When Al was a child, his part Russian mom ran off with an encyclopedia salesman. Al's dad was from Italy, so he speaks fluent Italian. His father was a construction worker, so when dad went to the Middle East, Al was sent to an orphanage, and his retarded sister Trudy to an institution. Later, his dad and his dad's girlfriend used to sneak him out of the orphanage. Kept running away, once to join the circus and once he spent several months traveling with a pool wizard. He had a pet cockroach named Kevin and a dog named Chester (who he lost custody of to his third wife). While in the orphanage, Al took up acting and also fought Golden Gloves. When he was old enough, he went to get his sister but she'd died of pneumonia in the institution (in 1953, aged 16). During the 60's, he went on civil rights marches. Later, Al went to MIT, joined the Navy, and became a pilot. From 1968-1973 (or maybe 1975), he was a prisoner of the Viet Cong; during this time, his first wife Beth, a Navy nurse, lost hope, had him declared dead and married a lawyer. Later, he became an astronaut and is now a rear admiral ("highly respected and decorated"). He likes sports cars and classic cars and collects them. Al likes to watch sports, gambles a little (trips to Las Vegas, betting on horse races), and in the past, he had a tendency to drink to excess. Al met Sam on the Starbright Project (we don't know what that was); when they first met, Al was drunk beating up on a vending machine with a hammer. It was Sam's influence that prevented Al from being removed from the project because of his drinking. It was possibly his association with Sam that helped sober him up. This is, however, all secondary to Al's main interest, which is women! He's been married 5 times, spending his 1st, 3rd, and 5th honeymoons on the train to Niagara Falls. Wife #3 Ruthie was Jewish, #4 was Sharon ("she wore pink babydolls"), #5 was Maxine ("she didn't wear anything at all--she used to flavor her toes with mint leaves"), and either his second or third wife was Hungarian. Al's currently semi-regularly dating a blonde woman named Tina (they met in Vegas), who has a pet crocodile and a tattoo in a "super- private part of her anatomy". Although Al firmly believes in the "double standard", he really does respect women as individuals and gets very angry when they're mistreated. Al dresses flashy, smokes a lot of cigars, is somewhat superstitious, has a serious aversion to dead bodies, and knows a great recipe for chitlins.