Actress Courteney Cox

Courteney Cox first got noticed in a nonspeaking part in the video for Bruce Springsteen's single "Dancing In the Dark," in which she plays a concertgoer Springsteen picks out of the crowd to come up onstage and dance with him - which the Boss used to do all the time with female attendees to his shows.

Soon she was a semi-regular guest actress on the TV series "Family Ties." And though it took awhile, Cox - who turns 45 today - finally broke through in 1994 in a big way, playing Monica Geller in the sitcom "Friends."



Since that show ended in 2004, Cox has remained active in televsion and movies. She's married to David Arquette, a scion of one of Hollywood's most prominent families.