Michael J. Fox is an '80s movie icon and likable former sitcom star. He's also
afflicted with a crippling nerve disorder.

Canadian-born Fox left his family behind at 18 and moved to Los Angeles to make it in Hollywood. Four years later, he finally scored the TV role that would make his career: Alex P. Keaton on Family Ties. He quickly parlayed his TV fame into film roles, starring in the 1985 cult classic Teen Wolf and as Marty McFly in the blockbuster Back to the Future franchise. In 1996, he returned to TV on the mega-hit Spin City, but the advancing effects of Parkinson's forced him to retire from the hit show in 2000, and he was replaced by normal-at-the-time Charlie Sheen.

Fox was just 29 when he was diagnosed with Parkinson's, and he finally spoke
out in 1998, when his tremors became too obvious to hide. Fox has limited his
acting work to cameos, like Boston Legal and The Good Wife, but he's been far from inactive, spending most of his time raising money for his foundation. Drama surrounding his condition mounted after Fox appeared in a 2006 Missouri political ad for stem cell research, and dickwad Rush Limbaugh made the outrageous claim that Fox had exaggerated his symptoms. Limbaugh later publicly apologized.

Fox married his Family Ties costar Tracy Pollan in 1988 and they have four
children. [Image via Getty]