Behind the scenes: Katharine McPhee

We're making a tangible effort at andPOP to blog about every interview we do so after you read the profile of the artist we interviewed or watch the interview if we tape it, you can come to the blog and read a "behind the scenes" account of how the interview came together.

The number one question I have been asked since I started the site in August of 2000 (with Mike Levine) is "how do you get those interviews." The other is "who is the biggest asshole you've ever interviewed?" Hopefully, with these blog postings, those questions will be answered.

So we begin with Katharine McPhee, last year's American Idol runner-up who releases her debut album on Tuesday.

I was out interviewing Steven Seagal (an interview you can watch sometime in the next two weeks) and got back around 3 p.m. I checked my email to find out that there was a last minute opportunity to interview Katharine McPhee, and she was starting her phone interviews at 3 p.m. This was truly the first real, literal, "last minute" opportunity I have been apart of.

So I called the talented publicity manager up to see if we could still do it and was given the time of 5 p.m., which soon changed to 6 p.m., which came back down to 5:30 p.m.

Katharine was very open about everything I asked, from the sexy album cover to her battles with bulimia. She explained that she's always been an open person, so she didn't want to change that just because she became a celebrity.

She had already done several interviews going in-depth about going through an eating disorder so I didn't want that to be the focus. Difficult as it is to discuss, it's even tougher to talk about when you're given 15 minutes on the phone. Instead, we spent most of the time talking about the album.

For my first "behind the scenes" blog posting, I wish I could say that I got into a heated debate with Katharine or that she hung up the phone in a huff or that she said she wanted to beat up another former Idol, but this interview went pretty straight forward. She's quite the talent; should be interesting to see how her album does on the charts. The only successful runner-up has been Clay and his star is fading so it will also be interesting to see if she can remain in the public eye long enough to release another few albums.

The Raptors went on to beat the Celtics that night, much like they just did tonight, so it was a pretty good day.