50 Fun Facts About 2023 Pop Culture

Who played Ken opposite Margot Robbie in Barbie, which opened on the same day as Oppenheimer in July 2023?

Ryan Gosling played Ken; fans made a double bill of the two same-day releases, nicknamed Barbenheimer, and US cinemas took $311 million that weekend.

Who directed Barbie, the highest-grossing film of 2023?

Greta Gerwig was brought in by star and producer Margot Robbie to write Barbie, and agreed on condition that her partner Noah Baumbach write it with her; she then put herself forward to direct it.

Which Barbie song won the Academy Award for Best Original Song?

"What Was I Made For?" pulled Billie Eilish out of a spell of writer's block; she wrote it about Barbie with her brother Finneas and only afterwards saw that she had been writing about herself.

Which actor played J. Robert Oppenheimer and won the Best Actor Oscar for it?

Cillian Murphy had taken supporting roles in five earlier Christopher Nolan films, from Batman Begins to Dunkirk, before the director handed him this first lead.

After Christopher Nolan fell out with Warner Bros. over its HBO Max releases, which studio released Oppenheimer?

Universal Pictures won Nolan over by meeting his terms: a $100 million budget, a long exclusive run in cinemas, and no other film of its own released for three weeks either side.

In which US city did the Eras Tour open on March 17, 2023?

Glendale, Arizona, hosted opening night at State Farm Stadium; demand for the tour had crashed Ticketmaster's presale four months earlier, and a US Senate hearing on the company followed.

Which McDonald's mascot's birthday milkshake set off a mock-horror TikTok trend in June 2023?

Grimace, the purple McDonald's character introduced in 1971, got a birthday meal with a berry-flavored shake from June 12, 2023; TikTokers filmed themselves collapsing after sipping it.

Who voiced Mario in the hit 2023 animated film based on Super Mario Bros.?

Chris Pratt took the role over from Charles Martinet, Mario's voice in the games since the 1990s, who instead got a cameo as the brothers' father.

Which Meta app gained 100 million users in five days in July 2023?

Threads, Meta's rival to Twitter, passed 100 million sign-ups in five days; a week on, tracking firms found daily users down about 20% and time spent per user cut in half.

Twitter's 2023 rebrand to X revived the name of Elon Musk's 1999 online bank, which grew into which company?

PayPal took that name in 2001, a year after X.com merged with its rival Confinity; Musk bought the x.com address back in 2017, saying it had sentimental value.

Who replaced Elon Musk as CEO of Twitter in June 2023?

Linda Yaccarino, a television advertising chief, took over in June 2023, six months after Musk polled users on whether he should step down and 57.5% said yes; she resigned in July 2025.

Which company operated the Titan submersible that imploded on June 18, 2023 on a dive to the Titanic?

OceanGate's chief executive Stockton Rush died aboard with his four passengers; in 2018 submersible experts had drafted a letter warning him that the firm's experimental approach risked catastrophe.

The Titan submersible lost on a 2023 dive to the Titanic was steered with a modified version of what?

A video game controller: the chief executive of the sub's builder showed a CBS reporter the modified Logitech gamepad in 2022 and boasted that it ran the whole vessel.

In which church were Charles III and Camilla crowned in May 2023?

Westminster Abbey has staged England's coronations since 1066; for this one the Stone of Destiny was brought from Edinburgh Castle to sit beneath the 700-year-old Coronation Chair.

Which Miley Cyrus single, released in January 2023, became the best-selling global single of the year?

"Flowers" spent eight weeks at number one in the US; its echoes of Bruno Mars's "When I Was Your Man" led an owner of rights in that song to sue for copyright infringement in 2024.

In 2023 Beyoncé became the most-awarded Grammy artist ever but lost Album of the Year to whom?

Harry Styles won for Harry's House on the night Beyoncé's 32nd Grammy took her past conductor Georg Solti's record; she finally won the top album prize in 2025 for Cowboy Carter.

Which film won seven Oscars, including Best Picture, at the March 2023 ceremony?

Everything Everywhere All at Once took three of the four acting Oscars; one went to Ke Huy Quan, the former child star who had quit acting for nearly two decades after roles dried up.

Who was the 72-year-old lead of the first season of The Golden Bachelor?

Gerry Turner proposed to Theresa Nist in the finale and married her on live television in January 2024; three months later the couple said they were divorcing.

Which sitcom star was president of the actors' union SAG-AFTRA during its 2023 strike?

Fran Drescher, star of The Nanny, called the studios "a very greedy entity" on the eve of the July 14 walkout; it lasted until November 9, when a deal brought new AI protections.

Which HBO series based on a video game premiered on January 15, 2023 with Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey?

The Last of Us adapts Naughty Dog's 2013 game, whose infected were inspired by a Planet Earth clip of a real fungus that takes control of an ant's body.

Which Friends star died on October 28, 2023, at the age of 54?

Matthew Perry, Friends' Chandler Bing, had detailed his addictions in a 2022 memoir; five people, two doctors among them, were later charged with supplying the ketamine that killed him.

In which city did Beyoncé open her Renaissance World Tour on May 10, 2023?

Stockholm hosted the opening nights, and visiting fans pushed hotel prices so high that a Danske Bank economist blamed a "Beyoncé blip" for Sweden's higher-than-expected inflation that month.

Which podcast does Travis Kelce co-host with his brother Jason?

New Heights is named for Cleveland Heights, Ohio, where the brothers went to school; its audience jumped when they met in Super Bowl LVII, the first brothers to face each other in the game.

Which singer headlined the Super Bowl LVII halftime show in 2023, her first live performance in five years?

Rihanna headlined Super Bowl LVII on February 12, 2023, her first live show since the 2018 Grammys, and revealed her second pregnancy on stage.

Which unknown singer debuted at number one on the Hot 100 in August 2023 with "Rich Men North of Richmond"?

Oliver Anthony was the first artist to debut at number one with no chart history; when the song opened a Republican debate, he said he had written it about just those people.

Off which state's coast was the Chinese surveillance balloon shot down on February 4, 2023?

An F-22 shot it down off South Carolina near Myrtle Beach after it had crossed the continent; three more unidentified objects were downed within days.

In his 2023 memoir Spare, Prince Harry says which relative knocked him to the floor during a 2019 row?

Prince William, Harry writes, grabbed him by the collar and knocked him down onto a dog bowl in a row about Meghan; the memoir sold 1.43 million copies on its first day.

Who was Time magazine's Person of the Year for 2023?

Taylor Swift was the first person chosen for achievement in the arts; that July, fans dancing at her Seattle concerts had shaken the ground like a magnitude 2.3 earthquake.

Which band opened the Las Vegas Sphere with a residency on September 29, 2023?

U2 played 40 shows there without drummer Larry Mullen Jr., who was recovering from surgery; Bram van den Berg of the Dutch band Krezip sat in for him.

Which 2023 game was the first to win Game of the Year at all five major awards shows?

Baldur's Gate 3 swept the top prize at The Game Awards, the Golden Joysticks, DICE, GDC and BAFTA; Larian had moved its PC launch up four weeks to escape an autumn crowded by Starfield.

Which Netflix series, in which a road-rage incident ties together Steven Yeun and Ali Wong, won eight Emmys?

Beef grew out of a real run-in: a driver honked and swore at creator Lee Sung Jin, who followed him across Los Angeles, and that flash of rage became the series.

In which 2023 comedy series was Ronald Gladden the only person unaware that everyone around him was an actor?

Jury Duty built an entire fake trial around solar contractor Ronald Gladden, with James Marsden playing an entitled parody of himself among the hired actors.

Which 2023 film set in 1920s Oklahoma premiered at Cannes with Lily Gladstone opposite Leonardo DiCaprio?

Killers of the Flower Moon was reshaped when Leonardo DiCaprio gave up the FBI agent's role to play the husband, Ernest; Martin Scorsese then rebuilt the script around Ernest's marriage to his Osage wife, Mollie.

Which Irish singer, famous for "Nothing Compares 2 U", died on 26 July 2023?

Sinéad O'Connor made a global hit of the Prince-written song in 1990, then tore up a photo of the Pope on Saturday Night Live in 1992 in protest at child abuse in the Catholic Church.

Which "Queen of Rock 'n' Roll" died in Switzerland on May 24, 2023, aged 83?

Tina Turner had lived by Lake Zurich since the 1990s and gave up her US citizenship in 2013 to become Swiss; she died at her home in Küsnacht.

Which HBO drama about the Roy family ended on May 28, 2023, after four seasons?

Succession killed off its patriarch Logan Roy in only the third episode of the final season, a choice its creator made to upend viewers' expectation that he would die in the finale.

A promotion with which TikTok personality triggered the boycott of Bud Light in April 2023?

Dylan Mulvaney posted a sponsored Instagram video with a personalised Bud Light can on April 1, 2023; in the boycott that followed, Modelo Especial overtook it as America's top-selling beer.

Which 2023 horror comedy directed by Elizabeth Banks was inspired by a real 1985 incident in Georgia?

Cocaine Bear riffs on a 1985 case in which a black bear ate cocaine dropped from smuggler Andrew Thornton's plane; the real animal went on no rampage and was simply found dead.

Jeremy Allen White plays a chef running his late brother's Chicago sandwich shop in which FX series?

The Bear sent Jeremy Allen White on a two-week culinary-school crash course and into a Santa Monica restaurant kitchen so that he could pass for a professional chef.

Which MLS club announced the signing of Lionel Messi on July 15, 2023?

Inter Miami confirmed Messi's signing on July 15, 2023; he debuted six days later with a stoppage-time winner and led the club to the Leagues Cup title in August.

Which Welsh club owned by Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney returned to the Football League in 2023?

Wrexham won the 2022-23 National League to end a 15-year absence from the Football League, the first of three straight promotions filmed for Welcome to Wrexham.

Fisher Stevens directed which footballer's four-part Netflix documentary, released in October 2023?

David Beckham interrupts on camera when his wife Victoria calls her family working class, telling her to "be honest" about the car her dad drove her to school in; she admits he had a Rolls-Royce.

Grand Theft Auto VI's December 2023 trailer revealed a return to which fictional city?

Vice City, the neon setting of a 2002 game, sits in the new fictional state of Leonida; Rockstar put the trailer out early after it leaked, and it passed 85 million views within a day.

Which independent film, released by Angel Studios in July 2023, grossed $251 million on a $14.5 million budget?

Sound of Freedom starred Jim Caviezel as Tim Ballard; Angel Studios' pay-it-forward ticket scheme helped it outgross Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny at the US box office.

Which video-game horror adaptation starring Josh Hutcherson hit cinemas and Peacock simultaneously on October 27, 2023?

Five Nights at Freddy's starred Josh Hutcherson as a night guard at a haunted pizzeria; only a third of critics liked it, yet it took close to $300 million worldwide.

Which May 2023 Marvel film, directed by James Gunn, told Rocket's origin story?

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 opened on May 5, 2023; Disney had fired Gunn from it in 2018 over old tweets before rehiring him, and by its release he was co-running rival DC Studios.

Which British city hosted Eurovision 2023 on behalf of war-hit Ukraine?

Liverpool beat Glasgow to stage the contest after the UK, runner-up in 2022, stepped in for Ukraine; Sweden's Loreen won with "Tattoo", her second victory.

Which talk-show host apologised for resuming taping during the 2023 writers' strike?

Drew Barrymore had restarted taping without her writers; she was picketed and dropped as host of the National Book Awards before backing down a week later, with the strike in its fifth month.

How much was Gwyneth Paltrow awarded when she won her 2023 Utah ski-crash trial?

Paltrow had countersued for a symbolic $1 plus legal fees and got exactly that in March 2023, after the jury found retired optometrist Terry Sanderson at fault for the 2016 collision.

Which Marvin Gaye song did a 2023 jury clear Ed Sheeran of copying?

The jury found in May 2023 that 'Thinking Out Loud' did not copy 'Let's Get It On'; Sheeran argued the shared chord progression was a common building block of pop.