The Media Interview

The folks at Doogtoons may be on to somethng: conduct an interview, then do a cartoon version of it, adding short scenes that “comment” on what the person is saying. They’ve started a couple of celebrity interviews on their site and here are some screenshots from an interview with Weird Al about his childhood. Personally, [...]

One of the concerns people raise about email interviews is that you’re allowing the interviewee take their time to craft an answer, maybe even run it by some media handlers. It’s turned out to be a non-issue, I think, because interviews by email generally allows people more time to give thoughtful, useful answers instead of [...]

HarperCollins took their time, but have finally fired Judith Regan, the publisher of the cancelled O.J. Simpson book and the interviewer from the cancelled OJ TV interview on Fox. Thanks to The Flack for pointing out the good news.

The editor of Cracked magazine, Jay Pinkerton, did an interview that went rather badly, and he blogged about what it’s like to be on the other side of an interview: In working for a magazine [that] conducts interviews, I’ve come across people who outright refuse to take questions by phone or in person, asking for [...]

A friend of mine was given a message at work when he came back from lunch the other day: a newspaper reporter will stop by tommorrow to ask some questions. My friend writes an occasional column in a local paper and has been interviewed a couple of times before, so he didn’t think much of [...]

Giving a bad interview, it turns out, is a lot like getting a bad haircut: you spend about a week trying to avoid it as a topic of conversation, and when someone mentions it, you preemptively degrade it, secretly hoping they’ll tell you it’s “not so bad;” that in fact having sideburns of unequal length [...]

Ok, maybe this is a little paranoid, but my feeling is that if you’re doing an on-camera interview, try not to have anything very personal visible on camera. Example: I was watching a nationally-televised interview last night and the person being interviewed had their laptop open just behind them on the desk. On the laptop [...]

Picked up a book at the library the other day (yes, a building filled with printed books) called The Sound and the Fury and it turns out to be based on a web-site called Rock’s Back Pages. If you’re a music journalist doing research or a musician looking for some tips on how to conduct [...]

“I remember she was great on air, sure we’ll book her.” What was interesting about this producer’s response was that he remembered this guest from a radio station where he used to work. Now he’s a TV producer and is booking an interview, no questions asked, because the woman had added value to his previous [...]

Sorry, nothing from me about the Barbara Walters special last night – The 10 Most Fascinating People of 2006. My apologies. Problem was, I couldn’t see it. For those outside of Canada, you may find this story a little bizarre: Canadian government regulations require cable providers to automatically switch an American station to a Canadian [...]