Simon Pegg

He and Edgar Wright spent years building something out of Channel 4's fringe comedy schedule. The sitcom Spaced (1999) had a cult following before it had an actual audience. The zombie film they made as a lark, Shaun of the Dead (2004), cost $6.1 million and made $39 million worldwide, including praise from George Romero himself. There's also a genuinely funny irony embedded in the arc: right after Shaun wrapped, Pegg told interviewers they wouldn't go off and do, 'I don't know, Mission: Impossible III.' He then signed on for Mission: Impossible III.

Pegg holds a distinction almost nobody else in his profession can match: major roles in Doctor Who, Star Trek, and Star Wars, across three separate universes. The franchise work has been constant and profitable, but his credibility comes from the Cornetto trilogy scripts he and Wright co-wrote. He's also been more candid than most about his alcoholism during the peak MI years, telling interviewers he was drinking at breakfast and crediting rehab with saving his life. He's finishing out the MI franchise with The Final Reckoning (2025), and a new Wright collaboration is already confirmed.

He wasn't born Simon Pegg. His surname was Beckingham until his parents divorced when he was seven and his mother remarried. He's godfather to Apple Martin, Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin's daughter; Martin returned the favor and became godfather to Pegg's daughter Matilda. He holds a black belt in karate, and Wright deliberately kept him away from Dog Soldiers so that Shaun of the Dead would be his first horror role. His father was a jazz musician and keyboard salesman, and Pegg played drums in a band as a teenager, a thread that keeps surfacing through an otherwise very nerdy career.