20 Milestone Celebrity Birthdays in October

Neil deGrasse Tyson, Jane Krakowski, Sheryl Underwood and Tony Shalhoub among those looking forward to banner years

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Nicholas DeRenzo,

AARP

Published September 28, 2023

Oct. 2: Donna Karan, 75

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The fashion legend left behind her namesake DKNY brand in 2015 to focus on her Urban Zen line, a clothing and lifestyle company with a charitable foundation attached. The move has allowed her to pursue some very cool projects that combine fashion and philanthropy: This spring, for instance, she recruited designers like Michael Kors and Tommy Hilfiger to create new looks using vintage military clothing, with proceeds from the auction supporting Veteran Services USA and their innovative PTSD treatment.

Oct. 3: Neve Campbell, 50

An alum of the tear-jerking family drama Party of Five, the Canadian actress became one of the great scream queens of her generation when she played Sidney Prescott in the blockbuster Scream franchise, most recently in the 2022 sequel. She famously sat out of this year’s Scream VI over contract disputes, and series creator Kevin Williamson remarked of the controversy: “All I can say is, ‘Pay her the money.’” Campbell most recently returned to television with two very different shows: Peacock’s postapocalyptic action comedy Twisted Metal, on which she plays the head of New San Francisco, and The Lincoln Lawyer, a Netflix legal drama from David E. Kelley.

Oct. 5: Neil deGrasse Tyson, 65

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Few contemporary scientists have enjoyed as much fame as the charismatic astrophysicist, who has been the director of New York City’s Hayden Planetarium, the host of the StarTalk podcast and the executive science editor and narrator of the Emmy-winning Cosmos, a successor to the classic Carl Sagan series. Last year, he released the new book Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization, in which he steps back — way back — to offer a big picture view on topics like religion, gender, race, war, politics and beauty.

Oct. 5: Steve Miller, 80

The 2016 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee has topped the Billboard Hot 100 singles charts three times, with “Rock’n Me,” “Abracadabra” and “The Joker,” which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. This year, he honored the milestone by heading back out on the road with his bandmates, with tour dates scheduled through this December, and they also released a new two-disc set called J50: The Evolution of The Joker, which features 27 previously unreleased demos, live performances, outtakes and rehearsals, with narration throughout from the Space Cowboy himself.

Oct. 8: Chevy Chase, 80

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An original member of the Not Ready for Primetime Players, Chase only lasted on Saturday Night Live for one year, before branching out with movies like National Lampoon’s Vacation and Fletch. He enjoyed a return to the small screen with the cult sitcom Community, but on-set tensions led to his departure from the series after four seasons. (He’s not expected to return for the show’s in-the-works Peacock movie sequel.) This fall, Chase reunited with his SNL pal Dan Aykroyd for the horror comedy Zombie Town, based on a book by the YA frightmaster R.L. Stine.

Oct. 9: Jackson Browne, 75

The Rock & Roll Hall of Famer and political activist released his latest album Downhill From Everywhere in 2021, and it proved that he was still an artist with something to say: His lyrics tackled topics as diverse as immigration and environmental collapse, and he was rewarded with a Grammy nomination for best Americana album. He’s also remained a vibrant live act as well, playing five nights at the Venetian in Las Vegas and three nights at the Pantages Theater in Los Angeles this month.

Oct. 9: Tony Shalhoub, 70

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The stage and screen actor struck TV gold thrice, with Wings, Monk and later The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, winning his fourth Emmy for the role of mathematics professor-turned-theater critic and curmudgeonly patriarch Abe Weissman. The Broadway stage, of course, isn’t foreign to Shalhoub, who picked up a Tony for his role in The Band’s Visit. This year, he played former PepsiCo CEO Roger Enrico in Eva Longoria’s Flamin’ Hot about the creation of the infamous Flamin’ Hot Cheetos by a Frito Lay janitor. Next up, he’s set to return to perhaps his most beloved role as detective Adrian Monk in the Peacock-exclusive TV movie Mr. Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie, which will see him solving — you guessed it! — one last case, involving his stepdaughter as she preps for her wedding.

Oct. 10: Mario Lopez, 50

The ’90s heartthrob will perhaps forever be best known for his role as A.C. Slater on Saved by the Bell, and in 2020, Lopez returned to the halls of Bayside High for Peacock’s reboot, on which an older and wiser Slater was now a P.E. teacher at his alma mater. For more than 15 years, Lopez has also enjoyed a reputation as one of Hollywood’s go-to hosts on shows like The X Factor, America’s Best Dance Crew, Extra and Access Hollywood, on which he’s reported the latest entertainment world trends and breaking news stories for more than 1,000 episodes.

Oct. 10: Tanya Tucker, 65

Nearly a half-century after she reached the top 10 on the country charts with her cover of the song “Delta Dawn” at the age of 13, the outlaw country legend saw her Grammy drought come to an end in 2020: After 10 previous nominations, she finally took home two trophies for best country song (“Bring My Flowers Now”) and best country album (While I’m Livin’). The recording of that album was documented in last year’s critically acclaimed film The Return of Tanya Tucker — Featuring Brandi Carlile, and her hits kept coming this spring when she was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.

Oct. 11: Jane Krakowski, 55

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The Tony-winning Broadway star got her start at the age of 18 playing a dining car in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s train-themed, roller skate musical Starlight Express. After making her way to the small screen in Ally McBeal, Krakowski earned a quintet of Emmy nominations for her scene-stealing turns in the Tina Fey–produced sitcoms 30 Rock and Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. More recently, she combined her passions for making people laugh and tap their toes in the Apple TV+ musical sitcom Schmigadoon!, on which she played a spoof of The Sound of Music’s baroness and a gender-swapped homage to Chicago’s razzle-dazzle lawyer Billy Flynn.

Oct. 12: Hugh Jackman, 55

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Perhaps no actor in Hollywood history has so effortlessly skirted the line between action hero and song-and-dance man as this Aussie triple threat, who recently trod the boards as Harold Hill in the revival of The Music Man. Following his Golden Globe–nominated turn in the drama The Son (itself based on a stage play), Jackman returns to the role of Wolverine in next year’s Deadpool 3, and he recently revealed that his bulking-up plan involves eating more than 8,000 calories a day!

Oct. 16: Tim Robbins, 65

A man of many talents, The Shawshank Redemption star earned a best director Oscar nomination for Dead Man Walking and later took home the best supporting actor trophy for his turn in Mystic River. In recent years, he’s become a force on prestige television, playing the U.S. secretary of state in the HBO political comedy The Brink, a progressive Portland dad in Here and Now, and a crime boss in Castle Rock, a psychological horror series based on the works of Stephen King. This year, he returned in the acclaimed dystopian Apple TV+ series Silo, which is set in a vast underground bunker after a mysterious disaster.

Oct. 17: Alan Jackson, 65

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In 2021, the cowboy-hat-wearing Country Music Hall of Famer released his 21-track, nearly 83-minute album Where Have You Gone, his first in six years. Jackson also revealed that he had been diagnosed with the degenerative Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, which causes nerve damage, but on a recent episode of his daughter’s podcast, he mentioned that he still plans to release more music. “The creative part jumps out every now and then,” he says. “I’m always scribbling down ideas and thinking about melodies, and I feel like there’ll be some more music to come.”

Oct. 20: Viggo Mortensen, 65

A three-time Oscar nominee, most recently for Green Book, Viggo Mortensen is perhaps best known to moviegoers as the brave Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Following his turn in last year’s Thirteen Lives, about the rescue of the Thai boys’ soccer team from a flooded cave, he’s set to appear in another based-on-a-true-story drama, with David Mamet’s upcoming JFK thriller Assassination. This fall, he pulled triple duty with the 1860s-set Western The Dead Don’t Hurt, which he wrote, directed, and costarred in as a Danish immigrant who starts a relationship with an independent French Canadian woman played by Vicky Krieps.

Oct. 22: Catherine Deneuve, 80

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Widely considered one of the greatest French stars to ever grace the silver screen, Deneuve has received 14 César Award nominations, more than any actress other than Isabelle Huppert, and critic Pauline Kael once called her “the French Grace Kelly.” Over the years, she’s mastered musicals (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg), psychological thrillers (Repulsion) and historical epics (Indochine), and this month, she’s taking on the biopic genre, starring as former French First Lady Bernadette Chirac in the satirical comedy Bernadette, which Deneuve described as “the story of a woman who emerges from her mold and acquires strength and freedom over time.”

Oct. 22: Chistopher Lloyd, 85

Character actor Christopher Lloyd has amassed a résumé filled with lovable oddballs, from Jim Ignatowski on Taxi to Doc Brown in the Back to the Future franchise to Uncle Fester in the Addams Family films. Over the years, he’s maintained his mile-wide range, on screen and stage, appearing as King Lear in a 2021 production in the Berkshires and Commissioner Helgait on the Star Wars series The Mandalorian. Next up, he’ll star in an undisclosed role in Knuckles, a Paramount+ spin-off series of the Sonic the Hedgehog films, alongside Stockard Channing and Idris Elba.

Oct. 25: Marion Ross, 95

One of the most iconic sitcom matriarchs in TV history, Marion Ross earned two Emmy nominations for her role as Marion Cunningham on the 1950s-set Happy Days, and she returned to the decade once again as a Jewish-American grandmother in Brooklyn Bridge, for which she picked up two more nods. Despite officially retiring from on-screen acting in 2018, she appeared in Senior Entourage in 2021, a mockumentary that costarred Ed Asner and Helen Reddy.

Oct. 26: Natalie Merchant, 60

The former lead singer of the 10,000 Maniacs and an alt-rock hitmaker in her own right, Merchant stepped away from the spotlight for the past five years after being diagnosed with a degenerative spinal disease that temporarily robbed her of her singing voice. This spring, after the long road to recovery, she released Keep Your Courage, her first album of all-new material since 2014. She described the album as “a song cycle that maps the journey of a courageous heart” and followed it up with a 37-city tour that sees her performing some dates with a live orchestra.

Oct. 28: Sheryl Underwood, 60

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The Little Rock–born comedian got her start in the late 1980s, when she was named the first female finalist in the Miller Lite Comedy Search competition. In 2011, Underwood joined CBS’ hit daytime show The Talk, on which she currently ranks as the longest-running panelist, and she earned a Daytime Emmy in 2017 alongside her cohosts Julie Chen Moonves, Sara Gilbert, Sharon Osbourne and Aisha Tyler. She has also shown off her conversational prowess and quick wit on the Sheryl Underwood Podcast, which sees her discussing topics as diverse as the NFL, politics and soap operas.

Oct. 31: Dermot Mulroney, 60

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The titular BFF in My Best Friend’s Wedding, Dermot Mulroney is also a classically trained cellist who has played on the scores of films like Young Guns, The Wedding Date, The Family Stone and August: Osage County. He’s been keeping incredibly busy on-screen, with many new projects listed on his IMDb page since last year. Among the standouts are the LeBron James biopic Shooting Stars, in which he played college hoops coach Keith Dambrot, and Showtime’s Ghosts of Beirut miniseries, about the real-life manhunt for a Lebanese terrorist over decades. He’s also joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe, appearing as the president of the United States in the new Disney+ series Secret Invasion.

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Nicholas DeRenzo is a contributing writer who covers entertainment and travel. Previously he was executive editor of United Airlines’ Hemispheres magazine and his work has appeared in the New York Times, Conde Nast Traveler, Travel & Leisure, Sunset and New York magazine.