The winner of multiple Emmy Awards,[2] Siegel also worked as a radio disc jockey and an advertising copywriter.

[5] During college, Siegel worked to register black voters in Georgia during the Civil Rights Movement, and he spoke frequently of having met Martin Luther King Jr.

In 1986, Spy magazine derided Siegel as "the poor man's Gene Shalit", who relied "heavily on alliteration.

[2] While Siegel worked at his reviewing, he wrote the book for The First, a Broadway musical based on the story of Jackie Robinson,[9][10] for which he received a Tony Award nomination in 1982.

[3] In 1999, Siegel was also one of the many guest critics on Roger Ebert's show At The Movies as a replacement for Gene Siskel following his death.

He wrote the book Lessons for Dylan which shares the ups and downs of his life with his young son, as he might not live long enough to relate those stories in person.

He welcomed his newborn son, Dylan Thomas Jefferson Swansea Siegel, home on the same day he completed his chemotherapy treatments.

[14] In June 2005, Siegel published a letter in the peer-reviewed cancer medicine journal, The Oncologist entitled, "One at a Time".

Bush and his wife Barbara were in the audience when Joel spoke on May 10 at the Essex House in New York City.