Words: Catherine Bray
Illustration: The Boy Fitz Hammond
What your course won’t teach you: the dos and don’ts of interviewing the good, the bad, and the reluctant.
Scene: hotel room, interior.
The elegantly attired star reclines wearily on a sofa, awaiting yet another dull interrogation on their latest project, sternly instructed by the PRESS OFFICER to ignore any enquiry tainted with even the most elusive tang of controversy. Our hero, the journalist, waits outside the suite, running over in their mind a carefully prepared list of clever questions designed to truly engage their icon with their perceptive insights.
Cut to: montage. The star and our hero are now best friends (perhaps lovers?). We see them wandering, laughing uproariously down a palm-lined boulevarde. Glugging champagne in a bar, entranced by one another’s conversation. Dashing to a car through a coruscating galaxy of paparazzi flash bulbs. Wandering under a full moon, the star offering our hero a lit cigarette. This is true love. Fade to black on a kiss.
Back to reality. Becoming best mates with your interviewee is not the reason the interview was set-up. Usually you’re there primarily to help your readers get some insight into your subject’s work, and maybe try to find out a little bit about what makes your subject tick as a person. Whether you’re a print, online or broadcast journalist, whether you specialize in entertainment, politics, lifestyle, or any other discipline, at some point you’re probably going to experience the thrill of a great interview, the horror of a bad one and everything in between. For the would-be journalist, therefore, one of the most worthwhile skills of the trade to master is interviewing technique.
Perhaps one illusion best dropped soonest is that you are there to make friends, even if you are interviewing a personal idol. Another delusion is the contrary idea that it’s a good idea to piss off your interviewee - anger makes great copy, right? Well, it can do, and depending on the kind of publication you work for, may hook readers, but bear-baiting is a different kind of talent to journalism.
This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be frank. However, what might be considered frank when speaking to a friend can easily seem rude to a famous stranger. A journalist who wishes to remain anonymous recounted to me with wistful regret the time he opened an interview with Gwyneth Paltrow with some honest criticism of the star’s pet project, Sylvia: “Never, ever open with any kind of derogatory comment about the star’s past work, unless they bring it up themselves, and if a PR or minder is present expect the interview to be terminated immediately. And, worst case scenario, for a complaint to be made about your interviewing technique.”
It’s the kind of gaffe that we all like to think we would never make, but for the aspiring journalist there are plenty of other pitfalls - as well as opportunities - which tend to be learned after the fact, as they aren’t necessarily taught on journalism courses. Of course, you can learn some of them chewing the fat with some seasoned pros, which is exactly what I set out to do here.
1. Don’t: Embarrass yourself and everyone else present with crazed requests.
“The worst thing I’ve ever seen done was at a series of roundtable interviews for Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. One journalist, at the end of each interview, insisted on being photographed with the star as a sort of proof they actually met them. But this particular photo apparently had to involve the star holding up, or wearing, a jumper patterned with the journo’s national flag. Nasty.” James Mottram, film critic and author, The Sundance Kids
It sounds obvious, but if you’re interviewing a celebrity or other high-profile figure there’s a world of difference between politely asking someone to sign their autobiography, and going above and beyond. Some interviewees will be quite obliging; I remember a roundtable interview where The Lord of the Ring’s Andy Serkis posed happily for pictures and even recorded an answerphone message for one journalist in his Gollum voice, but it’s certainly not in their job description to play ball with this kind of thing.
2. DO: See/read/listen to your interviewee’s work in advance if possible.
“Always best to have seen whatever you’re interviewing the subject on. Mr Evan Katz, Producer of Season 5 of 24, wasn’t best pleased when I began the interview with: ‘Hi Evan, I haven’t actually seen season 5 yet, and I’m trying to avoid spoilers, so can we kinda talk about it without talking about it?’ He did his subsequent best to give away every twist he possibly could, then saying ‘Oh… I’m sorry, did I say something I shouldn’t have?’ and sniggering. Fair play though, I would’ve done the same.” Tristan Burke, freelance film journalist
It’s not always possible to get your hands on the relevant goods prior to an interview, but make sure you know as much as possible about your subject before turning up. Fact-checking your research is always worthwhile: interviewees quickly get bored of having to refute a popular misconception, and while the internet has made laying your hands on a wealth of information a relatively fast process, it’s also very easy to circulate rumours. Before asking whether it’s true they starred in The Wonder Years, see if you can find a reputable source backing it up.
3. Don’t: Underestimate the language gap.
If you’re interviewing someone from a different culture or country, check your questions make sense and aren’t going to piss people off.
“I was with a gaggle of journos in the gardens of Pinewood on the set of Stardust. Director Matthew Vaughn was wheeled out, wearing don’t-fuck-with-me-sunglasses to face about twenty hacks. And, as frequently happens, it was the overseas journos that asked the worst questions. Their first bloody question to Vaughn was ‘Has Claudia Schiffer visited the set?’ which immediately put him in a bad mood. I think if your editor’s told you to ask that question, at least butter them up first. Then they asked Clare Danes how it felt to move from being a sexy girl to a sexy woman. She looked bewildered.” Steve O’ Brien, pundit, BBC4
There are always going to be cultural differences when interviewing internationally, some of which will be avoidable, some less so. In general, save those potentially controversial topics for last.
4. DO: Take the age of your interviewee into account.
“Woody Allen and I had a strange musical chairs incident at the start of the interview. He asked me where I wanted to sit, I took a chair. He said no, not that one, that’s my chair, so I moved to a neighbouring sofa. Moments later he asked me to move again, because he couldn’t hear me. Rather boringly, I’d done my research, prepped well and it went swimmingly. I’d just forgotten to factor in the fact that 70-odd-year-old men are a bit deaf. And speaking of OAPs… I interviewed veteran Hammer Horror scream queen Ingrid Pitt at her house, and the whole thing was faintly surreal. Couple of tips: don’t laugh when your hostess drops a plate of biscuits; she thought I was taking the piss. Win her round by complimenting her on her Russian tea. Do nod sagely when her mild request to write a column for your magazine suddenly turns into a proper, scary demand. Glad her husband walked in at that point to calm her down a bit.” Graham Taylor, The Sun TV Mag
5. DO: Know your subject area.
“I interviewed cartoonist Scott McCloud in 1990 or so, with no chance to do any preparation or research, soon after he had made a splash beyond comics’ little pond with a ‘graphic novel’ called Understanding Comics. It was soon obvious that he had had his fill of being asked dumb questions by people who knew nothing about comics, and he tested me out early on, in steps - mentioning Jack Kirby (the giant of US comics), then Art Spiegelman (Maus), then Osamu Tezuka (Japan’s “god of comics”). When I replied to that last one by saying that I’d written an obituary for Tezuka, and showed that I knew McCloud’s other work too, I was in, and he became friendly and forthcoming. We talked a lot about the craft of comics, as I recall, and knowing what I was talking about made all the difference, by asking productive and even demanding questions and showing I understood and followed what he said. I got a lengthy interview out of him, and he was genuinely interested and thoughtful.” Martin Skidmore, freelance journalist
Always pursue interview opportunities that fall within your specialist subject areas - you’re putting yourself streets ahead of the writer who just takes it on as a job at no extra effort. The problem may be making sure you let your interviewee get a word in edgeways.
6. DON’T: Assume anything.
“I once had an hour-long interview with Sir Ridley Scott which, without anyone telling me, was shortened to 45 minutes. Needless to say, I was a little surprised when the publicist told me to wrap things up a full quarter of an hour earlier than I was expecting. The moral of the story? Always keep your last question in mind, ready to drop in if required. It should be something that you really want an answer to, and preferably something that will prompt a long answer giving you plenty of quotage. Also, as you go into the interview, check how long it’s going to be - it might have changed at the last minute and there’s never any harm in asking.” Richard Edwards, News Editor, SFX
As Richard points out, it’s always worth checking and double-checking the details of your interview. As well as being useful from your point of view, if it’s a high-profile interviewee with a busy schedule it’s helpful to the press officer to know you’re on the ball.
7. DON’T: Rely on technology.
“When Mrs Thatcher was made Minister of Education they wanted to me to do a proper profile of her, following her around for two or three days getting a flavour of her work, but what in fact happened was I was granted an hour in her office. I went along with a tape recorder with which I wasn’t very familiar and about half way through the interview I realized that the tape recorder wasn’t working and I was far too scared to say, so I went back to the office and said I’m sorry but I don’t think it added up, I don’t think this interview should run.” Katharine Whitehorn, author and veteran journalist, The Observer
Recording technology means there are plenty of journalists today, particularly on magazines, who don’t learn shorthand, preferring to rely on the dictaphone. Old school hacks may recoil, but there’s arguably nothing wrong with this - provided the technology doesn’t let you down. Accuracy aside, if you’re touching on anything contentious it is doubly essential that you have a record of what was said and that you keep the audio file so that you can prove, should you need to, that your article is accurate. Test your equipment, bring spare batteries, and if it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity you could even consider bringing a back-up recorder.
8. DO: Maintain your composure.
When interviewing legendary columnist, author and personal icon Katharine Whitehorn for the above comment on her Thatcher interview, I found myself unusually flustered. It’s one thing interviewing a major musician whose album you don’t happen to rate, or a filmic flavour of the month you only heard about for the first time this year, or a politician you know for a fact is a lying scoundrel, but interviewing someone you’ve looked up to since beginning your career can do strange things to a person. When she’d finished her anecdote, I laughed. Only I didn’t, I snorted. A great, pig-truffling snort straight from the bacon emporium. She politely pretended it hadn’t happened, and to cover my confusion I asked her to sign my copy of her autobiography. She asked me how I spelled my name. “Exactly like yours. But with a K. I mean a C. But exactly like yours apart from that. Except it’s not an a in the middle. It’s an e. The ending is identical though.” Smooth.
