Sarah Koenig

Image by Meredith Heuer/Courtesy of Serial
By late fall 2014, you could count on one thing coming up in every conversation with anyone who might ever have listened to NPR: Sarah Koenig’s podcast “Serial.” From hours-long debates over the possible guilt of Adnan Syed — the convicted murderer who was the podcast’s subject — to parodies of the ad for MailChimp, one of the show’s sponsors, that preceded every episode, the engrossing true-crime story seemed to be everywhere.
Koenig, 46, daughter of the legendary Jewish advertising copywriter Julian Koenig, has been a producer on “This American Life” since 2004 and produced the show’s 2006 Peabody-award winning episode “Habeas Schmabeas.” And she brought serious journalistic chops to her podcast’s first season. Koenig managed to strike a balance between intense investigative reporting and exceptional storytelling.
Speaking with NPR’s Terry Gross in December 2014, Koenig said the show’s producers “wanted it to feel like a living thing… a vital thing.” They succeeded; “Serial” shattered records for podcast downloads, bringing unprecedented celebrity to the podcast form. This year Fox 21 Television optioned “Serial” for TV, although the show in development reportedly will not concern the case of Adnan Syed.
The second season of “Serial” is due to arrive on iTunes and on a new platform — the audio streaming service Pandora — sometime before the close of this year. A third season is also in development. Koenig and her team have stayed close-lipped about the subject, although rumors are circling that the season will focus on Bowe Bergdahl, the GI kidnapped then released by the Taliban in Afghanistan. Regardless of where Koenig next fixes her gaze, we can trust her to deliver something challenging and fascinating.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Make a Passover Gift Today!
Most Popular
- 1
News Student protesters being deported are not ‘martyrs and heroes,’ says former antisemitism envoy
- 2
News Who is Alan Garber, the Jewish Harvard president who stood up to Trump over antisemitism?
- 3
Fast Forward Suspected arsonist intended to beat Gov. Josh Shapiro with a sledgehammer, investigators say
- 4
Opinion What Jewish university presidents say: Trump is exploiting campus antisemitism, not fighting it
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Pope Francis’ final speech called for ceasefire and hostage release in Gaza war
-
Opinion Shackled, imprisoned and subjected to false accusations, Kilmar Abrego Garcia recalls the fate of Captain Alfred Dreyfus
-
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
-
Culture In Pope Francis, a voice for interfaith dialogue and against antisemitism
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.