I like to say I have the best job in the world. I work for a few hours a day and that work consists of interviewing celebrities. For the most part it is a fun job, but sometimes it can be stressful. I work for a small station, Orange County TV. At the 2007 Emmy's, we were electronic crew number 127 out of 128. Second to last, people! Do you think every big celebrity made it through 128 crews? Um, no. The big stars made it through about 20 crews at the most.
There is a clear order to a red carpet press line. Entertainment Tonight always has the first spot. If they are not first, they will not cover an event. Second is always Access Hollywood, followed by E! and Extra. The rest is up for grabs depending on who covers the event. Usually next in line is the Associated Press, CNN, whoever the house crew is, some of the magazines such as People or Us Weekly, and then the rest of the crews.
I often wonder how the publicists decide how to order the crews. Sometimes my station will be towards the front of the line, and other times we will be second to last. Some publicists like to say they choose the order according to numbers, such as how many hits a website gets or the circulation of a magazine. But this isn't always the case, because I know for a fact that the company I work for has a better viewing than some other stations out there who have been ahead of us. Snap!
Of course, politics are always involved. If you are in good with a publicity company or studio, you will get better placement on the line. Since Orange County TV has a relationship with Disney (Anaheim, California, where you at?!?) we often get pretty good spots on the line for their premieres. I remember at the Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest premiere, we were almost last on the line mixed in between foreign press crews and websites I have never heard of. I thought this was unfair since we do so much for Disney, (Anaheim, California, where you at?!?) I talked to the publicist and we were moved up to the middle of the line. It's all about the publicists.
They hold the key to everything. I have a very good relationship with Will Smith's publicist. She will always make sure to bring Will Smith to me no matter where I am on the line. So yes, like everything else, it's a lot about who you know. If you go to octv.com and watch the piece we cut from the "Charlie Wilson's War" premiere, something may stand out to you. The only big name we interviewed from that movie was Tom Hanks, because he made it a point to give me an interview. Julia Roberts and Mike Nichols didn't care to talk to the third to last crew on the line.
So what do you do when you are at an event and don't know anybody's publicist and are at the end of the line? You scream. And pray. Then you go back to screaming. It's a sophisticated affair, let me tell you. You also try to make the celebs feel guilty into giving you an interview. I recently worked the premiere of 27 Dresses. The star of the film, Katherine Heigl, showed up very late and only did press for the first few crews. As she was running by the other 40 crews waiting to interview her, my friend who works for WireImage and who was conveniently standing next to me yelled out "Please Katherine! The star of the film! One question!" Katherine Heigl stopped, about 6 crews stuck their microphones in together and she gave us the answer to one question. Thank God because if she hadn't given us a soundbite, we would have had to cut a piece together with quotes from the only other person we interviewed...a 9 year old who played the young version of Katherine's character. Yeah, she was cute, but "cute" doesn't help when you're digging for soundbites.
My cameraman has also become very clever with getting celebrities attention on the carpet even if it just a shot for b-roll. He once yelled to Stacy Keibler "I love your cookies!" She didn't stop for an interview but at least we got a great shot of her smiling and looking right into our camera. He's told T.R. Knight he had nice shoes, Snoop Dogg that we were shooting for BET, and yelled to almost every woman who walks by "Oh yeahhhh! Wow!" None of these people ever planned on stopping for an interview but at least they made eye contact with my camera and laughed or waved. Point being, we got a shot.
I also think it's funny how most of the time, celebrities will spend 5 minutes talking to crews such as Entertainment Tonight, who will always ask personal questions they don't want to answer, dumb questions like "So was that really your butt in the movie???" and then run 5-10 seconds of that interview on air.
Most of the other crews on the line are there for the reason they are supposed to be there... to publicize the event! Some celebs get it right: if they don't have time to stop one on one for everyone, they will at least group stations together and give a soundbite to everyone. Hilary Swank recently did this at the premiere for P.S. I Love You. Every crew walked away with something they could use from her. I don't think publicists understand how grateful a small station is for that. The media gets their soundbite, the publicists get their client out there, the event gets promoted, and everyone is happy. When that doesn't happen, you have to cut together a piece like we did for Enchanted. (Exhibit A. We work with what we get.)
Orange County TV puts together amazing pieces on the movies, events, and charities we cover. It would benefit the celebs to give us an interview because we would actually run their quotes. If you go to octv.com and watch any of the pieces we have put together, you may actually learn something about a charity or movie that you didn't know before as opposed to who's dating who and what they think about the latest scandal. OCTV may be a small fish in a big sea, but sometimes it's those small websites or channels that fight the hardest to give you the most interesting information.