Assignment 1 - Section 1: Purposes of interviews

There is a range of different ways to conduct an interview, this links with the type of style the interview is. From the style of an interview the purpose is completely different for example an entertainment related interview can be for promotional reasons such as promoting the celebrity, album, film etc. This is completely different to a political interview, the aim of this is to gain information from the interview on a more serious and informational level.

One interview style is an informational interview. The interview between Russell brand and Paxman is a political context. The whole purpose of the interview between Russell Brand and Paxman is to gain information as well as listen to his opinion about him featuring in a political article. Starting with an open question, Paxman is allowing Russell Brand to explain himself about the political magazine. By doing this Paxman is hearing out Russell Brands opinion about politics and his political ideas for change. From the interview between Russell brand and Paxman, you can see how Paxman questions Brand about the article, by Paxman’s tone of voice and posture he is creating a comfortable feel throughout the interview as Brand is not a politician but is talking about politics from his point of view. Paxman approaching the interview in a different way rather than he usually would when interviewing politician’s shows the audience how layer back he is about this interview. The interview helps promote Russell Brand and his article in a political magazine the 'NewStateman' about his views on the government today. From Paxman's view on the points Russell Brand is stating, Paxman believes what he is saying is a 'revolution'. By listening to the podcast of 'the art of the interview' it has allowed me to understand the different techniques in an interview, from this interview Paxman uses the rule of three, asking a direct question to Russell Brand continuously until Brand gets frustrated and answers the question, this is a very good way to make the interviewee feel pressured into answering the question in this style of interviewing. The median that this interview would be on is TV 'BBC Newsnight', from this it would then be distributed to YouTube, BBC website etc. to be viewed again by the public. 

Another interview style is entertainment, an example of an entertainment style show is 'Alan Carr chatty man' which is an interview based show where Alan Carr invites celebrities onto his show and talks to them about their personal and work life but in an entertainment format. In this interview Alan Carr is interviewing Taylor Swift a celebrity/ music artist. In this Alan Carr is interviewing Swift about her personal life as well as her career. This is providing her fans and the audience on the show an insight on Taylor Swift and her life. As Alan Carr is also a comedian, he brings that to his interviews in order to make the interviewee feel very comfortable whilst on the show, by doing this Alan Carr would offer his guests alcohol before he begins with the interview, this creates a friendly bond between the interviewer and the interviewee, in addition to this Carr would also give a gift to some of his guests this then creates a friendship between the two which is what he wants.  The reason why Taylor Swift is also on the Chatty Man show is to promote her as well as any albums or upcoming work she is doing, she is promoting herself to the UK audience in order to gain more publicity in different countries. From the techniques I've learnt from the podcast, Alan Carr has scripted his interview and planned it well as he provides Swift with her favourite cider drink in the UK as well as gives her a painting about cats which he knows it is what she likes, all of this was to. The median of this interview is firstly aired on TV 'Channel 4' in October 2014, after this it then streamed online such as YouTube.

Here is an emotional interview of Paul Walkers brother. Paul Walker was a famous American actor who died on November 30^th 2013 in a car accident. In this interview Paul Walkers brother talks about the greatness of his brother, the interview is about his brother talking about the organisation 'reach out worldwide' which Paul Walker created before his death, this interview is also promoting the organisation which is beneficial. This was a very hard interview for Paul Walkers brother as he has just lost his brother and talking about the great things he has done in life is what he is promoting and wants everyone to know he has helped the organisation. The questions she was asking where very open, this allowed Paul Walkers brother to  talk very openly about his brother and allowed him to say whatever he wanted which was letting the audience know what kind of a person he was behind the cameras.  The interviewer approached the questions in a very calm and supportive way as she knows it is a soft topic she does not want to approach the interview in a rude way. Towards the end of the interview she gives he condolences, this is to show she is supporting him and his family with their loss. The median of this interview was on TV 'Fox News' which then streamed online to YouTube.