40 Fun Facts About Famous Marks

Mark Twain, the creator of Huckleberry Finn, was born and died in years when which celestial visitor returned?

Halley's Comet was at its closest to the Sun the day before Twain died in April 1910, a timing he had predicted the previous year.

Mark Hamill, famous as Luke Skywalker in Star Wars, first voiced which Batman villain in a 1992 animated series?

The Joker became Hamill's best-known voice role and followed him from television into video games, where it won him a BAFTA award.

Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook with his roommates in February 2004 while he was a student at which university?

Harvard lost Zuckerberg as a dropout in his second year, then welcomed him back in 2017 to give the commencement speech and collect an honorary degree.

Mark Ruffalo took over from Edward Norton in 2012 to play which Marvel hero in The Avengers?

Hulk stayed with Ruffalo for years: he returned as the scientist Bruce Banner and his green alter ego in Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame.

Mark Antony, the Roman general beaten at the Battle of Actium, had three children with which queen of Egypt?

Cleopatra and Antony fled to Egypt after Actium, where he stabbed himself in the mistaken belief that she was already dead.

Mark Spitz won seven swimming gold medals, each in world-record time, at the 1972 Olympics held in which city?

Munich was his farewell: Spitz retired at 22, and his seven golds at one Games stood as a record until Michael Phelps won eight in 2008.

Mark Knopfler was the singer, lead guitarist and songwriter of which British band, known for Sultans of Swing?

Dire Straits were co-founded by Knopfler and his younger brother David after he had spent three years working as a college lecturer.

Saint Mark the Evangelist, whose symbol is a winged lion, is the patron saint of which Italian city?

Venice claimed him after two of its merchants carried his body out of Alexandria around 828, and its great basilica was built to hold the relics.

Mark Cuban, who sold Broadcast.com to Yahoo, bought a majority stake in which NBA team in January 2000?

Dallas Mavericks cost Cuban $285 million, and the team repaid him by winning the NBA championship in 2011.

Before his film career, Mark Wahlberg had a 1991 hit as the rapper Marky Mark, fronting which group?

The Funky Bunch frontman opened concerts for New Kids on the Block, the boy band that featured Wahlberg's older brother Donnie.

Which actor was Oscar-nominated for playing Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in the 2010 film The Social Network?

Jesse Eisenberg came face to face with the real Zuckerberg in January 2011, when the tech founder made a surprise appearance on the Saturday Night Live episode he was hosting.

Mark Harmon, once a UCLA quarterback, is best known as agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs in which crime series?

NCIS first showed Gibbs to viewers in two guest episodes of the military legal drama JAG, before the character was given a series of his own.

Mark Messier, who ended the New York Rangers' 54-year Stanley Cup drought in 1994, won five Cups with which team?

Edmonton Oilers gave Messier the first five of his six championships, and he remains the only player to captain two different teams to the trophy.

Mark McGwire hit 70 home runs in 1998 while racing which Chicago Cubs slugger to break Roger Maris's record?

Sammy Sosa finished the season on 66, and the pair were still level on 65 going into the final series of the season.

Mark Ronson, the producer behind the hit Uptown Funk, won a Grammy for producing Back to Black for which singer?

Amy Winehouse and Ronson also shared the Record of the Year Grammy for Rehab, a single taken from the same album.

Mark Hoppus is the bassist, co-lead vocalist and only constant member of which band he formed with Tom DeLonge?

Blink-182 began in 1992 after Hoppus moved to San Diego for university and his sister introduced him to DeLonge, a friend from her high school.

Astronaut Mark Kelly, whose identical twin Scott also flew in space, became a US senator for which state in 2020?

Arizona had earlier sent his wife, Gabby Giffords, to the House of Representatives, and she survived an assassination attempt there in 2011.

Mark Carney, the first non-Briton to run the Bank of England, became prime minister of which country in 2025?

Canada had already put Carney in charge of its own central bank before London hired him, and he won his party's leadership five days before being sworn in.

Mark Rutte, who became secretary general of NATO in 2024, was prime minister of which country for almost 14 years?

Netherlands voters kept Rutte in office longer than any other Dutch prime minister, and his knack for surviving scandals earned him the nickname Teflon Mark.

Mark Twain took his pen name from a cry meaning two fathoms deep, heard in which job he once held?

Riverboat pilot Twain worked the Mississippi, where the leadsman's cry told the crew the water was deep enough for a steamboat to pass safely.

Mark Darcy, the awkward barrister who keeps popping into Bridget Jones's life, is played on film by which actor?

Colin Firth was the model from the start: author Helen Fielding described Darcy exactly like the actor who had played Mr Darcy for the BBC in 1995.

In The Martian, stranded astronaut Mark Watney, played by Matt Damon, stays alive by growing which crop on Mars?

Potatoes grow for Watney, a botanist, in Martian soil fertilised with the crew's own waste, and he makes the water for them from leftover rocket fuel.

Ewan McGregor played Mark Renton, an unemployed heroin addict from Leith, in which 1996 Danny Boyle film?

Trainspotting was adapted from Irvine Welsh's 1993 novel, and the role of Renton gave McGregor his international breakthrough.

Mark-Paul Gosselaar had his hair bleached blond to play Zack Morris in which NBC sitcom that began in 1989?

Saved by the Bell grew out of a cancelled Disney Channel sitcom, Good Morning, Miss Bliss, after NBC executives decided Zack could carry a show of his own.

Salsa singer Marc Anthony, who spells his first name with a c, married which pop star and actress in June 2004?

Jennifer Lopez had recorded a duet with him years earlier for her album On the 6, and the couple had twins in 2008.

In Grey's Anatomy, plastic surgeon Mark Sloan, played by Eric Dane, is given which nickname by the interns?

McSteamy was coined on his first trip to Seattle, when Sloan arrived hoping to win back Addison and mend his friendship with Derek Shepherd.

Adam Scott plays Mark Scout, a former history professor turned office worker, in which thriller series?

Severance puts Mark to work at Lumon Industries, a sinister biotechnology firm, in a department called Macrodata Refinement.

Mark Cavendish, a sprinter from the Isle of Man, broke Eddy Merckx's record for stage wins in which race?

Tour de France stage win number 35 came for Cavendish in 2024, ending the tie on 34 that he had shared with the Belgian great.

The Gospel of Mark, unlike the gospels of Matthew and Luke, makes no mention of which part of the life of Jesus?

His birth is missing because the narrative opens with Jesus as an adult being baptised by John, and it offers no family tree tracing his line back to King David.

Mark Webber, the Australian winner of nine Formula One races, was joined at Red Bull in 2009 by which German driver?

Sebastian Vettel moved up from the Toro Rosso team to replace the retiring David Coulthard, having once crashed into the back of Webber's car at a wet Japanese Grand Prix.

Mark Addy, Bafta-nominated for his film debut in The Full Monty, played which king in Game of Thrones?

Robert Baratheon lasts only one season: he is mortally wounded by a wild boar on a hunt, an accident arranged by his queen, Cersei.

Mark Burnett, a former British Army soldier, produced which reality show that became a hit in the summer of 2000?

Survivor drew an average of 51.7 million viewers to its finale, and Burnett followed it by creating The Apprentice.

Mark Thatcher, son of prime minister Margaret Thatcher, went missing in the Sahara in 1982 during which motor race?

Paris-Dakar Rally organisers lost track of Thatcher and his French co-driver in Algeria, where the pair had been driving a Peugeot 504.

Painter Mark Rothko, whose canvases fill a chapel in Houston, was born in 1903 in a city now in which country?

Latvia was part of the Russian Empire when he was born Markus Rothkowitz in Daugavpils, and his family reached Ellis Island in 1913 before settling in Portland, Oregon.

Mark Shuttleworth, the first African to travel to space, founded the company behind which Linux operating system?

Ubuntu is developed by his firm Canonical, and Shuttleworth paid his own way to orbit in 2002 as the world's second self-funded space tourist.

Mark Mothersbaugh, composer of the music for the cartoon Rugrats, sang lead in which new wave band behind Whip It?

Devo took Whip It into the US top 20 in 1980, and Mothersbaugh later scored all three Rugrats films as well as the show's 13-year run.

Mark O'Meara, at 41, added the 1998 Open Championship to which other title he had won that year?

The Masters and the Open together made O'Meara the oldest player to win two majors in a single year.

Mark Sinclair, who took a tougher stage name while working as a New York nightclub bouncer, is which action star?

Vin Diesel went on to play the street racer Dominic Toretto in the Fast & Furious films and to voice Groot, the walking tree of Guardians of the Galaxy.

Marc Jacobs, sacked by Perry Ellis over a grunge collection, became creative director of which French house in 1997?

Louis Vuitton had never offered ready-to-wear clothing until Jacobs created its first line, and he stayed with the house for 16 years.

Marc Bolan, born Mark Feld in east London, pioneered glam rock in the early 1970s as leader of which band?

T. Rex began as a psychedelic folk act under a longer dinosaur name, and Bolan's glitter-faced turn on Top of the Pops in 1971 is often called the start of glam.