9. Heroes and Villains of the Globalization Era: Music, Movies, Television, Sports, and Celebrity Culture

My Name is Whitney Houston: The Voice That Reached the World

I was born August 9, 1963, in Newark, New Jersey. Music was already waiting for me when I arrived. My mother, Cissy Houston, was a remarkable gospel and soul singer, and singers like Dionne Warwick were part of my family. I grew up hearing gospel music in church, and that is where I first learned what singing really meant. It wasn't just about hitting a note. You had to feel what you were singing. You had to believe it. Church gave me that foundation, and I carried it with me everywhere I went.

From the Church to the Recording Studio

As a teenager, I began singing professionally around New York and working as a background vocalist. I sang with artists including Chaka Khan and learned what it meant to work in a studio and support another performer. Eventually, Clive Davis heard me and believed I could become a major recording artist. When my first album, Whitney Houston, came out in 1985, everything started moving quickly. Songs like “Saving All My Love for You,” “How Will I Know,” and “Greatest Love of All” introduced my voice to millions of people.

Suddenly, the Whole World Was Listening

By the late 1980s, I wasn't simply making records anymore. I was traveling around the world, appearing on television, performing for enormous audiences, and watching songs that began inside a recording studio become part of people's lives. I became the first female artist whose album entered the Billboard 200 at number one, and I eventually had seven consecutive number-one singles on the Billboard Hot 100. That kind of success was extraordinary, but for me the center of it was still the same thing: walk onto the stage, open your mouth, and sing.

The 1990s Changed Everything

The 1990s took my career somewhere even I could not have completely expected. I performed the national anthem at Super Bowl XXV in 1991, and that performance became one of the moments people remembered most from my career. Then came acting. In 1992, I starred opposite Kevin Costner in The Bodyguard. I recorded “I Will Always Love You” for the soundtrack, and that song became inseparable from my name. The soundtrack became one of the best-selling albums in history. Suddenly I was not only a singer. I was a movie star, a soundtrack artist, and an international celebrity on an entirely different level.

Music, Movies, and a Changing Culture

I kept acting during the decade, appearing in Waiting to Exhale and The Preacher's Wife while continuing to record music. What fascinated me about the 1990s was how closely everything was becoming connected. A singer could become an actress. An actor could sell records. Music videos could make a song bigger. Movie soundtracks could become major albums of their own. Television carried performers around the world. Celebrity wasn't limited to one stage anymore. Entertainment was becoming one giant conversation, and I was right there in the middle of it.

Being Famous Was Different From Singing

People sometimes imagine fame as one long celebration. It isn't. Singing was something I understood. Fame was something else entirely. When millions of people know your face, people become interested not only in your music but in your marriage, your family, your appearance, your mistakes, and your private life. During the 1990s, that kind of celebrity attention grew enormously. Television programs, magazines, tabloids, photographers, and interviewers followed entertainers constantly. The public wanted more than the performance. They wanted the person behind it.

I Was Still a Singer First

No matter how large everything became, I always thought of myself first as a singer. The voice was the instrument God gave me, and my job was to use it. Awards were wonderful. Record sales were wonderful. Movies were exciting. But none of those things replaced the feeling of standing before an audience and knowing that a song had reached somebody. By the end of the 1990s, I had become one of the world's best-known entertainers, but that little girl who learned to sing in church was still there.

The Harder Years

My later life was not as easy as those years of success might make it seem. Personal struggles, addiction, intense public attention, and difficulties in my marriage became increasingly visible. My career slowed, and sometimes the public conversation about me became louder than the music. I continued recording and performing, and I kept trying to move forward. In 2011, I worked on the film Sparkle, which gave me another opportunity to act, sing, and produce. It would become my final film.

MTV, Hip-Hop, Grunge, and a Changing American Sound - Told by Whitney

1990–1991 - When the new decade began, American music was already changing underneath our feet. I had come out of the 1980s with big pop records, big ballads, and audiences around the world, but by 1990 you could hear something different happening. Hip-hop was becoming impossible for the mainstream to ignore. R&B was taking on sharper rhythms and new production. Rock music was beginning to move away from the polished sound that had dominated much of the previous decade. And MTV had become one of the most powerful places in America for deciding what young people saw, heard, wore, and talked about.

MTV Turned Music Into Something You Had to See

When MTV began in the 1980s, music videos were often treated as promotion for a record. By the early 1990s, the video itself could become part of an artist's identity. A singer was no longer competing only on radio. Now people were seeing your clothes, your choreography, your attitude, your band, and the entire visual world built around the song. MTV also aired specialized programming such as Yo! MTV Raps, helping bring hip-hop artists and videos into homes across the country. For younger listeners especially, television was becoming a musical discovery machine.

Hip-Hop Was Becoming a National Force

By 1990, hip-hop had moved far beyond its beginnings as a local New York culture. Public Enemy released Fear of a Black Planet that year, combining dense production with political commentary and helping demonstrate that rap could carry serious social arguments while still reaching a large audience. The Library of Congress later recognized the album for its cultural importance. Artists such as LL Cool J, Ice Cube, Salt-N-Pepa, A Tribe Called Quest, MC Hammer, and others represented very different forms of rap, which was one reason the genre grew so quickly. There was no single hip-hop sound anymore.

Rap Was Also Creating Arguments

Hip-hop did not enter mainstream America quietly. Rap lyrics about policing, poverty, race, violence, sex, and urban life created arguments among parents, politicians, musicians, and broadcasters. Some people saw the music as dangerous or offensive. Others saw artists describing realities that much of America preferred not to discuss. By 1991, rappers were also increasingly appearing in films and other forms of entertainment; Ice-T, for example, appeared prominently in New Jack City that year. Hip-hop was no longer simply a musical category. It was becoming part of American popular culture.

R&B Was Changing Too

I could feel those changes in my own music. My album I'm Your Baby Tonight was released in 1990, and I worked with producers L.A. Reid and Babyface as I moved further toward contemporary R&B and new jack swing. The title song and “All the Man That I Need” both reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100. Artists were blending pop, soul, dance music, funk, and hip-hop rhythms in new ways, and those boundaries between musical categories were becoming harder to draw.

Then Seattle Changed Rock Music

While hip-hop and R&B were changing one part of popular music, something very different was developing in the Pacific Northwest. In September 1991, Nirvana released Nevermind. Its distorted guitars, shifting volume, rougher appearance, and emotionally unsettled lyrics sounded dramatically different from much of the polished rock that had dominated MTV only a few years earlier. “Smells Like Teen Spirit” became a major hit, and Nevermind helped push what people soon called grunge into mainstream American culture.

Grunge Was Bigger Than One Band

Nirvana did not create the Seattle music scene by itself. Bands such as Soundgarden and Mudhoney were already established, while Pearl Jam and others would soon become nationally famous. But Nevermind helped turn regional alternative rock into a national phenomenon. Suddenly flannel shirts, distorted guitars, and songs about alienation and uncertainty stood beside polished pop stars and glamorous music videos. The Library of Congress has since recognized Nevermind as a recording of lasting cultural significance.

There Was No Longer One American Sound

That may be the most important thing to understand about 1990 and 1991. You could turn on the radio and hear a powerful R&B ballad, then hear rap, dance-pop, country, heavy metal, or alternative rock. Mariah Carey was beginning her extraordinary rise in pop and R&B, Public Enemy was challenging listeners politically, and Nirvana was helping reshape rock. The American music audience was fragmenting into different styles while, strangely enough, television and mass media were exposing those styles to more people than ever before.

We Were Hearing the 1990s Arrive

Looking back, those first two years were not simply the end of 1980s music. They were the opening of something new. Hip-hop was establishing itself as one of America's major musical forms. Grunge was about to transform rock. R&B was evolving through new jack swing and other new sounds. MTV made artists visual personalities as well as musicians. I had spent my career believing that a powerful voice could cross boundaries, but the early 1990s showed something even larger: American music itself was becoming more diverse, more competitive, and harder to fit into a single box. That was the sound of the decade beginning.

My Name is Roger Ebert: A Life at the Movies

I was born on June 18, 1942, in Urbana, Illinois. Long before I became known for movies, I loved writing. I worked on school newspapers, wrote constantly, and discovered that I liked explaining why something worked, why it failed, and why it mattered. That habit stayed with me. A movie review, after all, is not simply a thumbs-up or thumbs-down. It is an argument, a conversation, and sometimes a confession about what moved you.

I Found My Place at the Chicago Sun-Times

In 1967, I became the film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times. I was young, and I certainly did not know everything, but I had the great advantage of being curious. I watched Hollywood blockbusters, foreign films, documentaries, low-budget experiments, and movies almost no one had heard of. I believed that every film deserved to be judged for what it was trying to do, not simply by whether it fit my personal taste.

Movies Became a National Conversation

In the 1970s, I began appearing on television with fellow critic Gene Siskel. We argued about movies because we genuinely disagreed, and audiences seemed to enjoy watching two people take films seriously without taking themselves too seriously. Over time, our debates became part of American movie culture. People did not simply want to know whether we liked a film. They wanted to hear why.

The 1990s Were a Remarkable Decade for Film

The 1990s gave critics almost too much to talk about. Hollywood produced enormous blockbusters such as Jurassic Park and Titanic, while independent films gained wider audiences. Animation changed with movies such as Toy Story, special effects became more convincing, and filmmakers experimented with new styles and stories. Some movies became cultural events. Others became important because they reached smaller audiences and took risks the major studios sometimes avoided.

I Believed Great Movies Could Come From Anywhere

One of the pleasures of criticism was discovering films before everyone else did. I tried to support smaller films, independent directors, foreign filmmakers, and young artists who had not yet become famous. A critic should not simply follow the crowd. Sometimes the job is to point toward something extraordinary while the theater is still half empty and say, “You ought to see this.”

I Took Movies Seriously, But Not Worshipfully

Movies mattered to me because they could enlarge our lives. They could take us into another family, another country, another century, or another way of thinking. But movies were also entertainment, and I never believed critics should pretend every film was a philosophical examination of civilization. Sometimes a comedy should make you laugh. Sometimes an action movie should thrill you. The real question was whether the movie succeeded on its own terms.

Gene and I Became Part of the Culture We Critiqued

By the 1990s, Gene Siskel and I were recognizable public figures ourselves. That was a strange development for two newspaper critics. We appeared on television week after week, debated movies, interviewed filmmakers, and became part of the entertainment world we covered. Yet the work still came down to something very simple: watch the movie carefully, think about it honestly, and tell the reader what you saw.

Illness Changed My Life, But Not My Work

In the 2000s, I developed serious health problems, including cancer. Surgeries eventually took away my ability to speak, but they did not take away my ability to write. In fact, writing became even more important to me. I continued reviewing films, blogging, and communicating with readers. Losing my physical voice made me appreciate even more deeply the written one I had spent my life developing.

The Blockbuster Movie Becomes a Cultural Event - Told by Roger Ebert

By the opening years of the 1990s, Hollywood had learned how to turn certain films into something larger than a night at the theater. A blockbuster could dominate television commercials, magazine covers, fast-food promotions, toy aisles, soundtrack sales, and schoolyard conversations before many people had even bought a ticket. The movie itself still mattered, of course, but now Hollywood was increasingly selling an event.

Home Alone Proved a Family Comedy Could Become Enormous

In November 1990, Home Alone arrived with a simple idea: a boy is accidentally left behind while his family travels for Christmas, and he must defend his house from two burglars. That premise did not sound like the foundation of a cultural phenomenon, but audiences responded enthusiastically. Macaulay Culkin became one of the most recognizable child actors in America, the film remained in theaters for months, and it became one of the highest-grossing films of its era. Hollywood was reminded that a blockbuster did not need spaceships or superheroes. Sometimes it needed one unforgettable character and a story families wanted to see together.

Terminator 2 Raised the Technical Bar

Then came Terminator 2: Judgment Day in 1991, and suddenly audiences were looking at movie effects that seemed to belong to the future. Director James Cameron used computer-generated imagery in striking ways, especially for the liquid-metal T-1000. Visual effects had existed for decades, but this film demonstrated how digital technology could create images that traditional makeup, models, or mechanical effects could not easily achieve. It was also enormously expensive, heavily marketed, and designed to look spectacular on the biggest screen available. The modern effects-driven blockbuster was taking shape before our eyes.

Disney Animation Became Major Event Cinema Again

At the same time, animation was returning to the center of American movie culture. Beauty and the Beast, released in 1991, was not treated as merely a children's diversion. It became the first animated feature nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. Then Aladdin followed in 1992 and became another enormous commercial success. Disney combined memorable songs, recognizable characters, comedy, merchandising, and sophisticated animation into films that appealed to both children and adults. Families did not simply watch these movies. They bought the music, toys, clothing, and home-video releases that surrounded them.

Movie Stars Became Brands of Their Own

The early 1990s also belonged to stars whose names could help sell a movie before anyone knew much about the story. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Julia Roberts, Tom Cruise, Kevin Costner, Whoopi Goldberg, and others became powerful marketing tools. Audiences developed expectations around certain performers. If Schwarzenegger appeared in an action film or Roberts in a romantic drama or comedy, the star's identity became part of the advertisement. Hollywood had always had movie stars, but the blockbuster era made them increasingly central to enormous marketing campaigns.

Theater, Television, and Home Video Worked Together

One reason blockbusters grew so powerful was that movies were no longer confined to theaters. A successful film could appear later on VHS, cable television, network broadcasts, soundtrack albums, and rental-store shelves. Video stores became important parts of American neighborhoods, and families could watch popular movies repeatedly at home. A theatrical release might last several months, but the movie's cultural life could continue for years. Hollywood was learning to make money from the same story across many different forms of entertainment.

Opening Weekend Became a Story of Its Own

The business of movies was changing too. Studios spent heavily on advertising before release, and journalists increasingly reported opening-weekend ticket sales as major entertainment news. A huge first weekend could create the impression that everyone needed to see the film immediately. That sense of urgency helped turn movies into shared social experiences. Monday morning conversations at schools and workplaces often began with the same question: “Did you see it?”

Critics Were Watching a New Kind of Hollywood

From my chair as a critic, this presented an interesting problem. A movie could be commercially enormous and artistically mediocre, or financially modest and artistically wonderful. Ticket sales told us what people were watching, not whether the film was good. My job was still to judge what appeared on the screen. But there was no denying that by 1992 the business surrounding movies had become nearly as fascinating as the movies themselves.

The Blockbuster Had Become Part of American Life

By the end of 1992, Hollywood had demonstrated that a successful film could become a complete cultural package: stars, music, advertising, toys, home video, television appearances, and months of public conversation. Home Alone, Terminator 2, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin were very different movies, but each showed a different path toward becoming an event. The blockbuster was no longer simply a successful film. It was something Americans planned around, talked about together, and carried home with them long after the theater lights came back on.

My Name is John Madden: Football, Broadcasting, and a Life in the Game

I was born on April 10, 1936, in Austin, Minnesota, though I grew up in California. Football got hold of me early. I loved the physical part of the game, sure, but I also loved how everything fit together. Eleven guys had to know their jobs, and if one guy missed an assignment, boom, the whole play could fall apart. That fascinated me. I played football in college and was drafted by the Philadelphia Eagles, but a knee injury ended my playing career before it really began.

Coaching Became My Way Back Into the Game

When I could not play anymore, I started coaching. That turned out to be the right move for me. I worked my way through college football and eventually joined the Oakland Raiders. In 1969, I became their head coach. I was only thirty-two years old. The Raiders had big personalities, tough players, and a style all their own. I loved coaching them because they were aggressive, smart, and competitive. We did not always do things quietly, but we won a lot of football games.

The Super Bowl Was the High Point

For years, we kept getting close. We reached championship games, battled some of the best teams in football, and kept coming back. Then, after the 1976 season, we finally broke through. The Raiders defeated the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl XI. That team was tough, disciplined, and confident. Winning the Super Bowl was a great feeling, but what I remember most is the work it took to get there. Championships usually look simple afterward. They never feel simple while you are chasing them.

I Walked Away From Coaching

By 1978, coaching had taken a lot out of me. I loved football, but the pressure was constant. I decided to leave the sidelines while I was still relatively young. People sometimes thought that meant I was leaving football. Not a chance. I just had no idea yet that the next part of my life would make me even more recognizable than coaching had.

Broadcasting Changed Everything

I started working on television as a football analyst, and I quickly realized I loved explaining the game. I did not want to make football sound more complicated than it was. I wanted viewers to see why a block mattered, why a defense shifted, or why a quarterback made a certain decision. I used diagrams, telestrators, and plenty of circles and arrows. Sometimes those drawings got messy, but that was fine. Football is messy too.

Boom! That Was the Fun of It

People came to know me for the energy I brought to broadcasts. If a lineman made a great block, I wanted viewers to feel it. If somebody got hit hard, I might say, “Boom!” If a play developed perfectly, I wanted to show how every piece connected. I never believed football had to be explained in stiff, technical language. You could teach people the game and still have fun doing it.

The 1990s Made Sports Bigger Than Ever

The 1990s were an incredible time for sports television. Football grew into a massive national entertainment business, and athletes became celebrities far beyond the field. Television brought games into millions of homes, and broadcasts became major events. I worked for CBS, Fox, ABC, and later NBC, and I had the chance to call some of the biggest games in the country. Sports were becoming part competition, part entertainment, and part national conversation.

Then Came the Video Game

Another strange thing happened: my name ended up on a football video game. Madden NFL became enormously popular and introduced generations of young people to football strategy. Kids learned formations, play calling, player positions, and teams through that game. I insisted that it should feel like real football, with eleven players on each side and authentic strategy. I did not want a cartoon version of the sport. I wanted players to learn something while they played.

I Never Really Left Football

I retired from broadcasting in 2009, but football never stopped being part of my life. I continued talking about the sport, appearing in programs, and staying connected to the game. I had spent decades as a player, coach, broadcaster, and teacher, and I was fortunate enough to see football grow enormously during my lifetime.

What I Would Want People to Remember

I died on December 28, 2021, at the age of eighty-five. I know I made mistakes, and there were times I could have explained something better, coached something differently, or spent more time listening instead of talking. But I loved the game, and I loved helping other people understand it. If you remember me, do not just remember the shouting or the telestrator. Remember that football is really about people doing their jobs together. When everybody gets it right, boom, that is when something special happens.

Michael Jordan and the Globalization of American Sports - Told by John Madden

You could already tell Michael Jordan was special before the 1990s, but between 1991 and 1994 he became something bigger than a basketball star. He became one of the most recognizable athletes on Earth. The Chicago Bulls won three straight NBA championships from 1991 through 1993, and Jordan was right in the middle of it. He could score, defend, leap, compete, and perform under pressure. But here is the important part: television, advertising, international basketball, and merchandising carried that greatness far beyond Chicago.

Three Championships Changed the Conversation

The Bulls defeated the Los Angeles Lakers in the 1991 NBA Finals, the Portland Trail Blazers in 1992, and the Phoenix Suns in 1993. Jordan won the NBA Finals Most Valuable Player Award in all three series. Once a player keeps winning on that stage, people stop asking whether he is great and start asking where he belongs in the history of the game. Those Finals were watched far beyond the United States, helping turn the NBA into an increasingly international entertainment product.

The Dream Team Took American Basketball Around the World

Then came the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona. For the first time, active NBA stars were allowed to represent the United States in Olympic basketball, and the roster was extraordinary: Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Charles Barkley, Scottie Pippen, David Robinson, Karl Malone, John Stockton, and other elite players. They became known as the Dream Team. They won the gold medal by huge margins, but the bigger story was what happened around them. Opposing players wanted photographs and autographs. Crowds wanted to see them practice. American professional basketball suddenly had a global showcase unlike anything it had experienced before.

Television Made the World Smaller

Sports television was changing fast during these years. Satellite broadcasting and expanding cable networks made it easier for major American games and highlights to reach international audiences. Fans in Europe, Asia, Latin America, and elsewhere could follow NBA stars more closely than before. Jordan's dunks did not stay inside an arena. They appeared on sports programs, advertisements, videotapes, magazines, and highlight packages. One spectacular play could travel around the world.

The Shoes Became Part of the Story

Jordan's partnership with Nike also showed how sports and business were becoming inseparable. Air Jordan sneakers had begun in the 1980s, but by the early 1990s the brand had become a major part of youth fashion and sneaker culture. Kids who had never been to Chicago could wear Jordan's shoes. His number, image, and style became recognizable symbols. Everyone seemed to love him, except his rival’s fans, but for a different reason than you may suppose. He decided early on that he would not take sides on things that were controversial, even politics. He is still quoted today for saying “Even Republicans buy shoes”, when the media was trying to get him to pick sides, specifically against a political party. Athletes were no longer simply selling tickets; they were selling clothing, shoes, cereal, drinks, and lifestyles.

American Athletes Were Becoming Global Celebrities

Jordan was the clearest example, but he was not alone. Magic Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal, Charles Barkley, Andre Agassi, and other American athletes were becoming major international personalities. Sports stars appeared in commercials, talk shows, movies, and magazine advertisements. Broadcasters were not merely explaining games anymore. We were helping introduce personalities. Fans wanted to know how athletes trained, what they wore, what they said, and what they did away from competition.

Then Jordan Walked Away

In October 1993, Jordan shocked the sports world by announcing his retirement from basketball. His father, James Jordan, had been murdered earlier that year, and Michael later pursued professional baseball, playing in the Chicago White Sox organization. Think about how famous an athlete has to be for changing sports to become international news. Every minor-league game suddenly attracted attention because Jordan was there. That tells you something about how large his celebrity had become.

Sports Had Entered a New Era

By 1994, American sports were no longer just American entertainment. The NBA was building international audiences, Olympic basketball had displayed professional stars to the world, and athlete endorsements had become enormous business. Michael Jordan stood at the center of that transformation. He showed that a great athlete could become a championship winner, an advertising icon, a fashion influence, and a global celebrity all at once. And once that door opened, professional sports would never fit neatly inside the stadium again.

My Name is Larry King: A Life Built on Questions

I was born Lawrence Harvey Zeiger on November 19, 1933, in Brooklyn, New York. I grew up in a working-class family, and radio fascinated me from an early age. I loved the voices, the conversations, and the feeling that someone sitting miles away could make you feel like they were talking directly to you. I did not begin with some grand plan to become famous. I wanted to get into broadcasting, ask questions, and see where the conversation went.

My First Break Came in Miami

I moved to Florida and started working in radio in the 1950s. Before my first broadcast, I was told that “Zeiger” was too difficult for listeners to remember, so I became Larry King. I worked as a disc jockey, announcer, and interviewer, and I quickly discovered what I enjoyed most: talking to people. I did not believe an interview had to sound like an interrogation. I wanted guests to relax. If they relaxed, they often told you something interesting.

I Learned to Ask Simple Questions

People sometimes thought an interviewer had to prove how much he knew. I never saw it that way. My job was to get the guest talking. I liked short questions: Why? What happened? How did that feel? What did you do next? You listen, then you follow up. If you're thinking about your next clever question while the guest is speaking, you're probably missing the interview happening right in front of you.

Radio Took Me Across America

In 1978, The Larry King Show became a nationally syndicated overnight radio program. Suddenly I was speaking with people all across the country. Politicians, entertainers, athletes, authors, experts, and ordinary callers all came through the program. Radio had an intimacy television sometimes lacked. A microphone, a voice, and a good conversation could keep people listening in cars, bedrooms, truck stops, and workplaces in the middle of the night.

CNN Changed My Career

In 1985, Larry King Live began on CNN. Cable television was still growing, and the idea of a nightly interview program reaching a national and eventually international audience was exciting. I sat behind a desk, wore suspenders, and talked to people. That was basically the formula. Presidents came on. Movie stars came on. Musicians came on. Athletes came on. Sometimes the biggest interviews came from simply letting somebody speak long enough to reveal who they were.

The 1990s Made Celebrity News Bigger Than Ever

The 1990s were a remarkable time to be interviewing famous people. Television was expanding, cable news was growing, and audiences wanted more access to celebrities than ever before. A singer was no longer only a singer. An athlete was not only an athlete. Movie stars, musicians, sports figures, and politicians became personalities whose private lives could become national stories. My program often became one of the places where those people came to explain themselves directly to the public.

I Interviewed History While It Was Happening

Over the years, I interviewed presidents, world leaders, entertainers, comedians, athletes, scientists, and people caught in major news events. I never believed I had to agree with a guest to have a useful conversation. The audience could make up its own mind. My job was to keep the conversation moving and ask the question viewers at home might ask if they were sitting in my chair.

Listening Was the Real Skill

People called me an interviewer, but listening was really the job. A guest could give you a dozen possible directions in a single answer. You had to hear them. Sometimes the best question was the simplest one. Sometimes silence did more work than another sentence. The best interviews rarely felt rehearsed. They felt like two people talking, with millions of others quietly listening.

The Microphone Eventually Went Silent

I ended Larry King Live in 2010, though I continued interviewing people through other programs and digital media. I died on January 23, 2021, at the age of eighty-seven. I made mistakes in my personal life and in broadcasting, and there were certainly questions I should have asked differently. But I was fortunate. I spent most of my life doing exactly what I wanted to do: sitting across from someone interesting, looking them in the eye, and saying, “Tell me about it.”

The Golden Age of Network Television - Told by Larry King

In the early 1990s, television was changing, but the major networks still had enormous power. CBS, NBC, ABC, and Fox competed for audiences every night, and millions of Americans often watched the same programs at the same time. That gave television something we do not see as often today: a shared national audience. If a big episode aired on Thursday night, people talked about it on Friday morning at work, at school, and around the dinner table.

Thursday Night Became Must-See Television

NBC built one of the most successful television lineups of the decade, especially on Thursday nights. Seinfeld became one of the defining comedies of the era, while Cheers ended its long run in 1993 and Frasier began that same year. Friends premiered in 1994 and quickly became a major hit. ER also premiered in 1994 and drew huge audiences with its fast-moving medical drama. NBC eventually marketed Thursday night as “Must See TV,” and the phrase fit the mood of the time. Viewers planned their evenings around certain shows.

Sitcoms Reflected a Changing America

The sitcom was everywhere during these years. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Home Improvement, Roseanne, Full House, Family Matters, Martin, and other programs presented very different versions of American family and social life. Some focused on suburban homes. Others centered on urban neighborhoods, working-class families, or young adults trying to build lives of their own. Television comedy was not simply about jokes. It reflected changes in family structure, race, work, relationships, and generational attitudes.

Drama Became Faster and More Ambitious

Television dramas were changing too. NYPD Blue, which premiered in 1993, pushed the boundaries of what network television could show and discuss. ER brought viewers into a chaotic emergency room with quick dialogue, moving cameras, and overlapping medical crises. The X-Files, which began in 1993, mixed science fiction, mystery, government conspiracy, and horror. These programs showed that network television could tell more complex stories while still attracting large audiences.

Fox Became a Serious Competitor

Fox was still much younger than the traditional networks, but by the early 1990s it had become impossible to ignore. The Simpsons had already become a cultural phenomenon, while Beverly Hills, 90210 and Melrose Place helped attract younger viewers. The success of shows such as The X-Files demonstrated that Fox could develop programs with loyal national audiences. The old three-network system was turning into something more competitive.

Television Stars Became Household Names

Actors from successful network programs became some of the most recognizable celebrities in America. Jerry Seinfeld, Tim Allen, Will Smith, Kelsey Grammer, Jennifer Aniston, George Clooney, and many others became familiar faces in millions of homes. Television could make someone famous week after week because audiences invited the same performers into their living rooms again and again. That repeated exposure created a different kind of relationship between viewers and stars than a two-hour movie could.

Ratings Were a National Scoreboard

Networks lived and died by ratings. Companies such as Nielsen measured how many households watched different programs, and those numbers influenced advertising prices, renewals, cancellations, and scheduling decisions. A hit program could generate enormous advertising revenue. A struggling show could disappear quickly. Television was entertainment, but it was also a very competitive business, and every network wanted the largest possible audience.

Cable Was Growing in the Background

While network television was still dominant, cable television was expanding rapidly. CNN, ESPN, MTV, Nickelodeon, HBO, and other channels offered viewers more specialized choices. That meant the networks were beginning to lose their near-monopoly on American attention. The audience was slowly breaking into smaller groups, but between 1992 and 1995 the major networks could still create television moments that felt national.

For a Few Hours, Everybody Was Watching Together

That is what made this period so memorable. Television was becoming more diverse at the same time that large audiences were still gathering around the same shows. Comedies, dramas, sports, news, and talk programs created characters and stories that entered everyday conversation. I spent my own nights talking with many of the people who appeared on those screens, and I saw how quickly television could turn an actor, athlete, or entertainer into a national celebrity. For a few more years, America still had something close to one enormous living room, and the television set sat right in the middle of it.

Special Effects Transform Hollywood - Told by Roger Ebert

By the early 1990s, movie audiences had already seen spaceships, monsters, explosions, and imaginary worlds. What changed between 1993 and 1996 was the growing ability of filmmakers to make the impossible look convincing. Computer-generated imagery, digital compositing, advanced animatronics, miniature work, and traditional practical effects began working together with extraordinary results. The question was no longer simply, “Can they show us this?” Increasingly, the answer was yes.

Jurassic Park Changed What Audiences Expected

Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park, released in 1993, was one of the great turning points. The dinosaurs worked because the filmmakers did not rely on a single technique. Full-size animatronic creatures built by Stan Winston's team were combined with computer-generated dinosaurs created by Industrial Light & Magic. When the Tyrannosaurus rex attacked in the rain or the Gallimimus herd raced across the screen, audiences were seeing digital creatures move with a realism that had rarely been possible before. The dinosaurs did not merely look like visual effects. For a few moments, they seemed alive.

The Best Effects Made You Forget the Effects

That is an important distinction. A special effect is not automatically good because it is technically impressive. It succeeds when it helps us believe the story. Jurassic Park worked because the dinosaurs had weight, movement, shadows, and interaction with real environments and actors. The technology served suspense and character. Filmmakers quickly understood the lesson: computer imagery could become far more powerful when combined with careful cinematography, sound, models, makeup, and physical sets.

Hollywood Began Experimenting Everywhere

After Jurassic Park, digital effects appeared in increasingly varied films. Forrest Gump in 1994 used visual effects to place Tom Hanks's character into altered historical footage and create scenes in which he appeared to interact with famous public figures. The Mask used exaggerated digital transformations for comedy. Apollo 13 in 1995 combined models, visual effects, and footage created during actual weightless aircraft flights to make audiences feel trapped inside a spacecraft. Special effects were no longer reserved for science-fiction monsters. They could quietly reshape almost any kind of movie.

Toy Story Eliminated the Camera Altogether

Then came Toy Story in 1995. Produced by Pixar and released by Disney, it became the first feature-length film created entirely with computer animation. Every toy, room, light, shadow, and camera movement existed inside a computer-generated environment. That was a remarkable technical achievement, but the film succeeded because audiences cared about Woody and Buzz Lightyear. Technology may attract attention, but characters keep viewers in their seats. Toy Story proved that computer animation could support an entire feature film rather than simply provide a few spectacular sequences.

Disaster Movies Returned With Digital Power

By 1996, Hollywood was using new effects technology to make destruction bigger and more convincing. Independence Day showed enormous alien spacecraft hovering over cities and destroying landmarks. Twister used computer-generated tornadoes combined with practical debris and physical effects. These movies depended heavily on spectacle, but that spectacle was now something studios could advertise as an attraction by itself. Audiences increasingly went to certain films partly because they wanted to see what modern effects could do.

The Computer Did Not Replace the Artist

There was a temptation to speak as if computers were making movies by themselves. They were not. Artists, animators, model builders, designers, cinematographers, programmers, editors, sound engineers, and actors all remained essential. A computer could calculate an image, but people still had to decide what that image should look like and why it belonged in the story. The greatest technical advances came from combining new tools with old filmmaking skills.

Movies Became More Expensive and More Ambitious

As effects improved, studios became willing to spend more money on films designed around large-scale spectacle. That created opportunities, but it also created risks. A spectacular movie could become an enormous international success, while an expensive failure could cost a studio millions. Special effects were becoming part of Hollywood's business strategy as much as its artistic toolbox.

The Impossible Had Become Ordinary

By 1996, audiences had watched convincing dinosaurs, digital tornadoes, alien invasions, historical illusions, and an entire computer-animated world in only a few years. What had once seemed astonishing was quickly becoming expected. That is the strange thing about movie technology: today's miracle becomes tomorrow's ordinary tool. Between Jurassic Park and Toy Story, Hollywood crossed an important line. Filmmakers were no longer limited mainly by what they could physically build or photograph. Increasingly, if they could imagine it, they could find a way to put it on the screen.

Talk Shows, Cable Television, and the Celebrity Interview - Told by Larry King

By the middle of the 1990s, Americans were not satisfied with simply watching celebrities perform. They wanted to hear them explain themselves. Actors, musicians, athletes, politicians, and public figures were suddenly appearing everywhere on television, and the interview became entertainment of its own. That was good news for someone like me. I had always believed that if you put an interesting person in a chair and asked the right question, you did not need much else.

Cable Television Changed the Rules

Cable television had been growing for years, but by the 1990s it was becoming a major force in American life. CNN delivered news around the clock, MTV connected music with personality and image, ESPN turned sports coverage into constant programming, and channels such as Nickelodeon and HBO served more specialized audiences. The old network system was no longer the only place to become famous. Cable gave viewers more choices, and it gave public figures more places to tell their stories.

The Interview Became Part of the News

On Larry King Live, I interviewed entertainers, politicians, athletes, business leaders, and people caught in major events. The format was simple: sit down, talk, listen, and keep the conversation moving. Sometimes a celebrity appeared because a new movie or album was coming out. Other times the interview happened because of a controversy, tragedy, lawsuit, or major public event. By the 1990s, an interview could become news itself. A single answer could be replayed across television for days.

Daytime Talk Shows Became Huge

Daytime television was transforming at the same time. Oprah Winfrey had already built one of the most influential talk shows in the country, combining celebrity interviews with personal stories and social issues. Other programs followed with their own styles. Phil Donahue remained influential into the 1990s, while shows hosted by Sally Jessy Raphael, Jenny Jones, Ricki Lake, and others attracted large audiences. Some programs aimed for serious discussion. Others leaned heavily into confrontation, confession, and spectacle.

Late-Night Television Was a Celebrity Gateway

Late-night programs were another important part of the system. Johnny Carson retired from The Tonight Show in 1992, and Jay Leno became host. David Letterman moved to CBS in 1993 with Late Show with David Letterman. Those programs became essential stops for actors, comedians, musicians, and other celebrities promoting new work. A funny or memorable appearance could help shape a star's public image. Audiences were learning to judge celebrities not only by their performances, but by how they behaved in interviews.

Celebrity Became More Personal

This was one of the biggest changes. The public increasingly wanted to know what famous people thought, who they married, how they raised their children, what frightened them, and what happened behind the scenes. Magazines and tabloids fed that curiosity, but television made it feel immediate. When someone sat across from an interviewer and spoke directly into the camera, viewers could feel as if they were meeting that person themselves.

Fame Could Turn Into Scrutiny Very Quickly

The same television system that could build a celebrity could also surround that person during a crisis. The 1990s were filled with examples of private problems becoming public entertainment. Court cases, divorces, scandals, family disputes, and personal tragedies were often discussed on television almost in real time. The boundary between news and entertainment became harder to see, and audiences sometimes followed the personal lives of celebrities with the same intensity they followed their careers.

The O.J. Simpson Case Showed the Power of Television

Nothing demonstrated this more clearly than the O.J. Simpson case. After the 1994 killings of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, television coverage became nearly constant. Simpson had been a famous football player, broadcaster, and actor, so the case immediately combined crime, celebrity, sports, race, law, and television. His 1995 criminal trial became one of the most watched legal proceedings in American history. The case showed just how powerful television had become in turning real events into national cultural experiences.

The Best Interviews Still Came Down to Listening

For all the technology and fame surrounding television, the interview itself remained simple. Ask a clear question. Listen carefully. Do not interrupt unless you need to. Follow the answer somewhere interesting. The best interviews were not always the loudest ones. Sometimes a quiet question revealed more than a confrontation ever could.

Television Had Changed What It Meant to Be Famous

By 1997, celebrity culture had become much more personal and much more immediate. Cable television, daytime talk shows, late-night programs, and news interviews had given famous people constant access to the public, while also giving the public constant access to them. That changed celebrity forever. Fame was no longer just about what you did on stage, on screen, or on the field. Increasingly, it was about what you said when someone like me looked across a desk and asked, “So, what really happened?”

Music Becomes Bigger, Broader, and More Global - Told by Whitney Houston

By the middle of the 1990s, popular music had become almost impossible to describe with one sound. R&B was thriving. Hip-hop was expanding. Country music was filling arenas. Alternative rock was still powerful. Teen pop was beginning to rise, and Latin artists were reaching broader audiences. American music was not becoming smaller or more uniform. It was becoming wider, louder, and much more international.

R&B and Hip-Hop Kept Growing

R&B had enormous influence during these years, with artists such as Boyz II Men, TLC, Brandy, Monica, Mary J. Blige, and Mariah Carey reaching huge audiences. Hip-hop also continued moving into the center of popular culture. Artists including Tupac Shakur, The Notorious B.I.G., Nas, and others helped define the decade, while rap increasingly influenced fashion, language, advertising, and youth culture. What had once been treated by some as a temporary trend was clearly becoming one of the most important forms of American music.

Country Music Became a Mass-Market Powerhouse

Country music was also booming. Garth Brooks helped turn country concerts into large-scale arena spectacles, while artists such as Shania Twain crossed easily between country and pop audiences. By the late 1990s, Twain's Come On Over became one of the best-selling albums by a female artist. Country music was no longer limited to one region or one kind of listener. It had become a major national and international business.

Pop Music Learned How to Build Global Stars

By the second half of the decade, the machinery of pop music had become incredibly effective. The Spice Girls became an international phenomenon after “Wannabe” was released in 1996, and boy bands such as the Backstreet Boys developed enormous audiences in Europe before becoming even bigger in the United States. Record companies, radio stations, music television, magazines, concerts, and merchandising all worked together to make stars recognizable across borders.

Music Television Still Mattered Enormously

MTV and other music-video outlets remained powerful during these years because audiences were not just listening to songs. They were watching performers build identities. Hair, clothing, choreography, attitude, and visual style could matter almost as much as the record itself. A memorable video could take a song from radio success to international recognition. Music had become something you heard, watched, copied, and wore.

Soundtracks Connected Movies and Music

The 1990s also showed how closely movies and music could work together. I had experienced that myself with The Bodyguard earlier in the decade, and the pattern continued. Songs tied to major films could become international hits, while movie soundtracks became major albums in their own right. Celine Dion's “My Heart Will Go On,” connected to Titanic in 1997, became one of the clearest examples of how film and music could combine to create a worldwide cultural moment.

Different Genres Began Crossing Into Each Other

One of the most interesting things about this period was how difficult it became to keep musical categories separate. Pop borrowed from R&B. Country borrowed from pop. Hip-hop producers worked with singers. Rock bands experimented with electronic sounds. Artists who might once have been placed in completely different sections of a record store were now competing on the same charts and appearing on the same television programs.

The Music Business Was Becoming Truly Global

American performers were reaching enormous international audiences, but the flow also worked in the other direction. British acts, Canadian singers, Latin performers, and artists from many other countries entered the American market more easily. International tours grew larger, global television exposure increased, and major record companies were thinking about worldwide audiences when they developed artists.

By 1998, Pop Culture Had No Borders

That is what stands out most to me about 1994 through 1998. Music had become a giant meeting place. Hip-hop, R&B, country, rock, teen pop, dance music, and international influences all competed for attention at once. You could be a country singer from Canada, a girl group from Britain, an R&B singer from America, or a rapper from New York or California and still reach listeners around the world. The music industry was becoming more global because audiences were becoming more connected. By the end of the decade, a hit record was no longer just an American success. It could become part of a worldwide conversation.

Princess Diana, Paparazzi, and the Cost of Celebrity - Told by Larry King

By 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales, was one of the most photographed people in the world. She had married Prince Charles in 1981, raised two sons, carried out royal duties, and later continued major charitable work after their divorce. But by the 1990s, Diana was more than a royal figure. She had become an international celebrity whose clothing, relationships, travels, interviews, and humanitarian work were followed constantly by newspapers, magazines, television programs, and photographers.

The Public Wanted More and More

That was the strange thing about celebrity in the 1990s: being famous created an enormous appetite for more information. People wanted the photographs, the interviews, the personal details, and the story behind the story. Paparazzi photographers could earn substantial money for exclusive images of internationally famous people, and competition for those photographs could become intense. Diana lived inside that environment. Wherever she traveled, cameras often followed.

Diana Used Fame for Serious Causes

There was another side to her celebrity. Diana understood that cameras followed her, and she sometimes directed that attention toward humanitarian causes. In 1997 she traveled to Angola in connection with efforts against land mines, later promoted the issue in the United States, and visited land-mine projects in Bosnia shortly before her death. Images of her walking through a cleared minefield helped focus international attention on the dangers civilians continued to face long after wars ended.

Then Came the News From Paris

On August 31, 1997, Diana died after a high-speed automobile crash in the Place de l'Alma underpass in Paris. Her companion, Dodi Fayed, and the driver, Henri Paul, also died, while bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones survived with serious injuries. The news spread around the world almost immediately. This was no longer a royal story or a celebrity story. It became an international tragedy.

The Paparazzi Became Part of the Debate

Photographers had been following Diana's car before the crash, and their presence immediately became part of the public discussion. Questions arose about how aggressively photographers should pursue celebrities and where journalism ended and intrusion began. Later official investigations examined the circumstances of the crash and found that excessive speed and the impaired condition of driver Henri Paul were major factors. The larger public argument, however, continued: how much privacy should famous people surrender simply because the public is interested in them?

The World Mourned Together

The reaction was extraordinary. People placed enormous numbers of flowers and messages outside royal residences, and mourning extended far beyond Britain. Queen Elizabeth II addressed the nation on September 5 and acknowledged the overwhelming expression of sadness following Diana's death. Diana's funeral took place at Westminster Abbey on September 6, followed by her private burial at the Spencer family estate at Althorp.

Television Turned Grief Into a Shared Experience

This was television at its most powerful. News networks carried developments constantly. Viewers thousands of miles away could watch crowds gather in London, see flowers accumulating outside Kensington Palace, hear public reactions, and then watch the funeral. Television had already made Diana internationally famous. Now it allowed millions of people who had never met her to experience the aftermath of her death almost simultaneously. Later that year, the Queen described the worldwide response and the thousands of flowers and messages left in Diana's memory.

Celebrity Had Revealed Its Darker Side

The death of Princess Diana forced people to confront a contradiction that had been building throughout the decade. Audiences complained about intrusive photographers, yet celebrity photographs sold because audiences wanted them. Television criticized excessive attention while devoting hours to celebrity stories. Famous people benefited from publicity while sometimes finding themselves unable to escape it. There was no easy answer, but after August 1997 it became much harder to pretend that celebrity had no cost.

As an interviewer, I spent my career asking famous people questions, and there is a difference between asking someone to speak and believing that fame gives us ownership of that person's life. Diana's death became one of the defining media moments of the 1990s because it forced us to examine that boundary. The cameras had helped make her one of the most recognizable women on Earth. In the end, her story made the world ask a far more uncomfortable question: when does our fascination with famous people become too much?

Titanic, Championship Sports, and the Age of the Mega-Celebrity - Told by Roger Ebert, Whitney Houston, John Madden, and Larry King

By the late 1990s, popular culture had become enormous. Movies were not merely movies anymore. Sports stars were not simply athletes. Singers were not merely people making records. The largest stars could dominate television, magazines, advertising, radio, fashion, and conversations around the world at the same time. If you want one movie that demonstrates how large popular culture could become, start with Titanic.

Titanic Takes Over the World

Roger Ebert: Titanic opened in December 1997, and what followed was remarkable. James Cameron had made an extremely expensive historical drama about the 1912 sinking of the RMS Titanic, but audiences turned it into a global phenomenon. Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet became international stars, theaters remained packed for months, and the film eventually became the first movie to earn more than $1 billion worldwide. At the 1998 Academy Awards, Titanic won eleven Oscars, tying the record held by Ben-Hur. People were not simply watching a film. They were participating in a cultural event.

Whitney Houston: And you could hear that event everywhere too. Celine Dion's “My Heart Will Go On” became inseparable from Titanic. That is something the 1990s did incredibly well: movies and music could lift each other. You saw the movie, heard the song on the radio, saw the video on television, bought the soundtrack, and then heard it again at awards shows. The entertainment industries were becoming connected in a way that could turn one story into something the entire world seemed to know.

Michael Jordan's Final Bulls Run

John Madden: Movies had Titanic, but sports had Michael Jordan. In 1998, the Chicago Bulls won their sixth NBA championship of the decade, their second three-peat. Jordan hit the deciding shot late in Game 6 against the Utah Jazz and was named Finals MVP again. Now, that is already a great sports story. But Jordan was bigger than basketball by then. His shoes, commercials, clothing, highlights, and endorsements were everywhere. People who barely followed the NBA knew Michael Jordan.

Larry King: And that is where sports and celebrity began blending together. Jordan could appear in interviews, commercials, magazines, movies, and television programs just like a Hollywood star. By the late 1990s, athletes were not staying inside the sports section anymore. They were becoming entertainment figures with public images that had to be managed just as carefully as actors and singers.

Tiger Woods Arrives

John Madden: Then you had Tiger Woods. He won the Masters in 1997 at age twenty-one, finishing twelve strokes ahead of the field. It was one of those moments when you realized you were watching the beginning of something important. Golf had always had great stars, but Tiger attracted new viewers, younger viewers, and people who had never paid much attention to the sport. Television ratings rose when he was playing because people wanted to see what he might do next.

Roger Ebert: That is not so different from movie stardom. Once an audience believes a particular person might do something extraordinary, that person becomes the attraction. People bought tickets because Schwarzenegger was in the movie. They watched basketball because Jordan was playing. They watched golf because Woods was on the course. The personality became part of the product.

Pop Music Creates a New Generation of Stars

Whitney Houston: Music was doing the same thing. The Backstreet Boys were growing into an international sensation, the Spice Girls had already shown how quickly a pop group could become a worldwide brand, and then Britney Spears released “…Baby One More Time” in 1998. By 1999, she was one of the most recognizable young performers in the country. Jennifer Lopez moved between movies and music. Ricky Martin's performance at the 1999 Grammy Awards helped push Latin pop further into the American mainstream. Pop music was becoming increasingly international and heavily visual.

Larry King: And those singers were everywhere. They came on talk shows, appeared at award ceremonies, showed up on magazine covers, performed on television specials, and became subjects of constant entertainment reporting. Audiences were not merely buying songs. They were following personalities.

The Women's World Cup Creates Another National Moment

John Madden: One of my favorite examples came in 1999 with the FIFA Women's World Cup. The United States played China in the final at the Rose Bowl before more than 90,000 spectators. The match ended scoreless and went to a penalty shootout. Brandi Chastain scored the winning penalty, and the United States won the championship. That tournament helped bring women's soccer and players such as Chastain, Mia Hamm, Julie Foudy, and Michelle Akers enormous national attention.

Larry King: And again, television mattered. One photograph or one televised moment could suddenly make an athlete recognizable throughout the country. That was the power of the late-1990s media environment. A great performance could travel from the stadium to the evening news, magazines, advertisements, and talk shows almost immediately.

Celebrity Became a Business

Roger Ebert: Hollywood had understood celebrity as a business for decades, but by the end of the 1990s that system had expanded into almost every corner of popular culture. Studios sold stars. Record companies sold personalities. Sports leagues sold athletes. Advertising companies understood that attaching the right famous person to a product could reach millions of customers.

Whitney Houston: And image mattered almost as much as talent. Your clothing, your music video, your interviews, your performances, and even your relationships could become part of how the public saw you. That could create incredible opportunities, but it also meant that entertainers were constantly being watched.

Everyone Wanted Access

Larry King: That is what I noticed from the interviewer's chair. By 1999, people wanted access to celebrities almost constantly. They wanted to know what Jordan thought after the championship, what the Titanic stars were doing next, what singers were dating, what athletes were buying, and what famous people thought about everything. Entertainment journalism expanded because the demand was there.

John Madden: And once somebody became that famous, they could influence more than their own profession. Jordan influenced shoes and fashion. Tiger influenced golf audiences. Musicians influenced hairstyles and clothing. Actors influenced trends. That is when you knew you were not just dealing with stars anymore. You were dealing with brands.

The Mega-Celebrity Arrives

Roger Ebert: By the end of 1999, we had entered what you might call the age of the mega-celebrity. Titanic demonstrated how a movie could capture worldwide attention. Jordan and Woods showed how athletes could become international cultural icons. Pop stars demonstrated how music, television, fashion, and advertising could work together.

Whitney Houston: And the world was getting smaller. A song released in one country could become a hit somewhere else. A basketball game could create fans thousands of miles away. A Hollywood movie could pack theaters around the globe.

John Madden: Talent still mattered. You cannot fake six championships or win the Masters by having a good advertising campaign. But television and marketing could take that talent and make sure everybody knew about it.

Larry King: That may be the real story of 1997 through 1999. Fame had always existed, but now the machinery surrounding fame was becoming larger, faster, and more global. By the time the decade ended, the biggest celebrities were not simply known for what they did. They had become part of everyday culture itself.