24 Celebrity Pop Culture Facts
When Lana Del Rey covered “Heart-Shaped Box” in a 2012 show, Courtney Love took to Twitter and tweeted to Del Rey the true meaning behind the song: “You do know the song is about my Vagina, right? ‘Throw down your umbilical noose so I can climb right back.’ On top of which, some of the lyrics about my vagina I contributed. So, umm, next time you sing it, think about my vagina, will you? lol xc.”
You can listen to “Heart-Shaped Box” here.
2.
Paul McCartney and John Lennon used to masturbate together in a circle with some of their friends. In a 2019 interview with GQ, McCartney reflected on the sexual experience with great detail. “Over at John’s house, it was just a group of us,” he said. “And instead of just getting roaring drunk and partying, we were all just in these chairs, and the lights were out, and somebody started masturbating, so we all did.”
McCartney continued, “I think it was a one-off, or maybe it was like a two-off. It wasn’t a big thing. But, you know, it was just the kind of thing you didn’t think much of. It was just a group. Yeah, it’s quite raunchy when you think about it. There are so many things like that from when you’re a kid that you look back on, and you’re, ‘Did we do that?’ But it was good, harmless fun. It didn’t hurt anyone.”
3.
While filming New York, New York (1977), leading lady Liza Minnelli and director Martin Scorsese had an affair. At the time, Minnelli was married to Jack Haley Jr. (the son of Jack Haley, who played the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz), and Scorsese to Julia Cameron. In Minnelli’s 2026 memoir Kids, Wait Till You Hear This!, she revealed they had a very tense relationship, one that was consumed by cocaine addiction.
4.
Ever since Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette premiered on FX, I’ve been in a rabbit hole digging for all kinds of fun facts about their relationship, from how they got together to the unfortunate tabloid extravaganza. But one thing that did particularly interest me was the relationships John F. Kennedy Jr. had been in before meeting and marrying his wife, Carolyn Bessette. As the son of President John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, the man was a damn catch. So, it’s no wonder I learned that he was linked with notable women, like Madonna, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Daryl Hannah.
5.
According to Jane Fonda, during the infamous slap scene in Monster-in-Law (2005), Jennifer Lopez actually scratched her with her big diamond ring. “Jennifer had this enormous diamond ring,” Fonda said on The Drew Barrymore Show. “When she slapped me, it cut open across my eyebrow. She’s never apologized.”
6.
In the Stranger Things series finale, which premiered on Netflix on December 31, 2025, the show featured Prince’s iconic song “Purple Rain” and David Bowie’s memorable “Heroes,” among others. This inspired fans everywhere to listen to them on Spotify, increasing a hugeeeeeee spike in streams. “Purple Rain” streams increased by 608% and “Heroes” increased by 185%, and rightly so!!!
You can listen to “Purple Rain” here and “Heroes” here.
7.
On a recent podcast episode of Good Hang with Amy Poehler, Viola Davis sat in the chair to discuss her iconic EGOT-winning career, childhood, and more. But the one story that stuck out was her experience filming Doubt with the legendary Meryl Streep. Davis revealed to Poehler that she was beyondddddd starstruck by Streep (naturally) because she had followed her entire career. As a result, she was especially awkward around her and didn’t know how to handle being on set with her. And if you’re a fan of Streep, then you sometimes do silly things to impress her, as Davis did.
8.
While some TV actors feel annoyed by being perceived or known only for their most popular role, Lisa Kudrow feels the opposite. When it comes to Phoebe Buffay, the hilarious and kooky character she portrayed on Friends for 10 glorious years, she’s not at all bothered when “normal” people recognize her as Phoebe (even 32 years later).
9.
And another fun fact? Lisa Kudrow filmed The Comeback (2026) on Warner Bros. Stage 24, the same set where she filmed Friends. Full-circle moment? Full-circle moment!
10.
Rita Moreno was in an on-again, off-again relationship with Marlon Brando for eight years, which has always been glamorized by the public. In a 2021 interview with AP, Moreno revealed the truth behind her relationship with Brando, which was actually toxic. In the interview, she said, “We did a movie together long after I tried to do away with my life, and all of that had to do with my relationship with Marlon Brando. The movie’s called The Night of the Following Day [1969] … and I hauled off and slapped him in this scene … And, to my absolute astonishment, he not only slapped me back, he slapped me back so hard I — I now understood what it meant when you said, ‘I saw stars.'”
11.
In the ’80s, when Al Pacino and his ex-girlfriend, the late and great Diane Keaton, were living together, he was in deep financial trouble. Keaton helped him get back on his feet in the funniest way possible. They went to his lawyer’s office, and, in true Diane Keaton fashion, she asked him, ‘Do you know who he is?’ The lawyer answered, ‘Yeah, yeah,’ obviously recognizing his client, a renowned actor. Keaton said, ‘No, you don’t. He’s an idiot, and you gotta take care of him.'”
12.
Katharine Hepburn revealed in a rare 1985 interview that, as a teenager, she used to break into houses (and even steal a thing or two, like a crocodile nutcracker).
13.
Actors Nicole Kidman, Katie Holmes, and Mimi Rogers were at one time or another married to Tom Cruise. Fun fact: They were all 34 years old when they got divorced from Cruise.
14.
In 2001, Winona Ryder was caught stealing over $5,000 worth of designer items from Saks Fifth Avenue (including Marc Jacobs pieces). She went to court for it, wearing some of Jacobs’ items during her appearances. Because of the incident, Ryder’s acting career didn’t receive as much attention, and she left the public eye for a while. But the coolest thing to come out of this? Marc Jacobs and Winona Ryder started a long-lasting friendship and collaboration. When it came to the Spring 2003 ad campaign, Jacobs revealed to Hello! magazine, “I asked Winona to do the campaign because I thought she looked so beautiful in all these pictures that we’ve seen recently, regardless of whether they were from the trial.”
Years later, in 2016 and 2022, they collaborated again, and Ryder starred in Jacobs’ beauty product and handbag ad campaigns. Talk about the sweetest kind of revenge!!! Rock on, Winona.
15.
At Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl LX Halftime Show, he put on a truly incredible performance. He celebrated and showcased Puerto Rican culture in various ways, from older men playing dominoes to background performers wearing pava hats (traditionally worn by agricultural workers). Then, Lady Gaga surprised everyone with a salsa rendition of her hit “Die with a Smile.” Her outfit was more than just a plain old outfit. According to Harper’s BAZAAR, the flower she wore on her blue dress was a Flor de Maga, which is Puerto Rico’s “signature flower.”
You can watch Lady Gaga perform with Bad Bunny here.
16.
When the late artist Jean-Michel Basquiat dated Madonna in the early ’80s (just as the two were rising to fame), he gifted her many of his paintings. After they broke up, Madonna said Basquiat asked for his artwork back, and when she returned them, he painted over the pieces black.
17.
Being the incredible musician/artist he is, Lenny Kravitz owns a Kawai plexiglass piano (aka a hella cool transparent piano) that once belonged to Old Hollywood star Ingrid Bergman. In his music listening space, he typically sits in a red chair once owned by the late artist Andy Warhol.
18.
If you’ve been living under a rock, then I’m here to tell you Heated Rivalry (based on the book series Game Changers) is one of the best shows that’s hit our screens in a long, long time. And if you’re anything like me, you’ve seen a lot of the show’s spicy sex scenes between Shane (Hudson Williams) and Ilya (Connor Storrie) on your timeline, or maybe it’s just my miraculous algorithm. But I digress, because there’s so much more to the sex scenes than meets the eye, according to Heated Rivalry’s intimacy coordinator Chala Hunter.
Chala Hunter revealed to Elle that accurate queer representation was the most important thing to capture while filming sex scenes between Shane (Hudson Williams) and Ilya (Connor Storrie). “The scenes are written very specifically as they are in the book, and [writer, creator, and director Jacob Tierney] laid out the action in the script. Portraying queer joy and queer sex and not insinuating or implying it on screen is rare,” she said. “The sex is such a big part of the emotional, physical, and psychological journey that these characters go through.”
And when it came to Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie filming oral sex scenes, Chala Hunter had a bunch of props to make it seem real. “I had a huge kit of all kinds of pasties and intimacy garments. I also have different layers of thickness if we need to add more padding for an actor’s comfort, for the action to take place,” she said. “It might look like Hudson is rubbing his face in Connor’s crotch, but some of the time, he’s anchoring his forehead to just above Connor’s crotch.”
19.
Jordan Peele made Daniel Kaluuya film the famous “Give me the keys, Rose” scene in Get Out several times. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Peele pushed Kaluuya that day on set because he wanted his character (Chris) to finally break free. “Each take I was trying to rev [Daniel] up more and get him to this point where he was going to essentially lash out for the first time in the film,” Peele said. “[Chris has] been so patient, he’s been so contained, [and] he’s suppressed so many uncomfortable emotions throughout the movie that this is going to be his chance to lash out in the form of yelling at Rose (Allison Williams’ character).” After shooting several takes, Peele finally got the emotional reaction he wanted from Kaluuya on the last take.
20.
Freddie Mercury allegedly snuck Princess Diana into a gay club back in the ’80s by dressing her up in an army jacket and sunglasses. She had so much fun hitting the gay club with Mercury, she claimed she wanted to “do it again!”
In Edward White’s 2025 book Dianaworld, a biography about the late Princess of Wales, he reveals details about that glorious night. “Diana persuaded them to take her to the Royal Vauxhall Tavern, a place that [radio DJ Kenny Everett] warned was ‘not for you…full of hairy gay men,'” White writes. “Diana was insistent, however, so Everett helped her disguise herself in male drag: ‘A camouflage army jacket, hair tucked up into a leather cap, and dark aviator sunglasses. Scrutinizing her in the half-light, we decided that the most famous icon of the modern world might just pass for a rather eccentrically dressed gay male model.'”
21.
Dolly Parton used her acrylic nails to write “9 to 5” because she believed they sounded like a typewriter.
Parton reflected on her time writing the title track for 9 to 5 on The Tonight Show in 2019, telling Jimmy Fallon, “When I wrote this song, I used my acrylic nails on the set. I did because they make noise, and it kind of sounded like a typewriter to me. And I played it on the actual record — it says ‘Nails by Dolly’ on the album!”
You can listen to “9 to 5” here.
22.
One time, when Jennifer Hudson met a starstruck fan, she agreed to sing a duet with him: “I had the pleasure of meeting Jennifer Hudson (well, I was actually hired to do a home inspection for her). Even though I’d just started learning how to play the ukulele, I asked her if she wouldn’t mind singing if I played her a song, and I was floored when she agreed to it,” BuzzFeed Community user homelandinspection remembered. “She was so sweet and humble, and was gracious enough to do a duet with me. It still gives me goosebumps thinking about how extremely talented she was. I was completely gobsmacked at how amazing her voice really was, which paled in comparison to how incredibly nice she was.”
23.
Harry Styles has expressed on multiple occasions that he chooses to express his sexuality on his own terms and prefers not to define it. In 2022, Styles revealed to Better Homes and Gardens, “I’ve been open with it with my friends, but that’s my personal experience — it’s mine,” he said. “The whole point of where we should be heading, which is toward accepting everybody and being more open, is that it doesn’t matter. It’s about not having to label everything, [and] not having to clarify what boxes you’re checking.”
Harry also explained that his One Direction days made him fearful of expressing his sexuality due to the label’s “cleanliness clauses.” “I felt so ashamed about it,” he said. “Ashamed at the idea of people even knowing that I was having sex, let alone who with.”
24.
And there was a biggggggg pop culture rumor that Mister Rogers was a sniper in the Vietnam War and developed extreme anger issues. Allegedly, his therapist suggested that the best way to diminish his aggression was to get involved in children’s entertainment. But Mister (Fred) Rogers was never a member of the military, nor did he fight in the Vietnam War. He attended Rollins College in 1951 to study music composition, landed a job at a TV station in 1953, and, as you may already know, started Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood in the late ’60s.