2018. An animated comedic spin-off entitled The X-Files: Albuquerque is currently in development.
Anger Management is an American television multi-camera sitcom created by Bruce Helford that premiered on FX on June 28, 2012. The series is loosely based on the 2003 film of the same title and stars Charlie Sheen in a variation of the Jack Nicholson character in the film. The series received 5.74 million viewers in its debut, breaking the record as the most-watched sitcom premiere in US cable television history. On November 7, 2014, FX announced that the series would end after its 100th episode, which aired on December 22, 2014.
