For the very first time in my career as a writer/journalist, I actually got to ask a subject about his hobbies, favourite movies, likes and pet peeves.
I've done profile articles before, but somehow they have been serious pieces, focussing on the subject's educational background and career performance, not just him as an individual.
The piece is for a corporate newsletter of a multinational company, and they want to give readers a glimpse into the private lives of key employees.
The main benefit of this kind of interview is that the subject does not feel threatened , and is more chatty, making it very easy for me to gather the copy I needed to write the article.
We had a nice session playing "name the movie" - he couldn't remember the title of a movie he'd loved best. He could recall specific scenes, and the theme, but not the title or the stars.
Lucky for him my mind retains truckloads of useless bits of information, so he could name the scene and I'd recall the stars and use that track back to the movie title.
I wouldn't want to do this type of interview every working day, because I also love delving into difficult issues and asking some tough questions. But I enjoyed the change of pace.
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