A skilled interviewer
- 5 Oct 07, 01:35 PM
Excellent news about the Nick Clarke award for interviewing - absolutely appropriate. Nick had a great many talents, but if you had to pick one I'm sure most would go for his skill as an interviewer.
Described variously as cool, courteous, measured and/or forensic, his approach grew from the belief that his role was to find something out. He then, of course, had the charm and intelligence to pursue this relentlessly.
As a producer on The World At One or The World This Weekend you knew that when you told him you'd fixed x or y to be interviewed, he'd immediately ask why, what could they add to our understanding of a particular story?
Yesterday some of us were thinking back over the years of interviews. Lots of personal favourites, but everyone at some stage mentioned those during the period of Hutton and his report. As an example of keeping a firm grip on intellectual inquiry in the midst of heightened emotions and internal turmoil it stands as one of Nick's finest achievements.
Colin Hancock edits The World at One and The World This Weekend
