Counseling career Gordon was a practicing therapist from 2004 to 2009, working in
North Carolina,
Chicago, Illinois (where she moved in 2005), and
Brooklyn, New York (where she moved in 2007).
Writing and comedy Gordon began her comedy career in New York, where she worked at Comix comedy club and produced a live show with
Pete Holmes. By the time she moved to
Los Angeles in 2010, In 2011, she was asked by
Chris Hardwick, who wanted to turn the space into a curated comedy venue, to act as program director. From 2011 to 2015, Gordon and Nanjiani co-hosted a
Nerdist network podcast called
The Indoor Kids, which "isn't just about video games, but it isn't not about video games." In 2020, Gordon and Nanjiani co-hosted a podcast called
Staying In with Emily and Kumail, about the quarantine due to COVID-19. Gordon was signed to adapt Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney's 2016 novel
The Nest for
Amazon's film studio.
Joey Soloway and
Andrea Sperling will produce the feature film.
Super You Gordon's first book,
Super You: Release Your Inner Superhero, a tongue-in-cheek self-improvement guide, was released in 2015.
The Big Sick Gordon also co-wrote the screenplay of and co-executive produced the 2017 film
The Big Sick, with her husband
Kumail Nanjiani. The critically acclaimed film is based on the beginning of their relationship, with Nanjiani playing himself, and Gordon (renamed Emily Gardner) played by
Zoe Kazan.
The Big Sick was directed by
Michael Showalter and produced by
Judd Apatow. Gordon and Nanjiani's script won the
Independent Spirit Award for Best First Screenplay. It was also nominated for a 2018
Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, as well as screenwriting awards from the
Writers Guild of America, the
Gotham Awards, and a dozen critics' associations. ==Personal life==