List of Famous Critics
Updated June 9, 2017742 items
List of famous critics, with photos, bios, and other information when available. Who are the top critics in the world? This includes the most prominent critics, living and dead, both in America and abroad. This list of notable critics is ordered by their level of prominence, and can be sorted for various bits of information, such as where these historic critics were born and what their nationality is. The people on this list are from different countries, but what they all have in common is that they're all renowned critics.
The list you're viewing is made up of different people like Glenn Beck and Jon Stewart.
From reputable, prominent, and well known critics to the lesser known critics of today, these are some of the best professionals in the critic field. If you want to answer the questions, "Who are the most famous critics ever?" and "What are the names of famous critics?" then you're in the right place. {#nodes}Ranked by
- Glenn Lee Beck (born February 10, 1964) is an American conservative political commentator, radio host and television producer. He is the CEO, founder, and owner of Mercury Radio Arts, the parent company of his television and radio network TheBlaze. He hosts the Glenn Beck Radio Program, a popular talk-radio show nationally syndicated on Premiere Radio Networks. Beck also hosts the Glenn Beck television program, which ran from January 2006 to October 2008 on HLN, from January 2009 to June 2011 on the Fox News Channel and currently airs on TheBlaze. Beck has authored six New York Times–bestselling books.In April 2011, Beck announced that he would "transition off of his daily program" on Fox News, but would continue to team with Fox. Beck's last daily show on the network was June 30, 2011. In 2012, The Hollywood Reporter named Beck on its Digital Power Fifty list. Beck launched TheBlaze in 2011 after leaving Fox News. He currently hosts an hour-long afternoon program, The Glenn Beck Program, on weekdays, and a three-hour morning radio show; both are broadcast on TheBlaze. Beck is also the producer of For the Record on TheBlaze.Beck's supporters praise him as a constitutional stalwart promoting limited government, low taxes, gun rights, free speech and defending traditional American values, while his critics contend he promotes conspiracy theories and employs incendiary rhetoric for ratings.
- Jon Stewart (born Jonathan Stuart Leibowitz; November 28, 1962) is an American comedian, writer, producer, director, activist, political commentator, actor, and television host. He hosted The Daily Show, a satirical news program on Comedy Central, from 1999 to 2015. Stewart started as a stand-up comedian but branched into television as host of Short Attention Span Theater for Comedy Central. He went on to host The Jon Stewart Show and then You Wrote It, You Watch It, both on MTV. Stewart has also appeared in several films, such as Big Daddy (1999) and Death to Smoochy (2002), but did few cinematic projects after becoming host of The Daily Show in 1999. He was also a writer and co-executive producer of the show. After Stewart joined, The Daily Show steadily gained popularity and critical acclaim, and during his tenure, The Daily Show won 22 Primetime Emmy Awards. Stewart is known as an outspoken, humorous critic of personality-driven media shows, in particular those of the U.S. media broadcast networks such as CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC. Critics say Stewart benefits from a double standard: he critiques other news shows from the safe, removed position of his "news satire" desk; Stewart asserts that neither his show nor Comedy Central purport to be anything other than satire and comedy. In spite of its self-professed entertainment mandate, The Daily Show has been nominated for news and journalism awards among its accolades. Stewart hosted the 78th and 80th Academy Awards. He is the co-author of America (The Book): A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction, which was one of the best-selling books in the U.S. in 2004, and Earth (The Book): A Visitor's Guide to the Human Race, released in 2010. Since leaving The Daily Show, Stewart has for the most part maintained a low profile, with his sustained advocacy for 9/11 first responders being a notable exception.
- Simon Phillip Cowell (; born 7 October 1959) is an English television music and talent show judge, businessman, A&R executive, talent manager, television producer, and entrepreneur. He has judged on the British TV talent competition series Pop Idol, The X Factor and Britain's Got Talent, and the American TV talent competition shows American Idol, The X Factor and America's Got Talent. Cowell is the principal, founder and chief executive of the British entertainment company Syco.Cowell often makes blunt and controversial comments as a television show judge, including insults and wisecracks about contestants and their singing abilities. He combines activities in both the television and music industries. Cowell has produced and promoted singles and albums for various singers whom he has taken under his wing. He is popularly known for signing successful boybands such as Westlife, One Direction and CNCO. In 2004 and 2010, Time named Cowell one of the 100 most influential people in the world. In 2008, The Daily Telegraph ranked him sixth in their list of the "100 most powerful people in British culture".
- Michael Francis Moore (born April 23, 1954) is an American documentary filmmaker and author. He is best known for his work on globalization and capitalism. Moore has been labeled a left-wing documentary filmmaker and left-wing political activist, however, he rejects the label "political activist".Moore won the 2002 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for Bowling for Columbine, which examined the supposed causes of the Columbine High School massacre and the overall gun culture of the United States. He also directed and produced Fahrenheit 9/11, a critical look at the presidency of George W. Bush and the War on Terror, which earned $119,194,771 to become the highest-grossing documentary at the American box office of all time. The film also won the Palme d'Or at the 2004 Cannes film festival. His documentary Sicko, which examines health care in the United States, is one of the top ten highest-grossing documentaries. In September 2008, he released his first free movie on the internet, Slacker Uprising, which documented his personal quest to encourage more Americans to vote in presidential elections. He has also written and starred in the TV shows TV Nation, a satirical news-magazine television series, and The Awful Truth, a satirical show. In 2018 he released his latest film, Fahrenheit 11/9, a documentary about the 2016 United States presidential election and the subsequent presidency of Donald Trump. Moore's written and cinematic works criticize topics such as globalization, large corporations, assault weapon ownership, Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Donald Trump, the Iraq War, the American health care system and capitalism overall. In 2005, Time magazine named Moore one of the world's 100 most influential people.
- Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. He holds a joint appointment as Institute Professor Emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and laureate professor at the University of Arizona, and is the author of more than 100 books on topics such as linguistics, war, politics, and mass media. Ideologically, he aligns with anarcho-syndicalism and libertarian socialism. Born to working-class Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants in Philadelphia, Chomsky developed an early interest in anarchism from alternative bookstores in New York City. At age 16 he began undergraduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania, and from 1951 to 1955 was a member of Harvard University's Society of Fellows, where he developed the theory of transformational grammar for which he earned his doctorate in 1955. That year he began teaching at MIT, and in 1957 emerged as a significant figure in linguistics with his landmark work Syntactic Structures, which played a major role in remodeling the study of language. From 1958 to 1959 Chomsky was a National Science Foundation fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study. He created or co-created the universal grammar theory, the generative grammar theory, the Chomsky hierarchy, and the minimalist program. Chomsky also played a pivotal role in the decline of behaviorism, and was particularly critical of the work of B. F. Skinner. An outspoken opponent of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, which he saw as an act of American imperialism, in 1967 Chomsky rose to national attention for his antiwar essay "The Responsibility of Intellectuals". Associated with the New Left, he was arrested multiple times for his activism and placed on President Richard Nixon's Enemies List. While expanding his work in linguistics over subsequent decades, he also became involved in the linguistics wars. In collaboration with Edward S. Herman, Chomsky later articulated the propaganda model of media criticism in Manufacturing Consent and worked to expose the Indonesian occupation of East Timor. His defense of freedom of speech, including Holocaust denial, generated significant controversy in the Faurisson affair of the 1980s. Since retiring from MIT, he has continued his vocal political activism, including opposing the War on Terror and supporting the Occupy movement. Chomsky began teaching at the University of Arizona in 2017. One of the most cited scholars alive, Chomsky has influenced a broad array of academic fields. He is widely recognized as having helped to spark the cognitive revolution, a paradigm shift in the human sciences that established a new cognitivistic framework for the study of language and the mind. In addition to his continued scholarship, he remains a leading critic of U.S. foreign policy, neoliberalism and contemporary state capitalism, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and mainstream news media. His ideas have proven highly influential in the anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist movements, but have also drawn criticism, with some accusing Chomsky of anti-Americanism.
- Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert became the first film critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. Ebert and Chicago Tribune critic Gene Siskel helped popularize nationally televised film reviewing when they co-hosted the PBS show Sneak Previews, followed by several variously named At the Movies programs. The two verbally sparred and traded humorous barbs while discussing films. They created and trademarked the phrase "Two Thumbs Up", used when both hosts gave the same film a positive review. After Siskel died in 1999, Ebert continued hosting the show with various co-hosts and then, starting in 2000, with Richard Roeper. Neil Steinberg of the Chicago Sun-Times said Ebert "was without question the nation's most prominent and influential film critic", Tom Van Riper of Forbes described him as "the most powerful pundit in America", and Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times called him "the best-known film critic in America".Ebert lived with cancer of the thyroid and salivary glands beginning in 2002. In 2006, he required treatment necessitating the removal of his lower jaw, leaving him severely disfigured and costing him the ability to speak or eat normally. His ability to write remained unimpaired and he continued to publish frequently both online and in print until his death on April 4, 2013.
