How to Interview Celebrities

Setting up the Interview

Reach out to the celebrity. You can contact a member of their team, like their manager, agent, publicist, etc. For a more direct approach, you can try messaging the celebrity on social media or sending them an email. If you haven’t interviewed a lot of celebrities or a lot of big celebrities, start small. Try getting interviews with up and coming artists, actors, sports players, etc. You can email them something like, “My viewers and I are huge fans of yours. I’d love to interview about your upcoming project and the work you’ve been doing. If you’d be interested….”

Give them a reason for why they should give you an interview. If you aren’t well established, an easy way to do this is by appealing to their interests. This is only necessary if the celebrity doesn’t immediately agree to the interview. Use a connection that you have with the celebrity. This could be a person that you are both connected to, a charity you both support, or a passion that you both share.

Schedule the interview. Don’t push your schedule on them. Instead, ask the celebrity or their team member when a good time for an interview may be. Be as flexible as you can to accommodate their needs. You may need to do the interview on their set or at their house, instead of at your studio, over Facetime, for only a few minutes, or even over the phone. Remind them and their team of the interview a few days in advance. Be polite and say something like, “When would an interview work best in your schedule?”

Coming up with Questions in Advance

Research the celebrity. Look online to find out about the person’s accomplishments, rise to fame, and major projects. Read their website, look at their social media pages, like Instagram and Twitter, and go on pages like Wikipedia. Don’t forget to look out for their passions and interests. Watch their movies, listen to their music, read their book, watch their best games, etc.

Watch other interviews that the celebrity has done. Look at what interviews get positive and negative responses and use that to inform how you go about your interview. Also, watch the celebrity’s answers, tone, and body language when responding to certain questions. If the celebrity responds poorly to something, maybe don’t ask them that same question. Also, if the celebrity gets really passionate about something in another interview, consider asking them similar questions. You can also watch famous and infamous interviews with other celebrities to help guide your question writing.

Ask your users or viewers what questions they want to be asked. Have them submit questions online or by phone. While you’ll probably get a lot of repeat questions and inappropriate questions, you’ll most likely get some good content. It’s important to keep your users happy because you need their continued support.

Read over the questions before the interview. Try to do this as much as possible. That way, you won’t have to rely as heavily on your notes during the interview. Once you’ve read them out loud a good amount, try recalling them without your notes.

Write out the questions. Use the information you’ve gathered to help you craft guiding questions. At first, write down everything that comes to your mind. Once you’ve jotted down all your ideas, delete the bad questions and rephrase the ones that have potential. If you have too many questions, cut out more, and if you have too little, write more. It’s better to have too many questions than not enough. That way, you aren’t left with awkward pauses and a short interview. While the number of questions you’ll be able to ask will depend on how long the interview is and how long the celebrity takes to respond to each question, you can try to gauge it. To do this, just answer each question out loud and see how long each one approximately takes. Make sure the questions are clear and to the point. Try reading them out loud to see if they have a conversational tone. Ask them fun questions to show off their personality, like, “What’s your weirdest fear?” Avoid questions about their relationships, if they aren’t open about them, sex lives, etc.

Sort your questions by categories. Start off by asking about their current routines and projects. Then, try to transition to their future plans and dreams. Finish the interview by asking them more fun and personal questions about their interests and personality.

Conducting the Interview

Greet the celebrity. If they come to you, thank them for coming and meeting with you. However, if you come to the celebrity, just thank them for meeting with you. You can then either ask, “How’s your day going?” or say, “I hope your day is going well.” The idea is to make the celebrity feel welcomed and show your appreciation.

Ask them questions. To start the conversation, after you’ve greeted them, use some of the pre-prepared questions you wrote. Once they respond, ask natural follow-up questions, even if you haven’t already written them down. Natural follow-up questions will make the interview seem more like a conversation.

Let the celebrity respond fully. After you’ve asked them a question, let them talk for as long as they want. Listening, and not interrupting or just waiting to speak again, shows a level of respect and genuine interest in the celebrity and what they have to say. Also, by not cutting them off, they’ll give you more content, which you can ask follow up questions on.

Use questions to transition to a new topic. You can say something like, “That’s awesome! Now I’d like to ask about…” This will help your viewers stay engaged and create a clear organizational structure for the interview.

Show the celebrity that you’re listening. This is the best way to put them at ease and make them feel comfortable. Try mirroring their body language, nodding your head, and saying something back to them that you’ve just told you. Try to be approachable. Smile, give them sincere compliments and make light-hearted jokes if you can. Match the pace of your nods to the beat they are speaking at.

End the interview by thanking them. An easy way to end an interview with a celebrity is to say something along the lines of, “Unfortunately that’s all the time we have. It was such a pleasure talking to you. Thanks for making the time.” Try to show your appreciation and don't run over the time limit.

Send the celebrity a formal thank you. You can send them an email, but the best way is always a letter. If you can, send a nice thank you gift, like flowers or a bottle of wine, along with it.