March 14 - Billy Crystal

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On this day, in 1948, William Edward Crystal was born in Manhattan, New York. As a toddler, Billy's family moved to Long Island so his father could take over his maternal grandfather's record store, the Commodore Music Store. The store was a big promoter of jazz musicians through it's record label, Commodore Records, founded by Billy's Uncle Milt. As a result, he grew up constantly surrounded by jazz legends. Louis Armstrong and Pee Wee Russell were frequent dinner guests. He saw his first movie in a theater, Shane (featuring future co-star Jack Palance), sitting on the lap of Billie Holiday. Billy and his brothers would entertain everyone with routines they'd memorized from comedy albums from their fathers store It was a pretty idyllic life until his mid teens. In 1963, unable to compete with new discount record chains, Commodore Music was forced to close and, a few months later, Billy's dad suffered a fatal heart attack at the age of 54.

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Billy graduated from Long Beach High School in 1965 and moved on to Marshall University in West Virginia on a baseball scholarship. He would not get a single at-bat at the school, however. The baseball program was axed in his first year. Rather than return to Marshall the following year, Billy stayed in New York (mainly because of a cute girl, Janice Goldfinger, to whom he's been married since 1970) and began studying acting at the Herbert Berghof Studio and directing at New York University. He graduated in 1970 with a Bachelor's degree and immediately put it to good use as a stand up comedian.

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Billy spent most of the Seventies doing all the things a stand up comic does. He performed at colleges and in coffee houses in a trio with friends, eventually creating a solo act playing gigs at comedy clubs. To keep his comedy career afloat, he subsidized his income as a substitute teacher in the New York City public school system (a fertile ground for bits for his act, I'm sure). He was scheduled to appear on the very first episode of Saturday Night Live, but his sketch was cut at the last minute (he made up for it, and then some, later). He also made the rounds on the syndicated game show circuit and still holds the record for getting his contestant the the top of The $20,000 Pyramid the fastest (26 seconds). He was part of the Dean Martin Roast of Muhammad Ali and a guest on the first Tonight Show with Johnny Carson (he would also appear on Carson's last show 22 years later).

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In 1977, Billy's acting career began with a bang when he became part of the cast of Soap. His portrayal of Jodie Dallas is sometimes credited with being the first openly gay character on television (it was actually the second, the first happened on The Corner Bar, a 1972 series that only lasted 16 episodes). Although Jodie would have relationships with women over the course of the series (and the network would be really skittish about anything overtly same-sex) Billy and the producers maintained that he was gay the whole time. While highly controversial with the religious right, Jodie never actually received any protests from the gay community (once some initial fears were satisfactorily dealt with).

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When Soap ended it's run in 1981, Billy was given his own variety show The Billy Crystal Comedy Hour but it only lasted two episodes. He then hosted Saturday Night Live and joined the regular cast for a season in 1984. His big contribution to the SNL oeuvre was the talk show host Fernando and the catch phrase "You look maahvelous!" Billy's most successful run on television is undoubtedly as an awards show host. He's emceed three Grammy Awards (all in a row) and hosted the Oscars nine times (second only to Bob Hope's nineteen turns) earning himself two Emmy Awards in the process.

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Billy's film career did not begin as well as his television one. His debut was in a Joan Rivers directed clunker called Rabbit Test in 1978. He plays the world's first pregnant man, a premise which definitely has potential, but there's a reason Joan never directed anything ever again (it is notable only for being the big screen debut of Billy and Michael Keaton). Things picked up for Billy when he teamed with Rob Reiner for three films. After a bit part in This Is Spinal Tap, Billy gave a star turn as Miracle Max in The Princess Bride. The duo's third film together, When Harry Met Sally..., is arguably Billy's best performance ever and earned him a Golden Globe nomination.

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In the years since, Billy's films have been a mixed bag. He earned another Golden Glob nomination for the classic Western comedy City Slickers (with Jack Palance) and helped start Robert DeNiro's comedy career with Analyze This but also did films like the box office bomb Father's Day. He actually used his degree in directing for the first time in 1992 for Mr. Saturday Night (a box office flop that was nonetheless nominated for a few acting awards) and again in 1995 on Forget Paris (a modest box office success). In 2001, Billy directed a HBO movie, 61*, which chronicled the race to break Babe Ruth's single season home run record and nabbed him an Emmy nomination for directing.

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Billy could have become part of the Disney family in 1995. He was asked to take on the role of Buzz Lightyear in Toy Story. He turned it down. The subsequent popularity of that franchise was definitely an influence when, six years later, he accepted the part of Mike Wazowski in Monsters, Inc. He reprised the role twelve years later for the prequel Monsters University and made a cameo as Mike Car in 2006's Cars.

In recent years, Billy has written a memoir of his father, 700 Sundays, which was developed from a successful one man show of the same name on Broadway. It won a Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event in 2005, He is part owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks baseball team, which earned him a World Series ring in 2001 when his team triumphed over his beloved New York Yankees. And I would be terribly remiss if I didn't mention the decades of philanthropy Billy has done, starting with hosting Comic Relief in 1986, his signing of a Harley Davidson motorcycle that supported Gulf Coast relief in 2005 and his continued participation in the Simon Wiesanthal Center Museum of Tolerance. Happy birthday Billy. May we be the one millionth person to tell you that you really do look maahvelous (and ask if you fee

l up to another Academy Awards broadcast; they could really use you).

November 28 - Randy Newman

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On this day, in 1943, Randall Stuart Newman was born in Los Angeles, California. Born on his father's 30th birthday, Randy spent some of his youth living in New Orleans before his family returned to Los Angeles at the age of 11. You could say that he later went into the family business: three of his uncles (Alfred, Lionel and Emil) and four of his cousins (Thomas, Maria, David and Joey) are also film composers. Although Randy didn't start out that way.

At the ripe old age of 17, Randy became a professional songwriter. He released a single, Golden Gridiron Boy, in 1962 as a performer but it was a flop and he wouldn't perform again for several years because of it. The same year, Randy gained exposure (and the royalties that come with it) when The Fleetwoods released his song They Tell Me It's Summer as the B-side of one of their hits. For those of you kids who don't know what a B-side is, go ask your grandparents. Throughout the rest of the Sixties, Randy's songs were recorded by such artists as Dusty Springfield, Gene Pitney and Petula Clark. He even saw several of songs become top 40 hits in the United Kingdom during this time.

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In 1968, Randy released his first album as a performer, the self titled Randy Newman. It didn't catch on with audiences but was a critical success and many of its songs were covered by other groups, so he still made money. The track I Think It's Going to Rain Today became something of a standard (the best known version is perhaps Bette Midler's on the Beaches soundtrack). Throughout the Seventies, Randy continued to write songs for other groups (like Mama Told Me Not to Come for Three Dog Night) while occasionally putting out albums of his own. The early albums never really became great commercial successes, but Randy built a large following anyways.  In 1974, he had his first success when the album Good Old Boys reached number 36 on the charts. Three years later, he cracked the top ten with Little Criminals featuring the hit song Short People.

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Randy's work composing for film actually began in 1971 when he penned the score to Norman Lear's Cold Turkey. It would be ten more years, though before he did it again. The wait was worth it. For 1981's Ragtime, Randy was nominated for two Academy Awards. Thus began his second career of composing both film scores and songs used in those films. His work can be heard on such movies as Pleasantville, Awakenings and Meet the Parents. Not only did he write songs for The Three Amigos, he co-wrote the script and provided the voice for the singing bush.

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Randy has become a staple for Pixar releases. Starting with their first feature, Toy Story, Randy has not only scored a total of eight Pixar films so far, but also written and performed songs for some of them: A Bug's Life, Toy Story 2 and 3, Monsters, Inc., Cars, Monsters University and Cars 3. He will return next year as the composer on Toy Story 4. His work on those eight movies garnered him several Oscar nominations, including two wins for Best Original Song for Monsters, Inc and Toy Story 3. The win for Monsters, Inc. actually ended his unwanted distinction for the most nominations without a win after losing 15 times. He still quips that his percentages aren't great as he's only won twice in 20 nominations.

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Randy also has the honor of scoring the last traditionally animated Walt Disney Pictures feature, 2009's The Princess and the Frog. Set in Louisiana, the mix of jazz, zydeco and blues was perfectly suited to Randy's style and he even got an animated version of himself in the film, albeit as a firefly. Two more Oscar nominations came his way for the songs Almost There and Down in New Orleans. Randy had previously written the music for Disney's version of James and the Giant Peach as well.

At the age of 75, Randy continues to write new songs, provide the scores for new movies and perform. He released an album just last year called Dark Matter. He scored last year's The Meyerowitz Stories and has at least one coming out next year.  In 2002, he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, became a Disney Legend in 2007, and a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame honoree in 2013. In short, he shows no signs of slowing down much. And for fans of his quirky songs and style, that's a very good thing.

September 22 - Bonnie Lynn Hunt

On this day, in 1961, Bonnie Lynn Hunt was born in Chicago, Illinois. As the sixth of seven children in an Irish/Polish Catholic family, Bonnie learned early on that life can be noisy and chaotic and that it helps if you know how to improvise.

Bonnie worked part time as a nurse's aide while attending Chicago's Notre Dame High School for Girls. After graduation she became a nurse at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in oncology. Since the cancer ward of a hospital doesn't lend itself to much in the way of lightheartedness, Bonnie co-founded an improv group in 1984 called An Impulsive Thing. Two years later she joined Second City, keeping her day job to pay the bills. Two years after that, she had a life-changing lunch break: an audition for the movie Rainman.

Bonnie got the part of waitress Sally Dibbs in the Dustin Hoffman/Tom Cruise vehicle. Two years later (there seems to be a pattern forming here) she would appear on the small screen in a show called Grand. I loved that show, at least the first season of it, but the network managed to kill it in the second season, like so many things the networks touch, and it died a horrible death. She was offered a role on Saturday Night Live but turned it down as she prefers more improvisation than Lorne Michaels does. She also declined a replacement role on Designing Women, instead joining season two of the Randy Quaid/Johnathan Winters sitcom, Davis Rules, in 1992. Unfortunately, season two was also that shows last season. In 1993, she had a sitcom that lasted only five episodes, The Building, that was filmed live and generally left any mistakes in. Two years later, a good chunk of the cast of The Building would return for Bonnie, another attempt at an improvisational loose comedy. Alas, it was critically acclaimed (again I found myself in the minority that loved it) but only made it 11 episodes.

Bonnie had returned to the big screen in 1992 in Beethoven with Charles Grodin. A sequel happened the following year, as well as a turn in Dave with Kevin Kline. For the next several years, Bonnie worked steadily in such films as Jumanji, Jerry Maguire and The Green Mile, which earned her a SAG Award nomination. In 2000, she wrote and directed the movie Return to Me starring David Duchovny, Minnie Driver and Carol O'Connor in his final performance. In 2003, she starred with Steve Martin in Cheaper by the Dozen and its sequel, you guessed it, two years later.

In 2007, she tried her hand at hosting a talk show. The Bonnie Hunt Show was loosely modeled after Live with Regis and Kelly in that Bonnie made a point of interacting with the audience as much as possible. The show ran for three seasons and earned Bonnie a Daytime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Talk Show Host in 2010.

You many have noticed that there are some gaps in Bonnie's history so far. That's because starting in 1998, Bonnie has had an increasing presence in the Disney catalog, mostly in Pixar films. Her first character was Rosie in A Bug's Life. She next appeared as Mrs. Flint in Monsters, Inc. Bonnie then played Sally Carrera in Cars, for which she also received writing credit, Dolly in Toy Story 3, Sally again in Cars 2, Karen Graves in Monsters University, Bonnie Hopps in Zootopia and Sally again in Cars 3. She also has a recurring role on Sophia the First as Aunt Tilly. Bonnie also starred in a sitcom produced by Touchstone Television from 2002-04 called Life with Bonnie, earning Golden Globe and Primetime Emmy nominations along the way.

When not lending her voice to subtly hilarious characters, Bonnie is, as all real Chicagoans are, an avid Cubs fan and, in a nod to her former profession, a board member and ardent supporter of the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation.