Dan Aykroyd

Born: 1 July 1952
Where: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

The Oscar-nominated actor will probably be best remembered for buddy movie The Blues Brothers and the action comedy Ghostbusters.

Born to government workers in Ottawa, he moved to Toronto in 1972 to work for Ivor Reitman, the future Ghostbusters director, at the groundbreaking Citytv.

He worked as a writer-actor for producer Lorne Michaels on The Great Canadian Humour Test but got his big break when he joined the cast of Saturday Night Live.

There he met the late John Belushi and formed the popular music duo The Blues Brothers, which blossomed into a movie by the same name.

He made his big screen debut in Love At First Sight but it wasn't until The Blues Brothers in 1980 that he attracted audience attention.

He followed that with Trading Place alongside Eddie Murphy and he also played Weber in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

In 1984, he scored a massive hit as Dr Raymond Stantz in Ghostbusters with Bill Murray and Sigourney Weaver.

Subsequent appearances included Spies Like Us, Dragnet and My Stepmother is an Alien.

In 1989, he was nominated for a best supporting actor Oscar for Bruce Beresford's Driving Miss Daisy with Morgan Freeman and Jessica Tandy.

In 1991, Aykroyd wrote and directed his first feature film, Nothing But Trouble, in which he starred alongside his pals Chevy Chase and John Candy.

The following year he starred alongside Robert Redford in Sneakers, played studio boss Mack Sennett in Chaplin and starred in the sci-fi comedy Coneheads.

He played Sgt Bilko in the big screen adaptation of the American sitcom and essayed a disturbed himan in the black comedy Grosse Pointe Blank.

Blues Brothers 2000 tried to repeat the original chemistry and Aykroyd also voiced the character of Chip in the cartoon Antz.

Michael Bay cast him in the blockbuster Pearl Harbor while he also appeared in Woody Allen's Curse of the Jade Scorpion.

Aykroyd starred alongside Britney Spears in her feature debut Crossroads and also had a cameo as media mogul Lord Monomark in Stephen Fry's directorial debut Bright Young Things.

A police buff, he rides an Ontario Provincial Police motercycle and sometimes rides shotgun with detectives in squad cars.

He also opened several House of Blues venues across America after being an early investor in the Hard Rock Cafe chain.

Recent work includes the rom-com 50 First Dates and the seasonal comedy Christmas with the Kranks.