Cindy Lou Pickett (born April 18, 1947) is an American actress best known for her 1970s role as Jackie Marler-Spaulding on the CBS soap Guiding Light; her role as Dr. Carol Novino on the hugely popular television drama St. Elsewhere in the 1980s; for her critically acclaimed performance as the real-life Kay Stayner, the mother of a boy who was kidnapped for several years, in the dramatic TV movie I Know My First Name Is Steven; and for her cinematic roles and performances as Valerie St. John in Roger Vadim's little-known 1980 erotic cult film, Night Games, for which she would have the leading role, and as the tough-as-nails and heroic Dr. Jane Norris in the 1989 sci-fi-horror film DeepStar Six. Pickett, however, is handily best known to audiences for her highly memorable turn as Katie Bueller, Matthew Broderick's titular character's loving and unsuspecting mother, in the 1986 classic and iconic American comedy movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

Pickett made a major departure from her soap opera image when she played the central role in the 1980 erotic film Night Games, directed by Roger Vadim. It was a sexually charged role involving numerous nude scenes, however the film never found an audience and did not boost Pickett's career. In the 1981 mystery/crime drama Margin for Murder, Pickett played the role of Velda, Mike Hammer's (Kevin Dobson) loyal and devoted secretary. She played "Jackie Marler" on the soap opera The Guiding Light from 1976 to 1980, "Vanessa Sarnac" on the ABC weekly TV series Call to Glory from 1984 to 1985, and she appeared on the hospital drama TV series St. Elsewhere from 1986 to 1988.

Elisabeth Judson Shue (born October 6, 1963) is an American actress and producer, most famous for her roles in the films The Karate Kid, Adventures in Babysitting, Cocktail, Back to the Future Parts II and III and Leaving Las Vegas, for which she won five acting awards and was nominated for an Academy Award, a Golden Globe and a BAFTA.

Shue was born in Wilmington, Delaware. Her mother, Anne Harms (née Wells), was vice president of the private banking division of the Chemical Banking Corporation. Her father, James Shue, a lawyer and real estate developer, was the president of the International Food and Beverage Corporation and unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. Congress in New Jersey in 1970, as a liberal Republican. Shue's mother was a descendant of Pilgrim leader William Brewster, while her father's family emigrated from Germany to Pennsylvania in the early 19th century. Shue's younger brother, Andrew, is also an actor.

Shue grew up in Bergen and Essex counties in New Jersey. Her parents divorced while she was in the fourth grade.^{[dead link]} Shue graduated from Columbia High School, in Maplewood, New Jersey, and attended Wellesley College and Harvard University, from which she withdrew to pursue her acting career. She returned to Harvard to finish her degree in Government in 2000. Shue was awarded entrance into Columbia High School's Wall of Fame in 1994, along with her brother Andrew.

Call to Glory is an American television series that aired 23 episodes during the 1984-1985 TV season on the ABC-TV network. Starring Craig T. Nelson as a USAF pilot, Colonel Raynor Sarnac. In the course of its production run, it drifted away from its original reasonably authentic setting and storyline which was centered at Edwards Air Force Base in the early 1960s time period. The show was cancelled at the end of the season, because of low ratings (due to having to compete with the Top 20 hits Scarecrow and Mrs. King on CBS and TV's Bloopers and Practical Jokes on NBC).

Somewhat inspired by the test pilot accounts in the Tom Wolfe book The Right Stuff, it was the first post-Vietnam War television show to portray the military in a favorable light.^{[citation needed]}

Heavily promoted during ABC's broadcast of the 1984 Summer Olympics; its pilot episode, which aired August 13, 1984, related to the U-2 flights over Cuba during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. The pilot episode was filmed at Laughlin Air Force Base, near Del Rio, Texas, which was the Air Force's original U-2 base and where the initial U-2 flights during the Crisis originated, prior to their shifting to McCoy Air Force Base, Florida for the remainder of the crisis.