Leslie Nielsen

Nielsen was cast as Dr. Rumack. When he was told, "Surely you can't be serious," and responded with the now-immortal line, a comedy icon was born.

Before he was fumbling through Airplane! or tripping over bushes in The Naked Gun , Nielsen was a serious dramatic actor. But the moment Hollywood let him be ridiculous with a perfectly straight face, history was made. Leslie Nielsen

The success of Airplane! led to the short-lived but brilliant TV series Police Squad! , where Nielsen introduced the world to Detective Frank Drebin. While the show only lasted six episodes, the character found a permanent home in The Naked Gun trilogy. Nielsen was cast as Dr

Born in Saskatchewan, Canada, in 1926, Nielsen didn’t start out chasing laughs. After a stint in the Royal Canadian Air Force and working as a radio DJ, he moved to New York to study acting. Before he was fumbling through Airplane

. For over 30 years, he was a serious dramatic actor, often cast as a "straight-laced" lead in sci-fi classics like Forbidden Planet (1956) or disaster epics like The Poseidon Adventure Everything changed in 1980 with