A gregarious actor with a smile that lights up the screen, Cuba Gooding, Jr. experienced the highs and lows of show business growing up as the son of his famous singer father. As he explained to the Los Angeles Times on January 5, 1997: "We lived in a big house and had chauffeurs, we'd go backstage at the concerts and then in the fifth grade . . . bang! Rock bottom." When his parents divorced, he moved with his mother, brother and sister out of the limelight and began facing financial hardships, which included stretches of being evicted and living in a car, as well as time on the welfare rolls. While the family was staying in a cheap motel in suburban Orange County, Gooding befriended future personal assistant Shawn Suttles and production company partner Derek Broes, and the three perfected their breakdancing moves, christening themselves the Majestic Vision Breakdancers.

 South African actress Charlize Theron made Oscar and Golden Globe-worthy impressions with heavy-hitting dramatic roles which often saw her struggling to survive oppressive environments. Theron’s own experiences surviving the strife of an unstable childhood home gave her a strong perspective, as did the strong-willed independence that inspired her to head to Europe and begin a professional modeling career while she was still a teenager. But if the 5’10” blonde was misdiagnosed as merely an actress-turned-model for her early supporting roles, that persona was shattered with a pair of Oscar-nominated starring performances in “Monster” (2003) and “North Country” (2005); both portraits of two women who came to deal with second-class citizen status in very different ways.