Jason Zinoman

I am a critic at large for the Culture section of The New York Times and write a column about comedy.

What I Cover

I cover comedy with critical rigor and curiosity, and explore how it reflects and influences the broader cultural and intellectual landscape. I am particularly interested in work that is innovative or unexpected, but it’s enough if it’s just really funny. I am easily bored writing in one form and tend to mix it up, moving from reviews to trend pieces, essays to profiles, time-intensive process pieces to reported investigations into the business of the art form — my aim is always to capture the comedy scene in its complexity while translating it clearly for a broad audience.

Since becoming the paper’s first comedy critic in 2011, I have focused on stand-up specials, but I also keep an eye on improv, sketch, podcasts, plays, musicals, TikTok accounts and any other forms in which jokes are made. As a critic at large, I also like to write about movies, theater and books but never seem to find enough time to do it.

My Background

The most valuable job I ever had was as a telemarketer selling theater subscriptions every summer during high school — work that taught me how to talk to many different kinds of people and how to listen, which is everything I really needed to know to become a decent reporter. I fell in love with criticism in college after reading Pauline Kael and moved to New York, where I wrote freelance reviews for many publications, some I don’t even remember. Vanity Fair and Slate are two that I do.

I got my first magazine job at Time Out NY, where I eventually became the chief theater critic and editor. I started writing regularly for The Times in 2003, reporting on Broadway, then transitioned to a role as a theater critic, focused on Off and Off Off Broadway productions. After a stint writing a column for The Times’s short-lived sports magazine, Play, I wrote a book called “Shock Value,” about the golden age of modern horror movies, which I am obsessed with. The year the book came out, I started the On Comedy column, which may be evidence that the line between comedy and horror is thin. I have also written a book about Dave Chappelle and a best-selling biography of David Letterman.

Journalistic Ethics

I follow The Times’s rigorous ethics policy and standards of integrity and always write with an open mind and a commitment to fairness, accuracy and independence.

• Email: [email protected]

• X: @zinoman

• Instagram: @zinomanj

• Threads: @zinomanj

• Anonymous tips: nytimes.com/tips