It's a celebrity, get me out of here

The celebrity interviews you read in newspapers aren't always the glamorous close encounters they appear to be. Below, BRIAN BOYDlifts the lid on one-on-ones, round tables and phoners, and, right, Ticket writers recall their worst interviews ever

What’s Bono really like? Has Mick Jagger had a facelift? Does Madonna really loook that butch when you’re standing beside her? Music/film interviewers can, in the course of their work, get a Willy Wonka golden ticket to rub tape recorders against A-list stars, but the celebrity caste system always remains in place.

It may seem – from the sometimes ridiculously enthusiastic reportage of the 20-minute encounter with the “talent” – that undying friendships have been forged and kisses’n’hugs have been exchanged, when more accurately the reporter is the hired promotional help who is asking the same word-for-word questions that the talent has already heard 18 times that day.

The celeb interview is a curious beast, invariably taking place in a charmless hotel suite. The interviewer gets to step inside stardom’s front door only for a while, before being deposited back on the street outside and given vague directions to the nearest bus stop.

And its form is as various as its content, from the exclusive, face-to-face, no-holds-barred encounter, to the anonymous phone interview with someone who is at the other end of the world and whose first name you’re having trouble remembering.

Here are the five rungs of the celebrity encounter.

1. EYEBALL TO EYEBALL

The Ticket editor loves these: it’s the one-on-one close encounter with no distractions, when the interview can take the scenic route and really reveal something of the person behind the film/album/book. The best-case scenario is when you get all the quality time in the world with Daniel Day Lewis or Nick Cave, as The Ticket did in the past year, making these interviews the gold standard.

However, those of you who like to read between the lines of modern journalism should note that many writers (not ours) will write up all interviews as the product of one of these long relaxed chats, even if they simply taped a press conference attended by 200 hacks.

2. THE BRIEF ENCOUNTER

This takes place in a €15-for-a-cup-of-coffee hotel; you’re number 12 of 20 people that afternoon interviewing the star; the second you say “Hello”, the meter is ticking and you now only have 19 minutes and 55 seconds left to get all you need for your “exclusive” and “never-before-revealed” story.

In the worst cases, a Stepford PR person will hover, and have a cardiac/stroke on the spot if you ask the “little boys” question (“the little boys” question is media shorthand for an awkward query the star doesn’t like hearing). Once the second hand shows that the 20 minutes are up, you’re pushed into a big chute that deposits you on the street outside.

Sometimes you will be asked to sign a 24-page document before being deigned worthy of the “face-to-face”. Why they call it this when the star is invariably wearing mirror sunglasses and will look anywhere but at your wan, jet-lagged face is beyond me.

A well-lubricated star once told us that all big-money stars are now given PR training, in which they are told to look at a point just over the interviewer’s left shoulder. This gives the impression – from a few metres – that they’re meeting your gaze without the discomfort of actually having to do so.

3. THE ROUND TABLE

Further down the scale is the “round table”. You sit at a table with five other journalists from European countries and a smug-looking star who’s thinking: “This cuts an hour off my promotional schedule.”

Of the six at the table, one will not be able to speak English, another will ask piercing questions about the star’s sexuality, another thinks he’s is in the queue for Mamma Mia! tickets, and one is there only to get an autograph or picture that they can flog on eBay later.

In such circumstances, a seasoned hack can steer the discourse their own way and emerge with useful and printable material. Last year, The Ticket got a very lively interview out of Coldplay’s Chris Martin during a round-table interview. It all depends on the length of the interview, the size of the group and the star’s ability to talk.

At the big film festivals such as Cannes and Toronto, there are thousands of international media personnel in town, and the only access to “talent” is through short roundtables with large groups of journalists. The Irish Times never accepts these.

4. THE PHONER

The “phoner” – one of the lowest rungs on the promotional merry-go-round – is loved and loathed in equal measure.

As a rule, The Ticket tends to spare its readers the pain of reading articles based on phone interviews. On occasion, though, they produce fine copy. The ever-quotable Iggy Pop gave The Ticket an especially frank and revealing interview by phone earlier this year.

Publicists like to set up phoners when Mr or Mrs Rockstar is in a prohibitively expensive place to travel to for a face-to-face, as the record company is usually picking up the tab (for major labels this would be New Zealand; for indies it would be Galway).

The phoner is loathed by interviewers because the star can go into remote-control mode far more easily than in a face-to-face situation. Also, the journalist doesn’t get a chance to write elegant prose such as “the sallow sunrise insinuated itself against the chloroform Colorado sky as Bono surreptitiously swigged from a bottle of Jack Daniels”, etc.

However, journalists also love phoners because we can file our nails or do some long-overdue darning while pretending to be interested in the egomaniacal rantings of the star on the other end of the line. It also means we don’t have to travel for 12 hours for a 20-minute interview with a star who treats us like a lower form of stenographer.

5. THE WEEKEND WITH THE NOBODY

Further down the promotional pole we go, until we reach celebrity’s dank and windowless basement where the embittered has-been and the manically wide-eyed newcomer reside. Both of these types will be happy to call around to your house and put the kettle on (this actually happened to me) if it means a vital hit of publicity for them.

The has-been will scorch your ears with tales of betrayal and back-stabbing, and blame everyone else (including their own parents) for the diminished wattage of their celebrity.

The novice will grin gormlessly throughout and come out with Taoist gems such as: “You’ve met Madonna; what’s she like; can you get this track I’m working on to her?” An up-and-coming Dublin rock group once told me: “U2 are shite. Not one of their songs would be good enough to fit on our debut album . . . by the way, have you got a home phone number for Paul McGuinness?”