That's a pretty brash claim. Shakespeare's been around for centuries, and has most likely been read or seen by more people in the sum of that time than celebrity news.

You forget, more people have lived since the end of the second world war, than lived between then and Shakespeare's time. If you also take into account the rise in global literacy, far more people will have read celebrity news than Shakespeare.

My guess is that anyone who is literate has read Shakespeare at least once. I have to imagine my public schooling is not that different from the norm, and I read at least 3 works as required (Hamlet, Macbeth, and Romeo & Juliet) and some other others as my choice for assignments.

At least, in the western world. I don't know how popular Shakespeare is outside of that. On the other hand, I don't know how popular celebrity news is either.