[John_Dory]

"I loved in when I did that [Big Weekend] the last time, it was in Cardiff... no... Wales..."

Stupid bint.

[Nicola_Red]

She is Cheryl Cole. Were any of you really expecting a thought provoking, fast paced interview?? She probably pre-recorded the generic answers she gave on tape and mimed.

Like Gareth Gates used to do for the speaking inbetween songs in his live shows

[dimtimjim]

G-g-g-g-g-g-g-gareth G-g-g-g-g-g-g-g-gates, y'mean....

[Yudster]

She is Cheryl Cole. Were any of you really expecting a thought provoking, fast paced interview?? She probably pre-recorded the generic answers she gave on tape and mimed.

Like Gareth Gates used to do for the speaking inbetween songs in his live shows

At least he had a legitimate reason to do that.

[MK Chris]

MadTheEddos - you have a brilliant avatar.

[MadTheEddos]

Thank you! He's my hero. The shot of Mr Bean at the Indian GP is rather epic too.

She is Cheryl Cole. Were any of you really expecting a thought provoking, fast paced interview?? She probably pre-recorded the generic answers she gave on tape and mimed.

Like Gareth Gates used to do for the speaking inbetween songs in his live shows

At least he had a legitimate reason to do that.

From what I understand he got the stammer cured(I say I understand cos I've never paid any attention to him - just going by what I've heard). In which case that was a bad move, since it was his defining feature.
I've always preferred Bo' Selecta Gareth Gates to the real one anyway - especially the version where he has Shouting Out Disease.

[dimtimjim]

Ok, I'd missed cheryl interview, but now heard it dunno why peeps would be moaning, I thougth it was a good interview - she seemed happy and comfortable.


And yes, big-up Ayrton.

[chrysostom]

I listened to it yesterday and thought it was a good interview too - her dismissing of the question actually gave away some of her feelings towards Cowell at the time, while hinting that things have been partially amended. How much more did you expect?

Given the tone of the interview, I certainly didn't think it was 'poorly handled'. Cheryl's been much frostier in a majority of her interviews.

[dimtimjim]

I thought the Cowel querstions were handled perfectly, what more could she say/would she want to say.

I'd guess it worked around her calling him spineless and him conceding and offering a cheque to ease the pain...

[Emmy]

What did people think of the Matt Le Blanc interview today? Having seen him on Graham Norton last Friday and then heard him again on Richard Bacon's show on 5Live this afternoon (I'm not a massive fan of his or anything, I happen to always watch/listen to those shows) I thought that this morning's interview was very poor in comparison. Whilst he did come across as a very laidback guy on all three shows, he appeared to be really enjoying himself on GN (which he confirmed in the 5Live show) and RB asked him a lot of good questions (including a couple of original ones about his time in Friends) to which he gave some interesting answers.

But yet again, as is often the case with Chris and guests, Chris seemed to have made a minimal effort in preparing for his interview aside from watching the first series of Episodes. Remember the days when they used to spend a bit of time preparing for interviews on air, tossing around ideas and asking people to text in questions, which they did then actually use? Lately, it's as if Chris and everyone else has totally forgotten that a guest is coming in until that morning, with seemingly no time spent coming up with decent questions/any real questions at all, or finding out some lesser known information about the guest that they could use etc.

As shown with today's interview, Chris is usually content to let it just meander along, going nowhere, with Matt spending most of time the explaining how he does nothing and giving us the big exclusive news that he has to listen to mainly Christmas music on the school run.

As I've said before, I really don't expect Paxman-like interviews from Chris, but for me the standard of them in general really does seem to have slipped a lot in the last few years. If they're going to bother to book guests, then it would be nice to put a tiny bit of effort into their interviews.

It's a pity the Matt walk-out gag didn't come off, at least that would have made this morning's one ever so slightly less dull.

[Travis Bickle]

Excellent post Emmy.

The Le Blanc 'interview' was OK, but Moyles, yet again, just flogged a good idea to death with the Le Blanc 'does nothing' theme. He should have moved on from it way earlier than he did. I missed the final few minutes of the interview so I don't know how it ended.

You are right about the lack of preparation as well. That was particularly evident during the Danny O'Donoghue interview last week. All Moyles had to do was catch up on - I think- three shows and he couldn't be bothered to do it. Instead we had to put up with him disrespecting his guest by doing no preparation and just wanging on about a phase of the show that was history and irrelevant by then. It was so poor I turned the radio off.

There is very little preparation on the show any more and the show just meanders with features used as and when they feel like it. I do feel that the production team need to take some blame for this though. Not just the interviews, but the show as a whole has very little prep involved in it any more and just wanders along aimlessly irrespective of whether it is entertaining or not.

Last week there was an appalling show with no features and there was a point where Dave was trying to work out what ready meal Chris had and it was so utterly boring Aled, in fairness, tried to move it along and Chris just overruled him and pretty much said he doesn't care what critics think.

Today's show was the best since the return from holiday in my opinion, but as a whole the show is in the worst rut that I have known.

[bmstinton93]

You 2 should definitely hook up.

[English Bob]

I'm afraid I have to agree about the guest interviews slipping in quality. Considering Chris has so much free time, why is it so hard to do some simple preparation for interviews? Seriously, just use google and jot some things down on a notepad, then ASK decent questions!

I know I've probably mentioned it before, but I'm a fan of podcasts, two networks in particular, Nerdist and Smodcast. I've been listening to Nerdist a lot lately, and they have the most amazing guests on, and the interviews are (largely) brilliant! The host, Chris Hardwick, actually asks interesting questions to get the ball rolling, and then the interview develops from there. All you need is some good questions to get the guest to open up a bit!

If you ask dull questions, you don't give the guest anywhere to go.

/startshamelessplug

I'd urge everyone to go listen to some podcasts from www.smodcast.com and www.nerdist.com and let me know what you think

/endshamelessplug

[Emmy]

You 2 should definitely hook up.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but haven't you suggested this before? Don't worry, if it does happen, we won't forget to send you your invitation to come and watch.

[Travis Bickle]

After the Le Blanc interview Chris seemed to try to justify it against any criticism by implying that it was almost an exploratory interview and we will reap the benefits of it the second and third time he returns. "That is what we do with our guests" he said.

Well, what about today? We want a decent interview today, not a pay off in a couple of years time when you have managed to work a bit of chemistry into it.

[SAV1OUR]

I downloaded the Kevin Bridges show the other day cos it hadn't been clipped, and I've realised that although Chris is no grand questioner, he tends to just have a chat with them first as though they've met at the bar over some pork scratchings.

Bridges came across well but the accent was tricky for my ears, I was surprised by how lively it all was though, Chris either gets off to a flyer or doesn't, and if this interview wasn't fantastic then I reckon the next one could be.

No need for a short memory though, wasn't that long ago he played a blinder with John Cleese and Michael Caine.

So it varies, depends on stature of guest, not just wow factor.

[The Deadly]

Matt LeBlanc is like that with everyone who interviews him so it isn't Chris' fault.

[bmstinton93]

You 2 should definitely hook up.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but haven't you suggested this before? Don't worry, if it does happen, we won't forget to send you your invitation to come and watch.

I have. I see myself as the Paddy McGuiness of cm.net.

[Emmy]

Matt LeBlanc is like that with everyone who interviews him so it isn't Chris' fault.

Well no, he wasn't like that with Norton and Bacon, that was my point. The main difference being that they actually got him to answer a number of questions which gave the viewer or listener new information about him. That's the usual purpose of a interview, with the interviewer having the responsibility of drawing the information of the interviewee. I came away from listening to both of those interviews thinking that he came across as a decent, funny guy who had something to say for himself. Where as if I had only heard him on the Moyles show I think I would have been left with the impression that he was very like his old Friends character; nice and harmless, but not exactly the sharpest tool in the box.

[John_Dory]

Chris was the interviewer? He talked about himself so much, I thought he was the interviewee.

[MK Chris]

I see myself as the Paddy McGuiness of cm.net.

Relying on someone else's humour to be seen as funny?

[bmstinton93]

Toph 2 - 2 Ben

[MK Chris]

...you were on -2 by the way.

[bmstinton93]

Bollocks.

[DarroM]

I have to agree with what Travis and Emmy said. I didn't watch last week's Graham Norton but I remember when he was on it last time promoting the first series of Episodes and he seemed dead on even though he was laidback! The interview yesterday was absolutely dull as hell and just went nowhere since they just ran the whole nothing theme to the ground. The interviews Chris does do range from entertaining and informative etc to amazingly dull and this one was on the latter side of the spectrum. I wasn't really paying full attention to the interview but I know Chris asked for questions and did they use any to ask Matt with or not? As I know this has been the case before and I am sure some of the questions the audience had were a lot more interesting than what was currently going on!

I think the show has been pretty good since coming back because I was getting bored with it leading into the holidays and hardly laughed at anything on the shows.