Most viewed Wikipedia articles on December 25 , 2015

Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte was a Chilean Army General, politician and military dictator who ruled Chile from 1973 to 1990, first as the leader of the Military Junta of Chile from 1973 to 1981, being self-declared President of the Republic by the junta in 1974 and becoming the de facto dictator of Chile, and after from 1981 to 1990 as de jure President after a new Constitution, who confirmed him in the office, was approved by a referendum in 1980.

Star Wars is an American epic space opera media franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has been expanded into various films and other media, including television series, video games, novels, comic books, theme park attractions, and themed areas, comprising an all-encompassing fictional universe. In 2020, its total value was estimated at US$70 billion, and it is currently the fifth-highest-grossing media franchise of all time.

Charles Cameron Woodson is a former American football player. He played college football for Michigan, where he led the Wolverines to a share of the national championship in 1997. Woodson, a "two-way player" who played both offense and defense, won the Heisman Trophy in the same year. To date, he is the only primarily defensive player to win the Heisman, and, until wide receiver DeVonta Smith won the Heisman in 2020, Woodson had been the most recent player to win the Heisman who was not either a running back or quarterback. Woodson went on to accomplish a storied career professionally with one of the most decorated professional football resumes of all time. He is considered by many of his peers to be one of the greatest defensive players to have ever played.

Jonathan Dwight Jones is an American professional mixed martial artist currently signed to the Ultimate Fighting Championship, where he has competed in the light heavyweight division. He is a former two-time UFC Light Heavyweight Champion. Jones first held the title from March 2011 to April 2015, and then from December 2018 to August 17, 2020, when he vacated the title. Jones has also held the interim UFC Light Heavyweight Championship. As of October 27, 2020, he is #2 in the UFC men's pound-for-pound rankings.

'Tis the Season may refer to:

A Christmas Story is a 1983 American Christmas comedy film directed by Bob Clark and based on Jean Shepherd's semi-fictional anecdotes in his 1966 book In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash, with some elements from his 1971 book Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories and Other Disasters. It stars Melinda Dillon, Darren McGavin, and Peter Billingsley and is a seasonal classic in North America. It is shown numerous times on television, usually on the networks owned by WarnerMedia, and a marathon of the film has aired annually on TNT or TBS since 1997 titled "24 Hours of A Christmas Story", consisting of 12 consecutive airings of the film from the evening of Christmas Eve to the evening of Christmas Day. It is often ranked as one of the best Christmas films.

Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year, it is preceded by the season of Advent or the Nativity Fast and initiates the season of Christmastide, which historically in the West lasts twelve days and culminates on Twelfth Night. Christmas Day is a public holiday in many of the world's nations, is celebrated religiously by a majority of Christians, as well as culturally by many non-Christians, and forms an integral part of the holiday season centered around it.

Macaulay Macaulay Culkin Culkin is an American actor, musician, and podcaster. Regarded as one of the most successful child actors of the 1990s, he was placed on VH1's list of the "100 Greatest Kid-Stars" and on E!'s list of the "50 Greatest Child Stars".

Baji Rao I, born as Visaji, also known as Bajirao Ballal, was the 7th Peshwa of the Maratha empire. In his 20-year military career, he never lost a battle and is widely considered as one of the best Indian cavalry generals. His relationship with his half-Muslim wife Mastani, a subject of controversy, has been adapted in Indian novels and cinema.

Dilwale is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language romantic action comedy film produced by Gauri Khan and directed by Rohit Shetty. The film is distributed by Red Chillies Entertainment. The film's dialogue was written by Sajid-Farhad and the soundtrack was composed by Pritam. It stars Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol in their seventh film together alongside Varun Dhawan and Kriti Sanon in the lead roles.

Boxing Day is a holiday celebrated the day after Christmas Day, occurring on the second day of Christmastide. Though it originated as a holiday to give gifts to the poor, today Boxing Day is primarily known as a shopping holiday. It originated in the United Kingdom and is celebrated in a number of countries that previously formed part of the British Empire. Boxing Day is on 26 December, although the attached bank holiday or public holiday may take place either on that day or one or two days later. Boxing day is also concurrent with the Christian holiday Saint Stephen's Day.

Spock is a fictional character in the Star Trek media franchise. Spock, who was originally played by Leonard Nimoy, first appeared in the original Star Trek series serving aboard the starship Enterprise as science officer and first officer, and later as commanding officer of two iterations of the vessel. Spock's mixed human-Vulcan heritage serves as an important plot element in many of the character's appearances. Along with Captain James T. Kirk and Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy, he is one of the three central characters in the original Star Trek series and its films.

The electric eel is a South American electric fish. Until 2019, it was classified as the only species in its genus. Despite the name, it is not an eel, but rather a knifefish. It is considered as a fresh water teleost which contains an electrogenic tissue that produces electric discharges.

Bajirao Mastani is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language epic historical romance film directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali, who also composed its soundtrack. Jointly produced by Bhansali and Eros International's Kishore Lulla, the film stars Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone and Priyanka Chopra. The supporting cast includes Tanvi Azmi, Vaibhav Tatwawaadi and Milind Soman. Based on the Marathi fictional novel Rau by Nagnath S. Inamdar, Bajirao Mastani narrates the story of the Maratha Peshwa Bajirao I and his second wife.

The Revenant is a 2015 American epic Revisionist Western film directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu. The screenplay by Mark L. Smith and Iñárritu is based in part on Michael Punke's 2002 novel of the same name, which describes frontiersman Hugh Glass's experiences in 1823; that novel is, in turn, based on the 1915 poem The Song of Hugh Glass. The film stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy, Domhnall Gleeson, and Will Poulter.

Mastani was the daughter of Maharaja Chhatrasal and the second wife of the Maratha Peshwa Bajirao I. Her relationship within the Maratha Brahmin family has been subject of both admiration and controversy, and well adapted in Indian novels and cinema.

Dame Olivia Newton-John is a British-Australian singer, songwriter, actress, entrepreneur and activist. She is a four-time Grammy Award winner whose chart career includes five US number ones and another ten Top Tens on Billboard's Hot 100, and two Billboard 200 number-one albums: If You Love Me, Let Me Know (1974) and Have You Never Been Mellow (1975). Eleven of her singles and 14 of her albums have been certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). She has sold an estimated 100 million records worldwide, making her one of the best-selling music artists of all time.

Santa Claus, also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, or simply Santa, is a legendary character originating in Western Christian culture who is said to bring gifts on Christmas Eve of toys and candy to well-behaved children, and either coal or nothing to naughty children. He is said to accomplish this with the aid of Christmas elves, who make the toys in his workshop at the North Pole, and flying reindeer who pull his sleigh through the air.

Daisy Jazz Isobel Ridley is an English actress who rose to international prominence through playing the lead role of Rey in the Star Wars sequel trilogy: The Force Awakens (2015), The Last Jedi (2017), and The Rise of Skywalker (2019).

Sadhana Shivdasani, popularly known by the mononym Sadhana, was an Indian film actress, who appeared in many successful films of 1960s and 70s. Regarded as one of the Greatest & finest top leading film actresses in the history of Hindi cinema, Sadhana was the highest-paid actress of her time from early 1960s to late 1970s. Popularly known as The Mystery Girl, Sadhana was one of the most beautiful and the top actresses in the 1960s, a period regarded as Bollywood's "golden era". She was active from 1960-1981.

Peter Billingsley, also known as Peter Michaelsen and Peter Billingsley-Michaelsen, is an American actor, director, and producer. His acting roles include Ralphie Parker in the 1983 movie A Christmas Story, Jack Simmons in The Dirt Bike Kid, Billy in Death Valley, and as Messy Marvin in Hershey's chocolate syrup commercials during the 1980s. He began his career as an infant in television commercials.

Joy is a 2015 American biographical comedy-drama film, written and directed by David O. Russell and starring Jennifer Lawrence as Joy Mangano, a self-made millionaire who created her own business empire.

It's a Wonderful Life is a 1946 American Christmas family fantasy drama film produced and directed by Frank Capra, based on the short story and booklet The Greatest Gift, which Philip Van Doren Stern self-published in 1943 and is in turn loosely based on the 1843 Charles Dickens novella A Christmas Carol. The film stars James Stewart as George Bailey, a man who has given up his personal dreams, in order to help others in his community, and whose imminent suicide on Christmas Eve brings about the intervention of his guardian angel, Clarence Odbody. Clarence shows George how he, George, has touched the lives of others and how different life would be for his wife Mary and his community of Bedford Falls if he had not been born.

James Maitland Stewart, also known as Jimmy Stewart, was an American actor and military officer. Known for his distinctive drawl and everyman screen persona, Stewart's film career spanned 80 films from 1935 to 1991. With the strong morality he portrayed both on and off the screen, he epitomized the "American ideal" in the twentieth century. In 1999, the American Film Institute (AFI) ranked him third on its list of the greatest American male actors.

Java is a class-based, object-oriented programming language that is designed to have as few implementation dependencies as possible. It is a general-purpose programming language intended to let application developers write once, run anywhere (WORA), meaning that compiled Java code can run on all platforms that support Java without the need for recompilation. Java applications are typically compiled to bytecode that can run on any Java virtual machine (JVM) regardless of the underlying computer architecture. The syntax of Java is similar to C and C++, but has fewer low-level facilities than either of them. The Java runtime provides dynamic capabilities that are typically not available in traditional compiled languages. As of 2019, Java was one of the most popular programming languages in use according to GitHub, particularly for client-server web applications, with a reported 9 million developers.

The Hateful Eight is a 2015 American revisionist western thriller film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It stars Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Demián Bichir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, and Bruce Dern as eight strangers who seek refuge from a blizzard in a stagecoach stopover some time after the American Civil War.

Star Wars is a 1977 American epic space-opera film written and directed by George Lucas, produced by Lucasfilm and distributed by 20th Century Fox. It stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alec Guinness, David Prowse, James Earl Jones, Anthony Daniels, Kenny Baker and Peter Mayhew. It is the first installment of the original Star Wars trilogy, the first of the franchise to be produced, and the fourth episode of the "Skywalker saga".

Web scraping, web harvesting, or web data extraction is data scraping used for extracting data from websites. Web scraping software may access the World Wide Web directly using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol, or through a web browser. While web scraping can be done manually by a software user, the term typically refers to automated processes implemented using a bot or web crawler. It is a form of copying, in which specific data is gathered and copied from the web, typically into a central local database or spreadsheet, for later retrieval or analysis.

Joy Mangano is an American inventor and entrepreneur known for inventions such as the self-wringing Miracle Mop. She was the president of Ingenious Designs, LLC, and appeared regularly on the US television shopping channel HSN until her departure in late 2018.

Vitamin B₁₂ deficiency anemia, of which pernicious anemia (PA) is a type, is a disease in which not enough red blood cells are produced due to a deficiency of vitamin B₁₂. The most common initial symptom is feeling tired. Other symptoms may include shortness of breath, pale skin, chest pain, numbness in the hands and feet, poor balance, a smooth red tongue, poor reflexes, depression and confusion. Without treatment some of these problems may become permanent.

Carrie Frances Fisher was an American actress and writer. Fisher played Princess Leia in the Star Wars films, a role for which she was nominated for four Saturn Awards. Her other film credits include Shampoo (1975), The Blues Brothers (1980), Hannah and Her Sisters (1986), The 'Burbs (1989), When Harry Met Sally... (1989), Soapdish (1991), and The Women (2008). Fisher was nominated twice for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for her performances on the television series 30 Rock and Catastrophe. She was posthumously made a Disney Legend in 2017, and in 2018 she was awarded a posthumous Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album.

Deadpool is a 2016 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. Distributed by 20th Century Fox, it is the eighth film in the X-Men film series. Directed by Tim Miller from a screenplay by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, it stars Ryan Reynolds in the title role alongside Morena Baccarin, Ed Skrein, T. J. Miller, Gina Carano, and Brianna Hildebrand. In the film, Wade Wilson hunts the man who gave him mutant abilities and a scarred physical appearance, becoming the beloved antihero Deadpool.

Krampus is a horned, anthropomorphic figure in Alpine folklore who during the Christmas season scares children who have misbehaved, assisting Saint Nicholas. The pair visit children on the night of the 5th December and Saint Nicholas rewards the well-behaved children with modest gifts such as oranges, dried fruit, walnuts and chocolate whilst the badly behaved ones only receive punishment with birch rods.

According to traditional festive legend in some parts of the world, Santa Claus's reindeer are said to pull a sleigh through the night sky to help Santa Claus deliver gifts to children on Christmas Eve. The commonly cited names of the nine reindeer are Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, and Rudolph, although Donner is sometimes called Donder and Blitzen is sometimes called Blixem.

Adam Douglas Driver is an American actor. He is the recipient of numerous accolades, including the Volpi Cup for Best Actor, as well as nominations for a Tony Award, two Academy Awards, and four Primetime Emmy Awards.

This is a list of notable deaths, organized by year. New deaths articles are added to their respective month, and then linked here.

Mark Richard Hamill is an American actor, voice actor, and writer. He is known for playing Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars film series, winning three Saturn Awards for the role. His other film appearances include Corvette Summer (1978) and The Big Red One (1980). Hamill has also appeared on stage in several theater productions, primarily during the 1980s.

Wardell Stephen "Steph" Curry II is an American professional basketball player for the Golden State Warriors of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Many analysts and players have called him the greatest shooter in NBA history. He is credited with revolutionizing the game of basketball by inspiring teams to regularly utilize the three-point shot. A six-time NBA All-Star, Curry has been named the NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) twice and has won three NBA championships with the Warriors.

Steven Allan Avery is an American convicted murderer from Manitowoc County, Wisconsin, who had previously been wrongfully convicted in 1986 of sexual assault and attempted murder. After serving 18 years of a 32-year sentence, he was exonerated by DNA testing and released in 2003, only to be charged with murder two years later.

Kylo Ren is a fictional character and a major antagonist in the Star Wars franchise. Introduced in the 2015 film Star Wars: The Force Awakens, he is portrayed by Adam Driver. Kylo Ren is the chosen name of Ben Solo, the only child of original Star Wars trilogy characters Han Solo and Princess Leia Organa. Though trained by his uncle Luke Skywalker as a Jedi, he was seduced to the dark side of the Force by Supreme Leader Snoke, and aspires to be as powerful as his grandfather, the Sith Lord Darth Vader. Ren is eventually redeemed like his grandfather before him and helps Rey in her fight against her grandfather, the revived Emperor Palpatine.

Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby Jr. was an American singer, comedian and actor. The first multimedia star, Crosby was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century. He was a leader in record sales, radio ratings, and motion picture grosses from 1930 to 1954. He made over seventy feature films and recorded more than 1,600 different songs.

"The Twelve Days of Christmas" is an English Christmas carol that enumerates in the manner of a cumulative song a series of increasingly numerous gifts given on each of the twelve days of Christmas. The song, published in England in 1780 without music as a chant or rhyme, is thought to be French in origin. "The Twelve Days of Christmas" has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 68. The tunes of collected versions vary. The standard tune now associated with it is derived from a 1909 arrangement of a traditional folk melody by English composer Frederic Austin, who introduced the familiar prolongation of the verse "five gold rings".

Deadpool is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer Fabian Nicieza and artist/writer Rob Liefeld, the character first appeared in The New Mutants #98. Initially Deadpool was depicted as a supervillain when he made his first appearance in The New Mutants and later in issues of X-Force, but later evolved into his more recognizable antiheroic persona. Deadpool, whose real name is Wade Winston Wilson, is a disfigured mercenary with the superhuman ability of regeneration and physical prowess. The character is known as the "Merc with a Mouth" because of his tendency to talk and joke constantly, including breaking the fourth wall for humorous effect and running gags.

Judy Garland was an American actress, singer, vaudevillian and dancer. With a career spanning 45 years, she attained international stardom as an actress in both musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist, and on the concert stage. Renowned for her versatility, she received an Academy Juvenile Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Special Tony Award. Garland was the first woman to win the Grammy Award for Album of the Year, which she won for her 1961 live recording titled Judy at Carnegie Hall.

Home Alone is a 1990 American comedy film written and produced by John Hughes and directed by Chris Columbus. It stars Macaulay Culkin, Joe Pesci, Daniel Stern, John Heard, and Catherine O'Hara. Culkin stars as eight-year-old Kevin, who defends his home from burglars Harry and Marv after his family accidentally leaves him behind on their vacation.

Return of the Jedi is a 1983 American epic space opera film directed by Richard Marquand. The screenplay is by Lawrence Kasdan and George Lucas from a story by Lucas, who was also the executive producer. It is the third installment in the original Star Wars trilogy, the third film to be produced, and the sixth film in the "Star Wars saga". It takes place one year after The Empire Strikes Back. The film stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Billy Dee Williams, Anthony Daniels, David Prowse, Kenny Baker, Peter Mayhew and Frank Oz.

Melinda Ruth Dillon is an American actress. She received a 1963 Tony Award nomination for her Broadway debut in the original production of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her roles as Jillian Guiler in Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and Teresa in Absence of Malice (1981). Her other film appearances include Bound for Glory (1976), F.I.S.T. (1978), A Christmas Story (1983), Harry and the Hendersons (1987), The Prince of Tides (1991), and Magnolia (1999).

Harrison Ford is an American actor, pilot, and environmental activist. As of 2019, the U.S. domestic box office grosses of his films total over $5.1 billion, with worldwide grosses surpassing $9.3 billion, placing him at No. 4 on the list of highest-grossing domestic box office stars of all time. In addition to his box office success, he is also an Academy Award nominee, a four-time Golden Globe nominee, a three-time Saturn Award winner, and the recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award and the Cecil B. DeMille Award.

Darth Vader is a fictional character in the Star Wars franchise. The character is a primary antagonist in the original trilogy and a primary protagonist in the prequel trilogy. Star Wars creator George Lucas has collectively referred to the first six episodic films of the franchise as "the tragedy of Darth Vader".

Donald John Trump is an American politician who was the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality.

Films generate income from several revenue streams, including theatrical exhibition, home video, television broadcast rights, and merchandising. However, theatrical box office earnings are the primary metric for trade publications in assessing the success of a film, mostly because of the availability of the data compared to sales figures for home video and broadcast rights, but also because of historical practice. Included on the list are charts of the top box-office earners, a chart of high-grossing films by calendar year, a timeline showing the transition of the highest-grossing film record, and a chart of the highest-grossing film franchises and series. All charts are ranked by international theatrical box-office performance where possible, excluding income derived from home video, broadcasting rights, and merchandise.

Adele Laurie Blue Adkins, is an English singer-songwriter. After graduating from the BRIT School in 2006, Adele signed a recording contract with XL Recordings. In 2007, she received the Brit Awards Critics' Choice Award and won the BBC Sound of 2008 poll. Her debut album, 19, was released in 2008. It is certified 8× platinum in the UK and triple platinum in the US. The album contains her first song, "Hometown Glory", written when she was 16, which is based on her home suburb of West Norwood in London. An appearance she made on Saturday Night Live in late 2008 boosted her career in the US. At the 2009 Grammy Awards, Adele won the awards for Best New Artist and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

The common iliac arteries are two large arteries that originate from the aortic bifurcation at the level of the fourth lumbar vertebra. They end in front of the sacroiliac joint, one on either side, and each bifurcates into the external and internal iliac arteries.

William Lyle Richardson, known professionally as Darren McGavin, was an American actor.

Vera-Ellen was an American dancer and actress. She is remembered for her solo performances as well as her work with partners Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Danny Kaye, and Donald O'Connor. She is best known for her starring roles in On the Town (1949) with Kelly and White Christmas (1954) with Kaye.

Elizabeth II is Queen of the United Kingdom and 15 other Commonwealth realms.

Kwanzaa is an annual celebration of African-American culture that is held from December 26 to January 1, culminating in a communal feast called Karamu, usually held on the 6th day. It was created by Maulana Karenga, based on African harvest festival traditions from various parts of Africa, including West and Southeast Africa. Kwanzaa was first celebrated in 1966.

The Star Wars sequel trilogy is the third trilogy of the main Star Wars franchise, an American space opera created by George Lucas. It is produced by Lucasfilm Ltd. and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. The trilogy consists of episodes VII through IX, chronologically following the prequel trilogy and the original trilogy, serving as the final act of the "Skywalker saga". Lucas had planned a sequel trilogy as early as 1976, but canceled it by 1981. He ended up producing only the first six episodes and for a time described these as comprising the complete story. The sequel trilogy concept was revived when The Walt Disney Company entered negotiations to acquire Lucasfilm in mid-2011. Lucas produced new story treatments, but according to him these were largely discarded. Both the acquisition and plans to produce the trilogy were announced in late 2012.

Jesus, also referred to as Jesus of Nazareth or Jesus Christ, was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the central figure of Christianity, the world's largest religion. Most Christians believe he is the incarnation of God the Son and the awaited Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament.

The Empire Strikes Back, also known as Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back, is a 1980 American epic space opera film directed by Irvin Kershner and written by Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan, based on a story by George Lucas. The second installment in the original Star Wars trilogy, as the sequel to Star Wars (1977), it is the second film in the franchise to be produced, and the fifth episode of the "Skywalker saga". The story is set three years after the events of the first film, as the Galactic Empire hunts the scattered Rebel Alliance throughout the galaxy. While Darth Vader relentlessly pursues Luke Skywalker's friends—Han Solo, Princess Leia, and Chewbacca—Luke studies the Force under Jedi Master Yoda to prepare himself for his upcoming confrontation with Vader.

This is a list of Bollywood films that were released in 2015.

White Christmas is a 1954 American musical film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, and Vera-Ellen. Filmed in Technicolor, it features the songs of Irving Berlin, including a new version of the title song, "White Christmas", introduced by Crosby in the 1942 film Holiday Inn.

Donna Reed was an American actress. Her career spanned more than 40 years, with performances in more than 40 films. She is well known for her role as Mary Hatch Bailey in Frank Capra's 1946 film It's a Wonderful Life. In 1953, she received the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Lorene Burke in the war drama From Here to Eternity.

Francis Albert Sinatra was an American singer, actor and producer who was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century. He is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, having sold more than 150 million records worldwide.

Hugh Glass was an American frontiersman, fur trapper, trader, hunter, and explorer. He is best known for his story of survival and forgiveness after being left for dead by companions when he was mauled by a grizzly bear.

Óscar Isaac Hernández Estrada is a Guatemalan-American actor who starred in the tragicomedy Inside Llewyn Davis (2013), for which he received a Golden Globe Award nomination, the crime drama A Most Violent Year (2014), and the science fiction thriller Ex Machina (2014). In 2006, he portrayed Saint Joseph, husband of Mary, in The Nativity Story. He also portrayed José Ramos-Horta, former president of East Timor and co-recipient of the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize, in the Australian film Balibo, for which he won the AACTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.

Festivus is a secular holiday celebrated on December 23 as an alternative to the pressures and commercialism of the Christmas season. Originally created by author Daniel O'Keefe, Festivus entered popular culture after it was made the focus of the 1997 Seinfeld episode "The Strike", which O'Keefe's son, Dan O'Keefe, co-wrote.

Jean Parker Shepherd Jr. was an American storyteller, humorist, radio and TV personality, writer, and actor. He was often referred to by the nickname Shep. With a career that spanned decades, Shepherd is known for the film A Christmas Story (1983), which he narrated and co-scripted, based on his own semiautobiographical stories.

Dame Shirley Veronica Bassey, is a Welsh singer, whose career began in 1953, well known for her expressive voice and for recording the soundtrack theme songs to the James Bond films Goldfinger (1964), Diamonds Are Forever (1971), and Moonraker (1979). In January 1959, Bassey became the first Welsh person to gain a No. 1 single.

Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach, formerly known professionally as Pia Romero, is a Filipino-German model, actress and beauty queen who was crowned Miss Universe 2015. She is one of the four Filipinas to have won the Miss Universe. Previously, she was crowned Miss Universe Philippines 2015.

Concussion is a 2015 American biographical sports drama film written and directed by Peter Landesman, based on the exposé "Game Brain" by Jeanne Marie Laskas, published in 2009 by GQ magazine. Set in 2002, the film stars Will Smith as Dr. Bennet Omalu, a forensic pathologist who fights against the National Football League trying to suppress his research on chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) brain degeneration suffered by professional football players. It also stars Alec Baldwin.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation is a 1989 American family comedy film, the third installment in National Lampoon magazine's Vacation film series. Christmas Vacation was written by John Hughes, who based it on "Christmas '59", his short story published in National Lampoon. The film stars Chevy Chase, Beverly D'Angelo, and Randy Quaid.

One-Punch Man is a Japanese superhero franchise created by the artist ONE. It tells the story of Saitama, a superhero who can defeat any opponent with a single punch but seeks to find a worthy opponent after growing bored by a lack of challenge due to his overwhelming strength. ONE wrote the original webcomic version in early 2009.

John Adedayo Bamidele Adegboyega, known professionally as John Boyega, is a British-Nigerian actor and producer. He first rose to prominence in his native Britain for his role as Moses in the sci-fi comedy film Attack the Block (2011), and his international breakthrough came with his role as Finn in the Star Wars sequel trilogy films The Force Awakens (2015), The Last Jedi (2017), and The Rise of Skywalker (2019). His other credits include the drama film Imperial Dreams (2014), the historical drama film Detroit (2017), the science fiction film Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018), and four episodes of the television series 24: Live Another Day. He received the BAFTA Rising Star Award in 2016, and was awarded the Trophée Chopard at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival. Boyega was cited as one of the Top 100 most influential Africans by New African magazine in 2020.

Hanukkah is a Jewish festival commemorating the recovery of Jerusalem and subsequent rededication of the Second Temple at the beginning of the Maccabean revolt against the Seleucid Empire in the 2nd century BCE. It is also known as the Festival of Lights.

Rosemary Clooney was an American singer and actress. She came to prominence in the early 1950s with the song "Come On-a My House", which was followed by other pop numbers such as "Botch-a-Me", "Mambo Italiano", "Tenderly", "Half as Much", "Hey There", and "This Ole House". She also had success as a jazz vocalist. Clooney's career languished in the 1960s, partly due to problems related to depression and drug addiction, but revived in 1977, when her White Christmas co-star Bing Crosby asked her to appear with him at a show marking his 50th anniversary in show business. She continued recording until her death in 2002.

The Big Short is a 2015 American biographical comedy-drama film directed by Adam McKay. Written by McKay and Charles Randolph, it is based on the 2010 book The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis showing how the financial crisis of 2007–2008 was triggered by the United States housing bubble. The film stars Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt, with Melissa Leo, Hamish Linklater, John Magaro, Rafe Spall, Jeremy Strong, Finn Wittrock, and Marisa Tomei in supporting roles.

Stephen William Hawking was an English theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author who was director of research at the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology at the University of Cambridge at the time of his death. He was the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge between 1979 and 2009.

Spectre is a 2015 spy film and the twenty-fourth in the James Bond series produced by Eon Productions for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Columbia Pictures. It is the fourth film to feature Daniel Craig as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond, and the second film in the series directed by Sam Mendes following Skyfall. It was written by John Logan, Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, and Jez Butterworth. It is the final James Bond film to be distributed theatrically by Sony Pictures Releasing through its Columbia Pictures label, as Universal Pictures will internationally distribute the next film in the series, No Time to Die.

The Martian is a 2015 science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Matt Damon. Drew Goddard adapted the screenplay from The Martian, a 2011 novel by Andy Weir. The film depicts an astronaut's lone struggle to survive on Mars after being left behind, and efforts to rescue him and bring him home to Earth. It also stars Jessica Chastain, Jeff Daniels, Kristen Wiig, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Sean Bean, Michael Peña, Kate Mara, Sebastian Stan, Aksel Hennie, Mackenzie Davis, Donald Glover, and Benedict Wong.

Sir Isaac Newton was an English mathematician, physicist, astronomer, theologian, and author who is widely recognised as one of the most influential scientists of all time and as a key figure in the scientific revolution. His book Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, first published in 1687, established classical mechanics. Newton also made seminal contributions to optics, and shares credit with Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz for developing the infinitesimal calculus.

2015 in film is an overview of events, including the highest-grossing films, award ceremonies, festivals, and a list of films released and notable deaths.

Broderick Stephen Harvey is an American television presenter, comedian, actor, broadcaster, author, game show host and businessman. He hosts The Steve Harvey Morning Show, Family Feud, Celebrity Family Feud and the Miss Universe competition.

The Danish Girl is a 2015 biographical romantic drama film directed by Tom Hooper, based on the 2000 novel of the same name by David Ebershoff, and loosely inspired by the lives of Danish painters Lili Elbe and Gerda Wegener. The film stars Eddie Redmayne as Elbe, one of the first known recipients of sex reassignment surgery, Alicia Vikander as Wegener, and Sebastian Koch as Kurt Warnekros, with Ben Whishaw, Amber Heard, and Matthias Schoenaerts in supporting roles.

Miss Universe 2015, the 64th Miss Universe pageant, was held on December 20, 2015 at The AXIS in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. Paulina Vega of Colombia crowned her successor Pia Wurtzbach of the Philippines at the end of the event. After 42 years, this is the third time the Philippines won Miss Universe, after Margarita Moran in 1973. 80 contestants competed for the crown.

Facebook is an American online social media and social networking service based in Menlo Park, California, and a flagship service of the namesake company Facebook, Inc. It was founded by Mark Zuckerberg, along with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes.

Creed is a 2015 American sports drama film directed by Ryan Coogler from a story by Coogler and a screenplay written by Coogler, Aaron Covington, and Sylvester Stallone who uncreditedly wrote all the scenes and dialogues with his character in the film. Both a sequel and spin-off to the Rocky film series, serving as the seventh installment of the series and a sequel to 2006's Rocky Balboa, Michael B. Jordan stars as Adonis "Donnie" Johnson Creed, Apollo Creed's son, with Sylvester Stallone reprising the role of Rocky Balboa. It also features Tessa Thompson, Phylicia Rashad, Tony Bellew, and Graham McTavish. The film reunites Jordan with 2013's Fruitvale Station writer-director Coogler, as well as Wood Harris, with whom Jordan had worked on the television series The Wire.

Danny Kaye was an American actor, singer, dancer, comedian, musician, and philanthropist. His performances featured physical comedy, idiosyncratic pantomimes, and rapid-fire novelty songs.

The Feast of the Seven Fishes is an Italian-American celebration of Christmas Eve with dishes of fish and other seafood.

Downton Abbey is a British historical drama television series set in the early 20th century, created and co-written by Julian Fellowes. The series first aired on ITV in the United Kingdom on 26 September 2010, and in the United States on PBS, which supported production of the series as part of its Masterpiece Classic anthology, on 9 January 2011.

George Walton Lucas Jr. is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and entrepreneur. Lucas is best known for creating the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises and founding Lucasfilm, LucasArts, and Industrial Light & Magic. He served as chairman of Lucasfilm before selling it to The Walt Disney Company in 2012. Lucas is one of history's most financially successful filmmakers and has been nominated for four Academy Awards. His films are among the 100 highest-grossing movies at the North American box office, adjusted for ticket-price inflation. Lucas is considered a significant figure of the 20th-century New Hollywood movement.

Khaled Mohamed Khaled, better known by his stage name DJ Khaled, is an American DJ, record executive, songwriter, record producer, and media personality.

Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria was a Colombian drug lord and narcoterrorist who was the founder and sole leader of the Medellín Cartel. Dubbed "The King of Cocaine," Escobar is the wealthiest criminal in history, having amassed an estimated net worth of US$30 billion by the time of his death—equivalent to $59 billion as of 2019—while his drug cartel monopolized the cocaine trade into the United States in the 1980s and early 1990s.

Bennet Ifeakandu Omalu is a Nigerian-American physician, forensic pathologist and neuropathologist who was the first to discover and publish findings on chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) in American football players while working at the Allegheny County coroner's office in Pittsburgh. He later became the chief medical examiner for San Joaquin County, California, and is a professor at the University of California, Davis, department of medical pathology and laboratory medicine.

Jessica Campbell Jones Cage is a fictional superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character was created by writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Michael Gaydos and first appeared in Alias #1, as part of Marvel's Max, an imprint for more mature content. Within the context of Marvel's shared universe, Jones is a former superhero who becomes the owner of Alias Private Investigations. Bendis originally envisioned the series centered on Jessica Drew and only decided to create Jones once he noticed that the main character had a distinct voice and background that differentiated her from Drew.

Marvel's Jessica Jones, or simply Jessica Jones, is an American television series created by Melissa Rosenberg for the streaming service Netflix, based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. It is set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), sharing continuity with the films of the franchise, and is the second in a series of shows that led to The Defenders crossover miniseries. The series is produced by Marvel Television in association with ABC Studios and Tall Girls Productions, with Rosenberg serving as showrunner. Scott Reynolds was a co-showrunner for the third season.

Making a Murderer is an American true crime documentary television series written and directed by Laura Ricciardi and Moira Demos.

Elf is a 2003 American Christmas comedy film directed by Jon Favreau and starring Will Ferrell, James Caan, Zooey Deschanel, Mary Steenburgen, Daniel Tay, Bob Newhart and Ed Asner. The film centers on Buddy, a human who was adopted and raised by Santa's elves. He learns about this and heads to New York City to meet his biological father while also spreading Christmas cheer in a world of cynics in the process.

Atal Bihari Vajpayee was an Indian statesman who served three terms as the Prime Minister of India, first for a term of 13 days in 1996, then for a period of 13 months from 1998 to 1999, followed by a full term from 1999 to 2004. A member of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), he was the first Indian prime minister not of the Indian National Congress to serve a full term in office. He was also noted as a poet and a writer.

A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas, commonly known as A Christmas Carol, is a novella by Charles Dickens, first published in London by Chapman & Hall in 1843 and illustrated by John Leech. A Christmas Carol recounts the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, an elderly miser who is visited by the ghost of his former business partner Jacob Marley and the spirits of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come. After their visits, Scrooge awakens on Christmas morning a changed man, embodying the spirit of Christmas.