'Spider-Man' Stars: Before They Were Famous

Martin Sheen
Born Ramon Antonio Gerardo Estevez to a Spanish father and an Irish mother in Ohio, Sheen, who plays Uncle Ben, intentionally bombed the entrance test for the University of Dayton so that he could pursue acting in New York, a profession his father disapproved of. Soon after adopting this stage name, Sheen started landing TV gigs, but his first taste of critical attention came with a supporting role in the 1968 movie "The Subject Was... more 

Martin Sheen
Born Ramon Antonio Gerardo Estevez to a Spanish father and an Irish mother in Ohio, Sheen, who plays Uncle Ben, intentionally bombed the entrance test for the University of Dayton so that he could pursue acting in New York, a profession his father disapproved of. Soon after adopting this stage name, Sheen started landing TV gigs, but his first taste of critical attention came with a supporting role in the 1968 movie "The Subject Was Roses," which nabbed him Golden Globe nomination. In 1973, he starred in Terrence Malick's masterpiece "Badlands." On the strength of that performance, Sheen was given the dubious honor of playing Capt. Benjamin Willard in "Apocalypse Now." The production, which demanded 12 months in the jungle with a director who was slowly losing his mind, proved to be so stressful that it gave Sheen a minor heart attack. In 1987, Sheen played an unemployed airline worker opposite his son, Charlie, in "Wall Street," and in 1999 he began portraying the president of the United States in the long-running TV series "The West Wing." less