Warren Beatty (Clyde Barrow)

Warren Beatty (Clyde Barrow)

Beatty has always seemed the most diffident of stars. In the 45 years since he played Clyde Barrow, he's made just 14 more features, though they've included such legendary films as "McCabe & Mrs. Miller," "Shampoo," "Reds" (which he won an Oscar for directing) and "Ishtar" (a legendary flop). Instead, he's been better known for being Hollywood's most notorious Lothario, though he settled down once he married his "Bugsy" co-star Annette Bening in 1992. The 75-year-old hasn't acted in a feature since his 2001 dud "Town & Country," though he did reprise his title role from the 1990 hit "Dick Tracy" in a 2010 short he directed about the history of the comic-strip sleuth. Aside from awards-show appearances, he's been content to cede the spotlight to Bening or his big sister, Shirley MacLaine.

Faye Dunaway (Bonnie Parker)

Faye Dunaway (Bonnie Parker)

Dunaway was 26 when her first major film role, beret-wearing bankrobber Bonnie Parker, made her an instant star. She played similarly stylish, brittle antiheroines in such unforgettable films as "The Thomas Crown Affair," "Chinatown," and "Network" (winning an Oscar for the last). Her famously campy, over-the-top portrayal of Joan Crawford in 1981's "Mommie Dearest" came to define and destroy her career; it seemed no one could ever look at her as a serious dramatic lead again. Not that that's reduced the demand for her services as a character actress. In the last 30 years, she's appeared in more than 50 movies and TV shows, most recently the 2010 TV movie "A Family Thanksgiving." For many years, the 71-year-old has been developing a film version of the play "Master Class," in which she'll play another legendary diva, opera star Maria Callas.

Gene Hackman (Buck Barrow)

Gene Hackman (Buck Barrow)

Hackman made his film debut opposite Beatty in 1964's "Lilith," but his role as Clyde's brother Buck Barrow in "Bonnie and Clyde" proved his breakout role, earning him an Oscar nomination. He made good on that promise with an Academy Award as reckless cop Popeye Doyle in 1971's "The French Connection." For the next three decades, he was one of Hollywood's busiest and most versatile actors, equally at home in comic and dramatic roles. Highlights included "The Poseidon Adventure," "The Conversation," the "Superman" movies (as villain Lex Luthor), "No Way Out," "Unforgiven" (which won him another Oscar), and "The Royal Tenenbaums. Now 82, Hackman has been quietly enjoying retirement since his last movie, 2004 comedy "Welcome to Mooseport."

Michael J. Pollard (C.W. Moss)

Michael J. Pollard (C.W. Moss)

As with Hackman, "Bonnie and Clyde" provided Pollard with his breakthrough role (as gang member C.W. Moss) and an Oscar nomination. The baby-faced actor soon found himself running a jokey campaign for president before settling into a long career as a character actor, in such films as "Little Fauss and Big Halsey," "Melvin and Howard," "Scrooged," "Dick Tracy" (reuniting him with "Bonnie and Clyde" star Beatty), and "House of 1000 Corpses." Pollard is also credited with coining the phrase "The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys" (which Steve Winwood turned into a hit song for Traffic) and with inspiring Michael Fox to add a J. to his stage name. Now 73, Pollard is due to shoot the comedy "The Next Cassavetes" in September.

Estelle Parsons (Blanche)

Estelle Parsons (Blanche)

Parsons was a lawyer and a political reporter for the "Today" show before turning to acting. "Bonnie and Clyde" was just her second movie, but her performance as Buck Barrow's wife Blanche earned her a Supporting Actress Oscar. She was nominated again the following year for "Rachel, Rachel." She worked again with Hackman in "I Never Sang for My Father" (1970) and with Beatty in "Dick Tracy" 20 years later, but she became better known for her TV roles, as another Blanche on "All in the Family" and as Roseanne's mother on "Roseanne." In the last few years, she's been busy on Broadway in such acclaimed dramas as "Mornings at Seven" and "August: Osage County." The 84-year-old's most recent screen appearance was opposite Al Pacino and Jessica Chastain last year in the Pacino-directed stage documentary "Wilde Salome."

Gene Wilder (Eugene Grizzard)

Gene Wilder (Eugene Grizzard)

Wilder made a memorable screen debut as Eugene Grizzard in "Bonnie and Clyde," followed a few months later by a career-defining role in Mel Brooks' "The Producers." He landed his best-known role in 1971 as the sly candymaker in "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," followed by more films with Brooks ("Young Frankenstein," which Wilder co-wrote, and "Blazing Saddles"). Known for light comedy, he made several movies as part of an unlikely buddy duo with Richard Pryor, including "Silver Streak" and "Stir Crazy." He also made three comedies with Gilda Radner, his wife from 1984 until her death in 1989. He closed out his acting career with an Emmy-winning guest spot as Will's boss on "Will & Grace" in 2002. Now 79, Wilder has said he's retired from acting, though he continues to work as an author. He published his most recent collection of short stories, "What Is This Thing Called Love," in 2010.

Evans Evans (Velma Davis)

Evans Evans (Velma Davis)

TV actress Evans made her film debut opposite Beatty in the 1962 drama "All Fall Down," directed by John Frankenheimer. Within a year, she and the "Manchurian Candidate" director were married. After that, she made few movies, but one of them was "Bonnie and Clyde," in which she played Velma Davis. After "Bonnie," Evans' films included "The Iceman Cometh," "Prophecy," and "Dead Bang." Her last acting appearance was a 1994 guest spot on the TV series "Are You Afraid of the Dark?", but over the last five years, the 75-year-old has appeared in a number of documentaries about the career of her late husband (who died in 2002) and about the making of "Bonnie and Clyde."

Denver Pyle (Frank Hamer)

Character actor Pyle made a career out of playing cowboys and hillbillies. Before playing lawman Frank Hamer in "Bonnie and Clyde," he was best known for the role of jug-band patriarch Briscoe Darling on "The Andy Griffith Show." A decade after "Bonnie," he landed his best-known role, as wily Uncle Jesse on "The Dukes of Hazzard," a role he played from 1979 to 1985. He continued appearing in films and TV, winding down his career with a role as a card sharp in Mel Gibson's Western comedy "Maverick" (1994) and one last turn as Uncle Jesse in the 1997 TV movie "The Dukes of Hazzard Reunion." He was 77 when he died of lung cancer in 1997.

Robert Benton

Born in Waxahachie, Texas, Benton grew up hearing tales of Bonnie and Clyde as local folk heroes, including from his own father, who had attended their funerals. Having lost his job at Esquire magazine, Benton decided to go into screenwriting, collaborating with former Esquire colleague David Newman on the screenplay that made them instant Hollywood successes and earned them both an Oscar nomination. Over the years, as Benton went into directing, he'd be nominated seven times, winning three for writing and directing "Kramer vs. Kramer" and for writing "Places in the Heart" (which he also directed). His last completed film was 2007's "Feast of Love," but the 79-year-old has a Western screenplay in the works called "North of Cheyenne."

Arthur Penn

Penn, whose brother was celebrated fashion photographer Irving Penn, was himself an acclaimed stage and TV director when he broke into film with his first tale of a famous outlaw, Billy the Kid, played by Paul Newman in 1958's "The Left-Handed Gun." He followed that with his adaptation of "The Miracle Worker," the Helen Keller biography that had earned him a Tony on Broadway; the film earned Oscars for both its stars, Patty Duke and Anne Bancroft. He went on to direct several films in tune with the upheavals of the 1960s: "Mickey One" (the first of his French New Wave-style films, and the first to pair him with Warren Beatty), "The Chase" (set in the turbulent South), "Bonnie and Clyde," the satirical "Alice's Restaurant" (based on Arlo Guthrie's anti-Vietnam War protest song), and revisionist Western "Little Big Man." In the 1970s and '80s, he turned to thrillers and crime dramas such as "Night Moves" and "Target" before easing out of film altogether and returning to TV as an executive producer on "Law & Order." He died in 2010 at age 88.