How to Interview a Hollywood Actor at a Press Junket
West Coast Media Jobs' Mallory Carra gives you advice on how to make the most of your five-minute brush with fame.
As an entertainment editor at Bustle for five years, Mallory Carra covered press junkets, red carpets, set visits, parties and all the usual Hollywood events.
Now a freelance journalist and podcast producer, she spends most of her time teaching journalism at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. She also runs West Coast Media Jobs.
She talked with us about how to interview an actor or actress at a press junket.
What is a Hollywood press junket?
A Hollywood press junket is a big publicity event where the press gets access to interview a film or TV show's stars and the studios engage with media outlets to promote the film or TV show, usually a few weeks before its release. The interviews are often embargoed — meaning, they can't be published until a certain date, usually closer to the release date. This is why so many interviews and news stories drop right before a film releases; the interviews often come from the junket.
Junkets can be on-camera or “print/text” ones. They are usually held at hotels (like the Four Seasons), where the celebrities — and sometimes the writer(s) and director as well — will be in separate hotel rooms, flanked by publicists, and they give interviews all day and sometimes for multiple days. On-camera junkets essentially look like all the clips you see go viral, like the recent "holding space" one from the “Wicked” junket. Most of the time, you have five minutes with talent. For text/print junkets, you have about five to 10 minutes, but there are no bright lights or cameras. Sometimes it's just you, the talent, and the publicist. Sometimes, it's a roundtable of reporters and the talent. Some junket interviews are also done via phone.
How, specifically, do you get invited to a press junket?
In Hollywood and entertainment reporting everything goes through publicists and the publicity departments issue the invites. A lot of the invites I've gotten were passed along from my editors, because I was the L.A.-based entertainment editor and the rest of them were in New York City. Some came to me after I had done a lot of celebrity interviews over the phone. When I first started in entertainment, I worked a lot with PR folks for one-on-one phone interviews with '90s TV stars, “The Voice” singers and “The Bachelor” contestants. From these interviews, publicists got to know my work and what I covered, resulting in invites for more interviews and eventually, junkets.
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How do you make your brief time with the stars of a movie count during a junket?
Planning, planning, planning. Before every junket I went to, I'd attend an advance screening of the movie or watch the TV episode screeners. Then, I'd meet with either the TV or the Movies editor, along with the head Entertainment editor to brainstorm a plan for the junket. For on-camera junkets, we had to submit a general idea of what I'd ask or what kind of game we'd play (on-camera junkets usually involve games, because, again, you have only 5 minutes; might as well make it fun!). Examples of games I've done are "Finish the Disney Lyric" at “The Lion King” (2019) junket and "Rewriting Famous Speeches" at “The Long Shot” junket; Publicists needed to approve that ahead of time. We'd submit one or two ideas to the publicists to see what makes it through.
For text junkets, it's a little less strict; those are usually just interviews, generally no games or submitting topics in advance, but I did submit my questions to my editors ahead of time. They often added or adjusted questions and helped me prioritize what we needed the most for stories in the works and what our audience was interested in.
For both mediums, when I'm in the interview, I'm listening to what's being said, but I'm also constantly checking the time and making sure I'm getting everything I need in that short time.
What are some pitfalls to doing a press junket interview?
They're so quick and short! In my experience, it's hard to get an in-depth interview and it's good to go into the interviews with that expectation — typically, you'll only scratch the surface. Sometimes you get lucky and get a profound soundbite, but they're rare. You also need to keep your questions on the approved topic or game. The on-camera junket rooms are filled with publicists knowing what was approved.
There's also a ton of waiting. You'll be sitting or standing in the hotel hallways for a bit. It actually works in your favor, because you'll have time to tweak questions, regroup, and check in with your editor while you wait for your next interview.
Any other tips?
My editors gave me this advice before my first on-camera junket and I still stand by it: Put your questions on index cards! They look better on camera and are easier to handle than a piece of paper or holding your phone.
For text/print junkets, bring a backup recorder and don't just depend on your phone or one recorder. During an interview with the star of a popular streaming TV show, my phone's Voice Memo app crashed and, because I only had 5-7 minutes, there was no time to fix it. Luckily, I also had my backup digital recorder running, so I was able to continue with the interview and not miss a beat.
Find Mallory at her Substack and LinkedIn.