I think it’s impossible to answer the question in the OP without it being made more specific. What time period is this referring to when the question is asked? Today, or ten years ago, or twenty years ago or whatever? Where are the people who are asked this question? In the U.S. or in another country or in a specific part of the U.S. or another country? How old are the people that are asked this question? A specific age group or all adults or all people of any age? Are there any other limits on the people asked this question, like their interests or their income or their social status or any other way of dividing people into groups?
Furthermore, assuming we don’t just guess at the answer or poll some insignificant number of them, how can we get an accurate answer? There’s a polling system call YouGov that is reasonably accurate for the present in the U.S. They also do polls in nine other countries. If the question is about everywhere in the world, how would we (for instance) know the answer in North Korea accurately? (And I have no idea whether North Koreans know anything about music or television outside their country.)
TIL that Bruce Springsteen’s most famous album came out in 1984. That’s the summer I was on a WestPac, an being on a submarine, my transistor radio didn’t pull in a very good FM signal. When I got back, Kaylasmom and I listened pretty predominantly to straight-ahead jazz for a few years. So Bruce was kinda below my radar, and I never really “got” why he was supposed to be “the Boss (the only thing I knew about him is that he was “discovered” by Benny Goodman’s brother-in-law, John Hammond, who was at least mentioned in Leonard Feather’s Encyclopedia of Jazz).
As for Courtney Cox, I never watched MTV so I wouldn’t know about her from a music video, and I never saw “Friends” until my daughter started bingeing it on Netflix in 2016. I don’t really “get” her, either.
I think the biggest problem is, how do you measure fame and as someone else pointed out, when and by who? It’s too subjective to have a definitive answer.
I never watched it, but my first awareness of her was as Michael J. Fox’s girlfriend in Family Ties. I don’t recall if that predated her appearance in the Springsteen video.
When I first read this I was like “C’mon Bruce is WAY bigger” but thinking more I’m not so sure.
Bruce became a big star over a period of 10 years from Born to Run to Born in the USA. His future work, while excellent, isn’t what made him a star, it kept him relevant rather than forgotten.
Courteney became a big star over a period of 10 years starring in the one of the most enduringly popular TV shows of all time. Her subsequent work, as well did not make her a star, but kept her visible.
Bruce arguably deserves more kudos for being the creator and performer of the work, but it’s not unreasonable to think that Courteney is more recognizable today as the work she performed in has remained more popular than 70s-80s rock.
Springsteen acquired his fame by producing, by creating, by emoting his art, and performing it, in a way that touched people and moved them and made them think, as well as making them enjoy it.
Cox acquired hers by saying her lines in an art form that was created by others, in an ensemble company that was primarily there to entertain and amuse, so even if she is by some measures more famous than Springsteen, what she does is piffle and what he does is art, so his fame is going to last and hers is going to fade.
She is quiche, in other words, and Springsteen is steak. For a while there, quiche was as popular as steak.
I think this is an unfair attack on the acting profession. It isn’t the soup to nuts creation that is composing and performing music, but it isn’t piffle.
This isn’t clear to me, as it very much depends on how long their particular form of entertainment remains popular. Friends has had 20 years to fade. In 2022, it was one of the top streamed shows in the world with 14.5 billion minutes watched.
This line of reasoning is tiresome. She is, undoubtedly, not among the most talented or skilled actors on TV, but that doesn’t mean she cannot act. If she could not actually act, she would have not made it far on looks alone.
Have you ever been to a community theater show, or a college play, and seen one actor in the cast who was clearly head-and-shoulders above the rest of the cast, as far as talent and acting ability? Ms. Cox’s acting ability is probably at least an order of magnitude above that person’s.
Hollywood is full of cute-to-gorgeous young actresses, all of whom were the best actor in their high school, and probably the best actor at their small college, too. They went to Hollywood, dreaming of becoming a star, but their acting ability isn’t good enough to get them past roles like “Cheerleader #3” in a made-for-TV movie, or a few speaking roles in commercials.
Cox starred in two long-running network sitcoms, the latter of which (Cougar Town) premiered when she was 45. Actresses of that age, who were getting jobs based on looks alone when they were in their 20s and 30s, are not going to be getting a lead role in a network sitcom; if they’re still working as actors in their 40s and 50s, they’re getting bit roles on smaller productions.
Cox is still regularly working, on high-profile TV shows and movies, in her 50s. As I noted before, she is no Meryl Streep (and likely in the bottom half of the six Friends actors, talent-wise), but if she had no real acting ability, she would have washed out of Hollywood long ago.
And also off-topic. Being talented is just one property that can aid in becoming famous, there are many more. One of the most critical is how popular a given kind of material is: you could be the world’s best ever Pesapallo player, but you’re not going to be as famous as the 50th best soccer player.
One of the most popular TV shows of all time, still getting huge ratings in countries all around the world, does likely make someone more famous than a singer-songwriter of heartland rock from the late 70s. Even if he’s a freaking genius or whatever. Thems the breaks.