The Media Interview

If you have to cough or sneeze in the middle of an answer, or a loud truck rolls by in mid-sentence, it’s important that you be able to start again so that they have a complete sentence to edit. You also need to make it sound like you’re doing it for the first time. Pittsburgh [...]

A TV interview with New Zealand celebrity Nicky Watson late last year became an instant classic after this part of the encounter was repeated over and over in the MSM and the blogosphere: Watson: “I must have called [her lost] dog’s name a million times and I hope that when he hears my voice he [...]

Larry King gave a good demonstration last night of what not to do as a guest. He was on Anderson Cooper 360, being interviewed by John King about Dr. Jan Adams walking off the Larry King Live show. Larry King was constantly looking away from his interviewer and at the camera. Breaking eye contact in [...]

Author Will Weaver on being prepared for unprepared interviewers: My 2 1/2 minute TV interview was with a woman anchor with big hair and pancake make-up, who scanned my novel’s inside cover during a cut-away to a commercial, then returned, on-air, to brightly to ask me questions about the novel –but I know the game, [...]

In the rush to fill a 24 hour cable news channel, ABC News demonstrates the dangers of throwing interviewers still in their first month of broadcasting school straight onto the air… Ok, the “first month of broadcasting school” may be a bit unfair to Merry Miller of ABC News Now, but I can certainly say [...]

I heard a headline on CNN the other day that made me curious. New York Rep. Peter King allegedly said there were too many mosques in the United States, but he claimed he was being taken out of context. The remarks were said to be in an interview with Politico.com, so I immediately brought it [...]

Check out this detailed account on the Huffington Post of how the message of a media interview can get misrepresented in the editing process and perhaps more importantly how the misrepresentation certainly seems deliberate. According to business psychologist and author Debra Condren, she was approached by a producer from ABC’s Nightline, who was looking for [...]

Preparing for a live television interview is tough. Even if you’ve had a lot of experience on TV, every situation is different enough – even down to the way you’re seated – that you need to be well prepared to handle what comes at you. Even then, there’s always something more… The other day a [...]

Been a lot of talk about a TV interview with American Idol judge Paula Abdul on January 11. People are saying she was drunk; her spokesperson says she was tired after three straight days of media interviews (see his comments below the video). Whatever the cause of her wild swaying and slurred words, she shouldn’t [...]

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.