On Camera, 2nd Edition

1 Interviewing

Interviewing for television should appear to be a terrific conversation between you and your guest. It might be a boisterous conversation, even an argumentative conversation, or a tender conversation … there are all sorts of conversations you can have. And just as there are all sorts of conversations, there are all sorts of interviews you may be conducting. We are talking here about in-depth interviews, not on-street reporting interviews. We’ll discuss those in detail in the chapters on reporting.

First, there are different styles of interviews and you will approach them differently. They fall into two basic categories: hard news interviews and soft interviews. The hard news interviews tend to be direct, informational, objective, ...