■ The Pop Edition
October 19: Macarena Turns 30, Riding in Cars at 25
Born On This Day
Jon Favreau
BORN 1966 · TURNS 60
He started as the affable friend in Rudy and Swingers, then quietly rebuilt himself behind the camera, directing Elf and eventually launching the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Iron Man. These days he's the guy Disney trusts with Star Wars and The Lion King remakes alike.
Trey Parker
BORN 1969 · TURNS 57
Co-creator of South Park with Matt Stone, he's kept the show running for over 25 seasons on a turnaround schedule that still shocks TV producers, plus a Broadway smash in The Book of Mormon.
Evander Holyfield
BORN 1962 · TURNS 64
The only four-time heavyweight champion in boxing history, he's remembered as much for his discipline in the ring as for the night in 1997 when Mike Tyson bit off part of his ear.
Jennifer Holliday
BORN 1960 · TURNS 66
Her performance of 'And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going' in the original Broadway production of Dreamgirls won her a Tony and set a vocal standard singers still chase.
John le Carré
BORN 1931 · WOULD HAVE BEEN 95
The former British intelligence officer turned spy novelist gave the Cold War its definitive fiction with Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. He died in 2020.
On The Charts: Macarena Rules the Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 dated October 19, 1996 had Los Del Rio's 'Macarena' sitting at #1, one week among a run that stretched fourteen weeks total, tying it at the time for one of the longest chart reigns in the survey's history. The Spanish duo, both in their fifties when the song broke, had recorded it years earlier as a straightforward flamenco pop number before a Miami-based remix crew, the Bayside Boys, added English-language verses and the dance instructions that turned it into a wedding-reception fixture.
It displaced a run of R&B and hip-hop that had defined 1996's charts, and critics at the time treated it as a novelty embarrassment, the kind of thing that would vanish by winter. Instead it became inescapable: on the radio, at the Democratic National Convention, in Sesame Street parodies. Thirty years on, the song still functions as musical shorthand for the mid-90s in a way few actual hits from that chart run manage, and the dance survives at parties that have never heard the original Spanish lyrics it started with.
Opening Weekend: Riding in Cars with Boys
Riding in Cars with Boys opened in wide release on October 19, 2001, with Drew Barrymore playing Beverly Donofrio, a woman raising a son at 16 while nursing dreams of a writing career that keep getting deferred by circumstance and a husband, played by Steve Zahn, sliding deeper into addiction. It was adapted from Donofrio's own memoir, and director Penny Marshall spent years developing the project before it reached screens.
Reviews at the time were mixed on the tonal shifts between comedy and genuine hardship, and it opened against a marketplace still cautious just weeks after September 11, when studios were quietly softening release calendars and trailers. The film didn't set the box office alight, but it aged into something closer to a cult favorite for the specific way it refused to flatten Beverly into either a martyr or a punchline. Twenty-five years later, it's remembered less for its box office than for Barrymore's performance spanning three decades of one character's life, aged makeup and all.
Meanwhile…
1987Wall Street's Black Monday crash rattled the stock market this week, and while it's a news story, it also reshaped the anxious tone of pop culture heading into the late 80s.
1960Jennifer Holliday is born in Riverside, Texas, decades before her Dreamgirls performance becomes a Broadway standard.
1962Evander Holyfield is born, years before four separate heavyweight title reigns and one unforgettable night against Mike Tyson.
1966Jon Favreau is born, decades before Iron Man reroutes the entire film industry toward shared universes.
1969Trey Parker is born, ahead of a comedy partnership with Matt Stone that would outlast most of the presidencies it mocks.
1996Macarena logs another week at #1 on the Hot 100, on its way to a fourteen-week total run.
2001Riding in Cars with Boys opens wide, giving Drew Barrymore a role that spans three decades of one character's life.