Alan Alda

Biography: The son of an actor and a beauty queen, Alan Alda began acting as a teen and found work on the small and big screens in his 20s. But it wasn't until he signed on to seminal sitcom M*A*S*H that he became a household name, eventually winning Emmys for acting, writing and directing. In real life, Alda is a private family man who makes his home in New Jersey, far from Tinseltown. After two decades in which he primarily worked in film, Alda returned to series TV in 2004 as a Republican senator on The West Wing. The next year, at age 69, Alda scored an entertainment hat trick when he was nominated for an Oscar, an Emmy and a Tony. Also the author of two memoirs, Alda has continued doing film and television work into his 70s, narrating PBS's The Human Spark in 2010.