Merry Christmas — and Happy Birthday!

Born in 1922 in North Carolina, the youngest of eight siblings portrayed a number of femmes fatales during the golden age of Hollywood in 1940s and 1950s. She enchanted millions of men, including Louis B. Mayer, the then-boss of the MGM film production company. When he saw her test shots, he said, "She can't sing, she can't act, she can't talk, She's terrific!"

The Hungarian director was born in 1886 in Budapest and went to Hollywood in the 1920s. There he directed well over 100 movies, including the cult classic "Casablanca," for which he received an Oscar in 1944. On the set, he was considered a despot, whose problems with English made for some amusing anecdotes. Curtiz, who also created the musical romantic comedy film "White Christmas," died in 1962.

The soul singer was born in 1980 in Warri, Nigeria. As a teenager, she fled violence in her family and settled down in Hamburg. She initially lived in a house for asylum seekers and over time built a career in music. In 2010, Nneka appeared on "The Late Show" with David Letterman. She sings in Igbo, English and Nigerian Pidgin and is a protagonist of the DW series "Artists after the Escape."

Born Elisabeth Amalie Eugenie, Duchess of Bavaria, in Munich in 1837, she was nicknamed Sisi way before she became Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary by marrying to Franz Joseph I. She hated the snotty, formal Habsburg court and lived a very complicated life that has inspired a Barbara Cartland novel, a trilogy of beloved Austrian films and an entire cottage tourism industry.

Fischer was born in Liptau, formerly part of Hungary, in 1859. When he was 26, he left his hometown and founded a publishing house bearing his name in Berlin. His company published books by the German poet Hermann Hesse and the novelist Thomas Mann, thus contributing to their success. In light of competition from dance, radio and cinema in the 1920s, he doubted people would continue to read.

Getting his skills as a member of the Jimi Hendrix tour crew, the British musician and singer later established his own band Motörhead in 1975 and moved to Los Angeles. Known simply as "Lemmy," and a prehistoric crocodile, an asteroid and an extinct worm have been named in his honor. This connoisseur of whiskey and cigars died of cancer a few days after his 70th birthday in 2015.

The American author is a "child of Jesus," both in the birthday and in the religious sense. She is a member of the Mormon Chuch, and its influence runs deep through "Twilight," the teen saga about vampires. Bella, the story’s teenage heroine, avoids coffee, tea, alcohol and tobacco, and she "seals" her marriage to Edward for eternity, which are all commandments of the Mormon moral codex.

Despite having sold more than 50 million records worldwide, the Puerto Rican pop singer born in 1971 pulled out of music and has dedicated himself to other projects. Currently, he's a judge of the Australian edition of the talent show "The Voice," and he is going to play the murderer of the Italian fashion designer Gianni Versace in the upcoming season of "American Crime Story."