The 8 people I'd most like to interview
In my "other" life as a broadcast journalist / TV personality, one of the questions I get asked the most is who in history I'd most like to interview. My colleagues and I also bounce this gem off each other every now and then and try to come up with the most impressive roster.
I've always appreciated people who go about life or do what they do while they walk this earth with great passion and great conviction. And in some way, no matter how minute, managed to change the world. Even if I, the moral majority, or the American legal system doesn't necessarily agree with their way of life, I've always wanted to sit down individually with a select group of people I've pegged as being those who've lived lives so extraordinary, others would like to hear of their experiences. It's my job as a storyteller to channel such information, so I've kept several people keenly and unwaveringly in mind.
So for all of you who've e-mailed me over the years, here goes:
- Joe Montana - the only person in my life who I've considered a hero. When I was a teen watching the San Francisco 49ers, he was a living god. People in their 50's have Mickey Mantle, I have Joe. The man could fall down the stairs and would be better and more graceful than anyone else at it.
- Jenna Jameson - quickly and tragically dismissed by the masses because of the moral implications of her infamy in adult entertainment, Jenna J is actually engaging, coherent, a savvy businessperson and a giant in her industry. Who can't respect that?
- Tupac Shakur - he redefined music and poetry. He was my generation's Jim Morrison. And his legend, as is true with the Lizard King, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, John Lennon, Bob Marley and Kurt Cobain is that much larger, having been taken from us too early.
- Bill Gates - to say that I sat down and chatted with the world's richest man would be something I'd carry with me happily forever. "Oops…sorry Bill, did I drop some papers? Can you pick those up, please? Oh, silly me, that's my resume…"
- Adolf Hitler - too often in the media we're matched up with interview subjects that we naturally gel with. I'd like to objectively interview someone whose belief system is the polar opposite of my own.
- Kirk Hammett of Metallica - in countless ways, his art has done so much for my own career.
- Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails - with apologies to Steve Jobs, NIN single-handedly saved Apple.
- Stephen Hawking - if he explained himself in a way in which I could even remotely grasp a fifth of his theories on astrophysics, such would be a testament to just how smart the man is.