David Sims

Early life

Sims was born in Manhattan, New York to a mother who was a city hall reporter, and a father who worked for the Bloomberg business news organization. While in New York he attended Public School 87, and enjoyed parks, museums, and playing little league baseball games. Sims has said that he developed his love of movies on his own, from the personal joy he experienced on his first viewing of Aladdin, to combing through The New York Times Arts section for movie posters for upcoming films. In 1994 his family moved to London as a result of his father's position at Bloomberg News. Sims would spend the rest of his childhood and his higher education in London. He finished his higher education at Newcastle University. Sims is also a member of both the New York Film Critics Circle, and also the Critics Choice Association.

In 2015, Sims, with his friend and actor Griffin Newman, formed the podcast Blank Check with Griffin & David. Since 2016 the podcast has covered 44 directors, including M. Night Shyamalan, the Wachowski siblings, Steven Spielberg, Ang Lee, Hayao Miyazaki, Jane Campion, David Lynch, John Singleton and Gina Prince-Bythewood. The podcast has produced nearly 600 episodes.

As a result of his pop culture expertise, and his position at The Atlantic he has twice been invited to appear on WNYC’s All Of It with Alison Stewart once in 2019, and again in 2022. In his first appearance, he was part of a panel discussion, which reviewed the end of the television series Game of Thrones. In his second time on the show he discussed major financial losses by the streaming service Netflix.

Personal life

Sims lives in Brooklyn with his wife, daughter and twin boys.