Rapidly recontextualized jokes

I was watching Sliding Doors on TV last night, which I'd never seen before. It's a nice little movie, but there was one bit of the script that had its meaning altered by events since the film was released.

James (John Hannah) is telling Helen (Gwyneth 'look at my lovely English accent' Paltrow) about how, when he was eight years old, his first love abandoned him because she was too obsessed with a certain pop star. Now, they could have used many pop acts from the 70s there - David Cassidy, the Bay City Rollers, the Osmonds etc - but instead they chose to use...Gary Glitter. Jokes about eight year olds leaving someone for Gary Glitter managed to develop a slightly different slant about a year after the movie was released.