Shales was born in Elgin, Illinois, the son of Hulda Louise and Clyde LeRoy Shales. Shales's first professional job was with radio station WRMN/WRMN-FM in Elgin at the age of 18. He served on the station's disc jockey, local news reporter, writer and announcer, on both the AM and FM bands. He later worked with Voice of America as a producer of broadcasts to the Far East. Shales graduated from American University in Washington, D.C., where he was editor-in-chief of the student newspaper, The Eagle, for the 1966–1967 academic year, as well as the paper's movie critic. Shales worked as entertainment editor at the Washington Examiner from 1968 to 1971. He joined The Washington Post as a writer in the Style section in 1972, was named chief television critic in July 1977, and was appointed TV editor in June 1979. The Washington Post Writers Group syndicated his column since 1979. Shales wrote for The Washington Post for several decades, but left the paper effective December 31, 2010. During 1998–1999, Shales was a frequent film critic for Morning Edition on National Public Radio. He was twice a guest co-host on the television show Roger Ebert & the Moviesafter the death of Gene Siskel. Shales was a member of the Peabody Awards Board of Jurors from 1991 to 1996. Shales has published four books, including two he co-wrote with James Andrew Miller. In 2002, Shales and Miller published Live From New York: An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live, which covers the history of the sketch-comedy variety show, and provides a behind-the-scenes look at its stars and production process. The book was re-released in 2015 to coincide with Saturday Night Live's40th anniversary. The updated edition contained over 100 pages of new material. In 2011, Shales and Miller published their second book together, Those Guys Have All the Fun: Inside the World of ESPN, which chronicles the history of the network ESPN from its infancy in 1979 through 2010. In 2015, the Focus Features optioned the book to adapt it into a movie. Of Shales, the Forbes Media Guide Five Hundred, 1994 wrote: "Forget the middle ground, Shales either loves it or hates it – and his reviews of TV shows and personalities are often unabashed paroxysms of that love or hate....Like the medium he covers, Shales turns out fast-paced and amusing fare that often lacks depth".
Honors
Shales received the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 1988 for his work at The Washington Post.
