Top 10 Times Celebrities Predicted the Future

Bruce Willis

In 1993 footage filmed on the set of "Pulp Fiction," Bruce Willis anticipated even riskier independent filmmaking. He said that within five years, a hit movie would be made on video and a meager budget of $60,000. Five years later, Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez made a horror mockumentary with an initial budget of about 60 grand. "The Blair Witch Project" became a box office and pop culture sensation, inspiring a movement of low-budget, high-grossing horror movies made to look like found footage. It seems like Willis was the first person to have faith in the new genre. Too bad he was too expensive and recognizable to be in any found footage movies himself.

Jimmy Fallon

While many “Saturday Night Live” talents have bright futures, Jimmy Fallon made an oddly specific assumption as a freshman featured performer in 1998. On an "SNL" holiday episode in 1998 satirizing “A Christmas Carol,” Fallon takes Alec Baldwin to December 12th, 2011, where Fallon’s a big enough star to host the show himself. Flashforward to December 17th, 2011, Fallon returns to “SNL” as host and a talk show icon. He was only off by five days, apparently not realizing that December 12th would be a Monday. He also didn’t anticipate rebranding from casual wear to his signature suits. Otherwise, Fallon’s vision was remarkably accurate.

Rishi Kapoor

Rishi Kapoor and Vinod Khanna were lifelong Bollywood idols. And yet, in 2017, Kapoor reported on Twitter that it was mostly contemporaries in the industry who attended his friend's funeral. Citing the perceived indifference of younger generations, the disgruntled actor said that he didn't expect a real turnout at his own funeral. Three years later, Kapoor was laid to rest with only close family and friends attending the ceremony. His colleagues' absence wasn't out of disrespect, though. He died of cancer under coronavirus lockdown ordinances in India, which limited capacity at funerals. Like Khanna, Kapoor will always be remembered as an icon of his industry. Sadly, unfortunate circumstances still realized his vision of an improper send-off.

Katie Holmes

“Dawson’s Creek’s” Katie Holmes broke a lot of hearts with her 2003 engagement to Chris Klein. Interestingly, in a 2004 interview for Seventeen magazine, Holmes remarked that she once imagined marrying Tom Cruise. Well, the following year, Klein was out and Holmes was engaged to Cruise. She probably should have been careful with what she wished for. In 2012, Holmes and Cruise ended their volatile six-year marriage in a bitter divorce. Since then, revelations about the Church of Scientology meddling in Cruise’s personal life have led some to believe that Holmes’s prophecy was no coincidence. Whether fated or orchestrated, the celebrity love story of Holmes’s dreams wasn’t built to last.

Chris Rock

Chris Rock poked fun at O.J. Simpson’s apparent flippancy over his acquittal in his double-homicide case in the 1997 premiere of his HBO talk show. The opening skit ends with Rock showing a fictional video by Simpson, titled “I Didn’t Kill My Wife, But If I Did, Here’s How I’d Do It.” In the following years, Juice found public resurgence in spoofing theories that he did kill Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman. This culminated in the 2007 “hypothetical” book titled “If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer.” It wasn’t the exact title posited on “The Chris Rock Show.” It certainly wasn’t a VHS tape. But Rock nailing Simpson’s disturbing rebrand still shows how ahead of the curve he can get.

David Prowse

When “The Empire Strikes Back” was first released, the revelation of Luke Skywalker’s parentage was explosive. But maybe not so much for regular readers of the San Francisco Examiner in 1978. An interview with David Prowse, Vader’s physical actor, probed for information about “Star Wars”’s highly anticipated sequel. Prowse facetiously predicted Vader and Luke engaging in an epic lightsaber duel, before Vader revealed himself to be Luke’s father. At the time, “Empire” was in an early scripting phase that didn’t feature this twist. With the movie’s climax ultimately playing out exactly as described, maybe George Lucas and Lawrence Kasdan took the tip. We can only hope that Prowse didn’t intentionally drop the movie spoiler of a generation.

Chris Pratt

Chris Pratt started making a name for himself as Andy Dwyer on the sitcom “Parks and Recreation,”although Dwyer is a galaxy away from Star-Lord. The path to that point may have actually started with a behind-the-scenes featurette for Season 2 of “Parks and Rec.” Pratt filmed himself pretending to text Steven Spielberg, desperate to cast him in “Jurassic Park 4.” The bit was meant to spoof the ego of a breakout star. But in 2015, Pratt starred as Owen Grady in “Jurassic World,” the fourth installment in the blockbuster franchise. Okay, Spielberg wasn’t directly involved in that production. The “Jurassic World Trilogy” nonetheless confirmed Pratt as a bankable Hollywood action star. Even he shrugged off this fate five years earlier.

Jim Morrison

The Doors frontman Jim Morrison had a revolutionary impact on music in his brief 27 years. With his instinct for innovation, he apparently had a sense for music’s future. In a 1969 interview for Rolling Stone, he said that technology like Moog synthesizers would lead one-man orchestras out of the basement and into concert halls. Moog music would soon help develop downsized electric keyboards. By the turn of the ‘90s, advanced effects and sampling gave way to electronic dance music. The genre allowed solo artists to become some of the world’ hottest live acts. That includes Skrillex, whose 2012 collaboration with The Doors, “Break’n A Sweat,” samples Morrison’s interview. Keyboardist Ray Manzerick believed his old bandmate would have been proud to hear his prediction realized.

Alec Guinness

Actor James Dean infamously starred in a PSA for safe driving, thirteen days before he died in a car accident. That wasn’t the only eerie coincidence surrounding this tragedy. A week earlier, Dean showed off his new Porsche 550 to actor Alec Guinness, who warned that it would be the death of him in a week’s time. In telling this story in 1977, Guinness said that this premonition simply came over him. This contributes to the myth that the Porsche Dean died in is cursed. Recycled parts from the destroyed car went on to be involved in other gruesome accidents. It’s a shame the 24-year-old Dean didn’t respect Guiness’ warning.

David Bowie

A fan of science fiction, David Bowie foresaw the future in his own time with the rise of commercial internet. He was one of the first major musicians with an online brand. He explained in a 1999 interview that this new medium would become a way for creators and consumers to interact. This prospect was a key influence on platforms like MySpace. Now the whole world is connected by countless social media networks. Bowie didn’t simply anticipate this future but helped build it. He launched the internet service provider BowieNet in ‘98, to build and connect with a community of fans. BowieNet may have retired in 2006, but played a role in the evolution of social media.


Which precise predictions by and about celebrities have impressed you most? Take your observation to the comments.