author and raconteur Toby Young; author and columnist George Szamuely; Amy Sohn, New York magazine contributing editor and author; author Jonathan Ames; theater critic Jonathan Kalb (two-time winner of the George Jean Nathan Award for Dramatic Criticism); author Ben Greenman; faux-memoirist "JT LeRoy"; Scott McConnell, American Conservative magazine editor; author HP Newquist; writer Kevin R. Kosar; Sam Sifton, New York Times editor; David Corn, novelist and Mother Jones Washington Bureau Chief. The City Sun film critic Armond White joined the staff in 1997 and wrote until 2011. He was joined for much of that time by film critics Godfrey Cheshire and Matt Zoller Seitz; many of the trio's reviews were collected in the 2020 book The Press Gang: Writings on Cinema from New York Press, 1991-2011. Following the convention established by earlier New York underground papers like East Village Other, New York Press also regularly published cutting-edge comic art, including early work by founding art director Michael Gentile, Kaz, Ben Katchor, Debbie Drechsler, Charles Burns, Mark Beyer, Carol Lay, Mark Newgarden, Ward Sutton, M. Wartella, Gary Panter, Danny Hellman, Tony Millionaire, Ariel Bordeaux and others. Art Spiegelman was the comics editor in the early 1990s. Ballpoint pen artist Lennie Mace was also among the regular contributing illustrators. Post-acquisition (2003–2013) Smith sold the paper in late 2002 to investment group Avalon Equity Partners for around US$3 million. Publishers Chuck Colletti and Doug Meadow became the president and C.O.O., respectively. Immediately after the sale, Strausbaugh was fired. After an interim editor declined to stay on, Jeff Koyen was hired away from The Prague Pill. From 2003 to 2005, as editor-in-chief, Koyen continued publishing approximately 100 pages each week. From 2007 onward, the Press ran at less than 40 pages each week. From April 2003 to July 2004, the Press had a sister publication, New York Sports Express, that was a free weekly devoted to sports. The publishers discontinued it. New York Press attracted strong criticism in March 2005 for a cover story entitled "The 52 Funniest Things About the Upcoming Death of the Pope," written by Matt Taibbi. The cover prompted outraged comments from a variety of New York politicians. Within a few weeks editor Jeff Koyen resigned due to the uproar. He was replaced by "interim editor" Alexander Zaitchik. During Koyen's and Zaitchik's editorship, the paper ran regular columns by Paul Krassner, Michelangelo Signorile, and Matt Taibbi. Many of the writers