Tabla de contenidos para PEOPLE Yearbook 2024 en People

Emma Stone won for Poor Things, as did awards season favorite Da’Vine Joy Randolph for The Holdovers. But the 2024 Academy Awards ceremony was largely a rematch of the Barbenheimer weekend of July 2023, when Barbie proved she was Kenough to beat Oppenheimer at the box office. At the March 10 event, however, the biopic about the father of the atomic bomb earned seven wins, while Barbie, which also had a Best Picture nod, did not get nominations for director Greta Gerwig or star Margot Robbie. (Proving, some said, the meta-pink-feminist comedy’s whole point.) Two of Oppenheimer’s statues went to lead Cillian Murphy and Supporting Actor Robert Downey Jr. “I’d like to thank my terrible childhood and the Academy—in that order,” said Downey, who beat out Barbie’s Ryan Gosling. (But…

Caitlin Clark’s soaring three-pointers, brilliant all-around performance and innate magnetism made her the face of women’s basketball. She ignited a surge in the sport’s popularity, reflected in higher attendance and TV ratings. As NBA great Steph Curry—to whom she is often compared—told CBS Mornings, Clark’s shooting skill is “her superpower, but the rest of her game is as polished as that, so this is must-see TV.” At the University of Iowa, Clark set an NCAA Division I lifetime scoring record with 3,951 points, averaging 28.4 per game. Drafted by the WNBA’s Indiana Fever, she won Rookie of the Year with an average of 19.2 points, 5.7 rebounds and 8.4 assists per game, helping Indiana make it to the playoffs for the first time since 2016. Clark set a single-season…

In April Nicole Kidman slipped into a luminescent gold Balenciaga dress and accepted the American Film Institute’s Life Achievement Award. “Thank you for inviting me into your movie families. Thank you for my childhood dream that became a reality,” she told a star-studded audience. Joining their mom on the red carpet were Kidman’s daughters with Keith Urban, Sunday, 16, and Faith, 13. (In October Sunday would make her catwalk debut, opening the Miu Miu fashion show in Paris.) Instead of resting on the laurels being celebrated, Kidman, 57, kept on. This year alone she starred in two miniseries, Expats and The Perfect Couple (opposite Liev Schreiber), and in a second season of Special Ops: Lioness. On the big screen, she and Zac Efron costarred in the frothy rom-com A…

In October 2021 Alec Baldwin was rehearsing a scene in Rust, a western on which he was both a producer and star, when the gun in his hand discharged, killing cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, 42, and wounding director Joel Souza. Charged with involuntary manslaughter, Baldwin maintained he never pulled the trigger and didn’t know the gun had live rounds. The film’s armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, was found guilty in March this year and was serving 18 months in prison when Baldwin went on trial in Santa Fe, facing the same sentence. But on the third day, Baldwin’s attorneys asked Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer to dismiss the case, claiming prosecutors had withheld evidence: bullets matching the ones on the Rust set. After prosecutor Kari Morrissey claimed in court that the ammo had…

When Joe Biden debated Donald Trump in 2020, he easily stood up to the Republican candidate’s badgering, blurting out, “Will you shut up, man?” Biden emerged strong and won the election. It was different when the two met in June in Atlanta. This time Biden, 81, occasionally seemed lost. He turned an answer about abortion (a strong issue for Democrats) into a take on immigration (an area of weakness). Trump, 78, said at one point, “I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows what he said either.” The night caused panic among Democrats; nearly two-thirds felt he should step down, according to an AP poll. Biden stood firm, saying only the “Lord Almighty” could change his course. Still, old…

1. Vic-Torri Swimmer Torri Huske of Stanford University winning two of her three gold medals, anchoring the U.S. team’s triumph in the women’s 4x100m medley relay and (inset) the individual 100m butterfly. “I don’t even know how to process it,” she said of her solo gold. “Like, I feel like I am going to cry, but I’m also smiling.” 2. Speed Queens From left: U.S. sprinters Melissa Jefferson, Twanisha Terry, Gabrielle Thomas and Sha’Carri Richardson jumped for joy after winning the women’s 4x100m relay. The U.S. team edged out Great Britain by 0.07 seconds. 3. Horse Power Pommel horse specialist Stephen Nedoroscik took flight and helped the U.S. men’s team to a bronze medal. A mechanical engineer by day, he won a solo bronze too. 4. Court Kings After…

Brat: a Color, an Album, a Season “That girl who is a little messy and likes to party and maybe says some dumb things sometimes. Who feels herself but maybe also has a breakdown. But kind of, like, parties through it, is very honest, very blunt … but it’s brat,” said Charli XCX (right, with Australian singer Troye Sivan), explaining the title of her sixth album, brat. On July 21, when Joe Biden ended his campaign amid brat summer, the pop star offered this example on X: “kamala IS brat.” Only hours old, the new campaign picked up the brash lime green and brat type style to announce “kamala hq” had arrived. Demure and Famous TikToker Jools Lebron was just sharing some pro tips: Be demure. Be mindful. Don’t overdo the makeup…

1. Shōgun FX’s new take on James Clavell’s historical novel made its own history with 18 Emmys. “Can people enjoy a 1600s feudal Japan story?” wondered producer and star Hiroyuki Sanada (above, with Anna Sawai). “Surprisingly, we got a great reaction.” 2. Ripley Director Steven Zaillian’s revisit with Patricia Highsmith’s con man challenged star Andrew Scott. “People have a lot of preconceptions about Tom Ripley,” he said. “It’s my job … to ignore all that.” With an icy elegance, he did. 3. Jon Stewart on The Daily Show With the election a Biden-Trump rematch, Stewart retook the anchor desk after nearly nine years away. Each Monday he rode out one wild news cycle after the next: “You can replace your old guy too,” he told the GOP when Biden quit the race.…

The devastation stretched 500 miles, across six states, from Florida’s Big Bend to the Appalachian Mountains in Virginia. Hurricane Helene attacked the American South as a category 4 in late September, with winds of up to 140 mph and storm surges as high as 15-ft., leaving millions without power, cell service and fresh water. Worst of all, Helene left more than 230 deaths in her wake with hundreds more missing. “We saw people in the river, and they couldn’t hang on to the trees,” nonprofit worker Amy Cantrell of Swannanoa, N.C., told People. In Beech Island, S.C., the bodies of Jerry Savage, 78, and his wife, Marcia, 74, were found hugging in bed after a tree crashed through their home. “My daddy died a hero,” says their daughter Tammy Estep.…

B. 1971 Shannen Doherty For the last nine years of her life, the straight-talking star became as well-known for the forthright and public way she confronted cancer as she had been for the sensation she caused at 19 as the rebellious Brenda Walsh (girlfriend of Luke Perry’s Dylan McKay, above) on the smash teen drama Beverly Hills 90210. The show’s instant success was “overwhelming,” she admitted, but “being someone who didn’t necessarily play by the rules, I didn’t placate the men in my business.” She left the series early, but 90210 producer Aaron Spelling then cast the Memphis native in his supernatural drama Charmed, as one of three sisters who were witches. It too became a cultural touchstone. Of her three marriages, “Listen, Elizabeth Taylor still has me beat…

“Why y’all acting like you don’t know this song?” chided Miley Cyrus to a Grammys audience that took the nudge and joined her celebration. She had just beaten out Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish and others to win her first Grammy (for Best Pop Solo Performance) and was now—with legs and fringe and strut recalling Tina Turner—singing her self-empowerment anthem “Flowers.” The song, which has been streamed more than 2.7 billion times, went on to win Record of the Year. “I’ve been doing this for 20 years, and this is my first time actually being taken seriously at the Grammys?” she marveled with some edge in W magazine. “If we want to talk stats and numbers, then where the f--- was I? This is not about arrogance. I am proud of…

Where was Kate? The Princess of Wales was scarcely seen in the early part of 2024 following a planned abdominal surgery in January. When she didn’t return to royal duties for weeks, Internet theories proliferated, fueled in early March by a U.K. Mother’s Day portrait with her children that appeared to have been digitally manipulated. (News agencies pulled it, and Kate apologized for the “minor adjustments.”) Then came word that left those who had joked about the photo and her absence feeling shamed: Kate announced in a March 22 video (above) that she had cancer. She and William had had to adjust to the “shock,” she said, and to take time to explain to children George, 11, Charlotte, 9, and Louis, 6, “in a way that is appropriate for them,…

Sean Combs In September the rapper known as Diddy pleaded not guilty to federal charges including sex trafficking and racketeering related to his “Freak Offs,” described in the filing as “orchestrated performances of sexual activity” between victims and sex workers that prosecutors say Combs “directed” and recorded. (Separately, he currently faces two dozen lawsuits alleging sexual misconduct or violence and dozens more accusations.) In a statement to People, his lawyer Marc Agnifilo said that Diddy, held in a Brooklyn jail, “is an imperfect person but he is not a criminal.… He looks forward to clearing his name.” If convicted, he could face life behind bars. Hunter Biden Found Guilty In June, Hunter Biden went on trial for lying about his crack cocaine usage when he obtained a .38-cal. Colt Cobra revolver…

Before even one athlete medaled at the Summer Olympic Games, singer Céline Dion offered a dazzling example of strength and perseverance. At the July 26 opening ceremony she gave a heart-stopping rendition of Édith Piaf’s “Hymn to Love” on the rain-soaked Eiffel Tower, her first performance since announcing in 2022 that she was suffering from the neurological disorder stiff-person syndrome. It followed the summer premiere of the Prime Video documentary I Am: Céline Dion, which detailed her long struggle with the condition. “I barely could walk at one point,” she told People in June, adding that she resolved to stay strong for her three sons, particularly after the death of husband René Angélil. “I was like, ‘Okay, they already lost a parent. I don’t want them to be scared.’ ”…

Electric with exuberance, August’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago culminated in the nomination of Kamala Harris for President of the United States and her running mate, Minnesota governor Tim Walz. Harris, 59, had vaulted to the nomination when 81-year-old President Joe Biden stepped aside (see page 38). She took on serious topics from foreign policy to the cost of living to reproductive rights. But the DNC’s overarching vibe was optimism—and the byword, “joy.” DJ Cassidy turned the roll call into a dance party, spinning songs to fit each state (rapper Lil Jon showed up in person for Georgia). Stealing the show, however, was Gus Walz, 17 (above), son of the VP nominee. During his father’s acceptance address, cameras caught the teen, who has a nonverbal learning disorder, tearing up…

Maybe she was hoping to keep the change in her relationship status secret, but, while in Paris to sing (in French!) at the Olympics, Lady Gaga was too full of love to keep it hidden. She introduced Michael Polansky, her boyfriend of five years, as her “fiancé” to then Prime Minister Gabriel Attal—who put a clip of their chat on his TikTok. Gaga (Stefani Germanotta) and Polansky were set up five years ago by her mother, Cynthia, who runs Gaga’s philanthropic foundation. Soon the star and the San Francisco tech exec got close during the COVID-19 quarantine, spent at her Malibu home. In April 2024 he proposed with a diamond the size of a boulder after a day of rock climbing. “He’s my best friend. He’s my partner. And…

In January Selena Gomez and music producer Benny Blanco made their relationship public at the Golden Globes. “I won,” the star wrote on an Instagram photo of the couple. Finding love is a win on its own, but good news kept coming. Her TV show Only Murders in the Building began a fourth season and earned her a first acting Emmy nomination. Meanwhile, in the film Emilia Pérez she took on the unexpected musical role of the wife to a Mexican drug cartel boss (played by Karla Sofía Gascón) who fakes death in order to get gender-affirming surgery. On the eve of the film’s New York City premiere, Gomez, founder of the mental health information site Wondermind, learned that, thanks to her makeup company Rare Beauty, she had landed…

She named her debut album The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, but since its release last September, Missourian Chappell Roan has mostly just risen—straight to the stratosphere. One after the other, synth-pop bangers like “Hot to Go!” and “Good Luck, Babe!” have headed up the charts: At one point in the summer Roan (who uses a performing pseudonym) had six songs on the Hot 100. Her live shows—she broke the attendance record at this summer’s Lollapalooza festival in Chicago—are high-camp celebrations as fiery as her Renaissance hair, mixing drag queens, wrestling costumes, faux pig snouts, nonstop dancing and a proud message of LGBTQ+ inclusivity. Having denied her own queerness through much of her conservative religious childhood, she lit out for L.A.—see her hit “Pink Pony Club” for…

When Taylor Swift returned to North America to wrap up her Eras Tour, she said she wanted to kick off that final leg of her history-making concerts in a place “where the crowds are going to be passionate, enthusiastic, screaming the words to every single song.” She definitely got her wish from the 180,000 people who packed into Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium over three nights in October. Vocal, friendship-bracelet-swapping fans have flocked to every stop on Swift’s record-shattering five-continent, 149-concert tour. At each venue she unspooled a three-hour selection of hits, graced shows with such performers as Sabrina Carpenter and some surprise guests (including boyfriend Travis Kelce, who took the stage in London) and offered a rotating fashion extravaganza that referenced the feel of each of her albums. The tour…

There were signs. In the documentary The Greatest Love Story Never Told, an addendum to This Is Me … Now: A Love Story, the musical film that very public Jennifer Lopez released in February, her more private husband, Ben Affleck, calls them “two people with different kinds of approaches trying to learn to compromise.” Twenty years after they called off their 2004 engagement, Lopez filed for divorce on Aug. 20, the second anniversary of their big blowout celebration in Georgia. (They’d quietly wed in Vegas in July 2022.) Lopez, 55, and Affleck, 52, had been living apart since April, neither one in the $60.8 million L.A. mansion they’d bought together in 2023, though reunited occasionally for family events with their kids, Lopez’s 13-year-old twins with her ex-husband Marc Anthony,…

“This ain’t a country album. This is a Beyoncé album,” said the woman herself just before the March 29 release of Cowboy Carter. “And I am proud to share it with y’all!” Her 12th collection featured a distinct twang, duets with legends including Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson, and a horse and Stetson on the cover. Along with its first radio hit, “Texas Hold ’Em,” Cowboy made the Houston native the first Black woman to top Billboard’s Country album and single charts. It soon hit more than a billion Spotify streams and by year’s end had 11 Grammy nominations. So it was a surprise to some that the effort earned no Country Music Award nods. “I feel like those songs were everywhere,” said Kelly Clarkson. But Beyoncé said, when she…

After Hamas slaughtered some 1,200 Israelis and foreigners and took 250 hostages on Oct. 7, 2023, Israel retaliated by invading and bombing both Hamas strongholds and Gaza civilian areas in an ongoing campaign that has since taken more than 42,000 lives. American campuses then roiled with protest. Students in support of Palestinians called for an end to U.S. policy arming Israel. Chants including “Burn Tel Aviv to the ground” left administrators grappling with how to deal with hate speech; three Ivy League presidents stepped down after their testimony to Congress on the issue. By April pro-Palestinian protesters set up encampments at schools in Florida, Texas, Illinois and elsewhere. At Columbia University in New York City (pictured) protests threatened graduation until police cleared the tent cities. Early in the new…

It had been building for a while: A featured role in Top Gun: Maverick. The fizzy 2023 rom-com Anyone but You. Then came June’s Netflix release of the caper comedy Hit Man, chased by Twisters, a summer popcorn action hit. Glen Powell, who had been working since he was a child actor in 2003’s Spy Kids 3, suddenly broke out. (How big did he get? Even his dog got famous. “There was a girl in New York, Brisket was walking up, and she goes, ‘That looks exactly like Glen Powell’s dog!’ ” he told People. “She didn’t even see me. I was like, “Brisket, you’ve made it!”) Yes, Glen Powell was everywhere. And … so were his parents. As he traveled to promote his films, mom Cyndy (who had…

“Kicks are getting stronger and are now visible at 24 weeks +5 days,” Gypsy Rose Blanchard wrote on Instagram. It has been a whirlwind year for the expectant mom, which began with her late December 2023 release from prison. Blanchard, who served most of her 10-year sentence for the 2015 killing of her mother, Clauddine “Dee Dee” Blanchard, is the most famous victim of Munchausen syndrome by proxy—a psychological disorder where Dee Dee forced her to undergo unnecessary medical procedures. Newly free, Blanchard, 33, restarted her life. She filed for divorce from her husband, Ryan Anderson, and reunited with former fiancé Ken Urker, who became her pen pal while she was in prison. “I’m in love,” she said of Urker, 31, with whom she is having the baby. “He…

As Donald Trump turned his head to look at a chart during an outdoor campaign rally, a shot rang out. The former President winced, grabbed his right ear and dropped to the ground. Secret Service agents rushed to shield his body, and other gunfire could be heard at the Butler Farm Show grounds near Butler, Pa., on July 13. Less than a minute later an agent called out, “The shooter is down. We are good to move.” Trump, blood streaking down his face, stood up and, halting the agents surrounding him, he thrust up his fist, saying, “Fight, fight, fight.” ‘BULLETS WERE CONTINUING TO FLY. I WAS VERY BRAVE’—DONALD TRUMP, JULY 19, 2024 Four hundred and fifty feet away, Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, lay dead, killed by a Secret…

On day one the outlook seemed bleak for Simone Biles at the Summer Games. After what was later reported to be a tweak in her calf, Biles was getting her left leg taped and limping to the exit at the packed Bercy Arena. It was an eerie echo of the Tokyo Games in 2021: Citing mental health issues and the “twisties”—a phenomenon that made her unable to sense where her body was in the air—an agonized Biles had withdrawn from most events. Asked if she was okay in Paris, she said, “Yup, as good as I can be.” Pretty darned good, as it turned out: Biles went on to win a silver medal in the individual floor exercise and golds in the vault, all-around and team—which she clinched with…

…

“I want to thank … me!” said Niecy Nash-Betts when she won an Emmy for Dahmer—Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story. She and others in the running for 2023 Emmys had to wait until January, owing to the Hollywood labor strikes. Big winners at the Prime Time ceremony, with six each, were the first season of The Bear and the final season of Succession. (Kiernan Culkin and Sarah Snook, below, were among those honored.) Then it was back to L.A.’s Peacock Theater in September, where Shōgun reigned in drama, and The Bear, which earned several acting honors (including for Jamie Lee Curtis’s ravenous turn in the “Fishes” Christmas episode), seemed ready to clean up again. But: upset! Best Comedy went to Hacks, with star Jean Smart earning her sixth statue.…

1. No Doubt + Olivia Rodrigo At Coachella in April, Rodrigo, who turned 21 on the eve of her Guts tour, joined a band that had inspired her. Gen X thrilled at No Doubt’s reunion after nine years—but winced, thinking of Gwen Stefani as an elder stateswoman. 2. Lainey Wilson The Academy of Country Music’s Entertainer of the Year released Whirlwind, “the most cathartic and personal piece of art I’ve ever made,” she told People. “I hope this record brings some peace to your whirlwind … like it did for me.” 3. The Rolling Stones Along with Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood, Mick Jagger (who turned 81 days after the end of the Hackney Diamonds tour) put on an “incredible show!” avowed Céline Dion, who caught it in Vegas. 4. Sabrina…

“I’ll never be doing a rally again. Can you believe it?” said a visibly relieved Donald J. Trump, 78, in a Nov. 6 victory speech. Sharing a Palm Beach, Fla., stage with family, friends and his running mate J.D. Vance, Trump predicted his second term “will truly be the golden age of America.” That age, according to his campaign promises, could include the deportation of millions of undocumented residents, extended tax cuts, steep tariffs on imported goods, prosecution of political opponents he called “the enemy from within” and the lifting of climate protections. Pivoting when Kamala Harris replaced Joe Biden on the Democratic ticket, Trump often spoke directly to female voters. “Women will be happy, healthy, confident and free,” he vowed at a September rally in Pennsylvania. “You will…