Kevin Pollak

Kevin Elliot Pollak (born October 30, 1957) is an American actor, impressionist, and comedian. He started performing stand-up comedy at the age of 10 and touring professionally at the age of 20. In 1988, he landed a role in Willow, his first major role in a film. Pollak is an avid poker player, hosting weekly home games with some of Hollywood's A-list celebrities. He finished 134th out of 6,598 entrants in the 2012 World Series of Poker, his winnings totaling to $52,718.

Early life

Pollak was born in San Francisco, California, the youngest son of Elaine Harlow and Robert "Bobby" Pollak. He has one older brother, who lives with his family in Boston, Massachusetts. He attended high school at Pioneer High School in San Jose, California.

Career

Acting

As an actor, Pollak's most notable roles are usually playing the best friend or confidant characters to the leading men, as he did in Ricochet (1991), A Few Good Men (1992), End of Days (1999), and The Wedding Planner (2001). However, he has also played a wide variety of parts, such as a criminal in The Usual Suspects (1995) and a gangster in The Whole Nine Yards (2000). He also briefly hosted Celebrity Poker Showdown in its first season. His most substantial role to date was in Deterrence (1999), in which he played the main character, a Vice President who must take over for a deceased President and deal with a nuclear crisis.

Kevin

Kevin (/ˈkɛv.ɪn/; Irish: Caoimhín [kiː.vʲiːnʲ], Middle Irish: Caoimhghín [kəiṽʲ.ʝiːnʲ], Old Irish: Cóemgein [koiṽʲ.ɣʲinʲ], Scottish Gaelic: Caomhainn, Latin: Coemgenus) is a male first name of Goidelic origin. Among the earliest famous bearers of the name was Saint Kevin, although Kevin is not a biblical name. Caoimhghín derives from the Irish caomh (Old Irish cóem) "kind, honest, handsome" and -gin (Old Irish gein) "birth". Kevin influenced the similarly Irish-derived Kelvin, as well as the Latin Calvin. "Kevin" is one of the top 100 male baby names in Chile, France, Hungary, Ireland, the Netherlands, Northern Ireland, Norway, Slovenia, Sweden and the United States. It can also be spelled Kevyn, Keven, or Kevan.

In the United Kingdom, its popularity peaked during the 1950s and 1960s, when it was frequently among the 20 most popular male first names, but by the 1990s it had fallen out of the top 100. In France, the name was very popular during the 1980s and 1990s, especially in the lower class. There is wide variation both on the pronunciation and accentation. A more Franco-Celtic pronunciation is often written as Kévin, while a consciously Anglo-American pronunciation is written without the accent. For example, French horseman Kevin Staut's and French runner Kévin Hautcœur's official websites differ, though the French media may pronounce both names similarly.

Christopher Walken

Ronald Walken, known professionally as Christopher Walken (born March 31, 1943), is an American actor. He has appeared in more than 100 films and television shows, including The Deer Hunter, Annie Hall, The Prophecy trilogy, The Dogs of War, Brainstorm, The Dead Zone, A View to a Kill, True Romance, Pulp Fiction, Sleepy Hollow, Catch Me If You Can, Kill the Irishman, Hairspray and Seven Psychopaths, as well as music videos by many popular recording artists. Walken has received a number of awards and nominations during his career, including winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1978 for his portrayal of Nikanor "Nick" Chebotarevich in The Deer Hunter.

Walken's films have grossed more than $1 billion in the United States. He has also played the lead in the Shakespeare plays Hamlet, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, and Coriolanus. He is a popular guest-host of Saturday Night Live, having hosted seven times as of April 2008. His most notable roles on the show include record producer Bruce Dickinson in the "More Cowbell" sketch, as the double-entendre-named disgraced Confederate officer, Colonel Angus, and his multiple appearances as The Continental.