Haruka curled up in her futon for over ten minutes.
After the dangerous thought ‘Mizutagawa Ritsu seems pretty handsome’ was completely locked away in the mental prison, she suddenly realized—in a few hours, she would be facing the first job of her idol career.
This afternoon’s magazine interview.
She sat down at the edge of the bed and began to think about it seriously.
She certainly knew what a magazine interview was.
Or rather, the idea of an idol doing a magazine interview was basic common sense.
She had read Haruka’s magazines countless times—bought the physical copies, flipped through e-versions online, and even collected a few scanned images.
Those beautiful photos and carefully crafted text interviews were part of her daily fan diet.
But knowing and understanding are two different things.
Just like she knew idols held live concerts to sing and dance but didn’t understand the costs and processes behind a single performance; she knew idols did magazine interviews but had no clue how the whole thing actually operated.
What’s the procedure for a magazine interview? What do you do first when you arrive?
Do you take photos first or do the interview?
Do you sit or stand during the interview?
What kind of questions does the reporter ask?
Is there a list of questions in advance?
Are there any taboos in answering?
How much of the content gets published and how much gets cut?
She had no idea about any of this.
Before, as a fan, she only saw the finished product—four or five beautifully laid-out pages in a magazine, accompanied by nice photos and text.
Like someone eating at a restaurant only sees the dish served, not what happens in the kitchen.
But now she had to go into the kitchen and cook.
Not only did she have to cook this dish herself, she had to do it without knowing where the stove switch was or how to adjust the heat, and still produce a banquet that would make everyone slap their thighs and shout, “Yes, that’s the flavor!”
What could she do? She had to learn on the fly.
So she picked up her phone, opened the browser, and typed a line into the search bar—”How to do an idol magazine interview.”
After thinking it over, she deleted that and changed it to “Full magazine interview process,” then deleted that too.
She did this because, just in case someone checked her search history one day—
“Wait, I almost forgot the browser has incognito mode…”
Haruka felt stupid about herself.
Finally, she blamed it on something else: “…Love brain is really bad.”
Then she typed these words, separated by spaces: “artist magazine interview process”
A ton of search results popped up.
There were industry educational articles, anonymous posts from managers, excerpts from former idols’ memoirs, and a few YouTube videos with titles like “[Exclusive Coverage]A Day Following a Popular Idol’s Magazine Shoot!” and so on.
She clicked on one of them.
It was written in great detail, with an educational article that included firsthand accounts from several artists.
She started reading, and the more she read, the more nervous she got.
So magazine interviews weren’t as simple as “sit down, have a chat, take a couple of photos.”
The general process went like this: first, before the interview date, the magazine’s editor would coordinate with the agency (usually the manager) in advance.
This stage set the tone for the entire interview: the shooting theme, clothing style, interview direction, and a list of “absolutely don’t ask” topics.
Then came the interview day.
After arriving at the magazine’s office or the outdoor location, the artist didn’t just sit down and start talking.
The first thing was to change hairstyle and makeup.
The time for this step depended on the shoot’s theme and complexity, ranging from forty minutes to an hour and a half.
During that time, the stylist worked on the artist according to the prearranged plan, and the photographer did final checks on lighting and composition with the editor.
Next came the clothing confirmation.
Usually two or three outfits were prepared, and the makeup artist or manager would decide which one to wear on the spot.
Some magazines provided outfits from brand sponsors, while others required the artist to bring their own or have the agency prepare them.
Then came the actual shooting session.
The order of shooting and interview wasn’t fixed.
Some magazines shot first and talked later, some talked first and shot later, and some mixed them.
But the mainstream approach was to shoot first and talk later, because shooting required the makeup to be in perfect condition, and the interview process could mess it up.
The shooting time also varied by theme.
For a set of six to eight final photos, the actual number of shots might be three hundred to five hundred—the photographer kept adjusting angles, lighting, and composition, then picked the best few from hundreds.
When Haruka saw “hundreds of photos,” she found it terrifying.
That meant she had to maintain her performance mode in front of the camera for at least an hour or two, constantly smiling, changing expressions, adjusting poses, and following instructions to make every shot look natural and non-repetitive.
That wasn’t the end.
She had only read halfway through the educational article.
After shooting, it was finally time for the interview.
The interview was usually conducted by the magazine’s editor or a full-time reporter.
It lasted between thirty minutes and an hour.
The questions revolved around the prearranged direction, but the specific wording and follow-ups were unpredictable.
The article also included an interview record with an anonymous artist—in which that anonymous artist said that even if they had seen the list of questions the manager had provided in advance, when it came time for the actual interview, the reporters always asked some off-list questions that required improvisation.
Some questions were so baffling that they made no sense, and they even brought up private matters that shouldn’t be discussed.
“Ugh… using an interview to reveal the secrets of interviews—could it be that even this article was improvised?”
Haruka scrolled back to the top, saw the author’s name was an editor from some magazine, and realized that this “educational piece” she was reading was itself an interview article from a magazine.
“Well, at least the explanation was pretty detailed.”
Despite her complaints, after reading so much, she did understand a few things.
The text of an interview couldn’t be printed verbatim.
Since interviews lasted at least an hour or two, there had to be selection, refinement, and polishing.
That unnamed artist also said they had to think carefully before speaking to avoid any ambiguity; otherwise, being taken out of context and getting roasted online would be miserable.
When she read that line, Haruka’s mind once again recalled a certain plot from that anime—how the production team, for the sake of buzz, traffic, and heat, deliberately spliced together two clips of a conflict between people on a dating show, but cut out the reconciliation clip, nearly causing an online firestorm and a suicide incident.
So out of nowhere, her brain constructed this scenario: the reporter first smiled and asked, “Does Miss Hoshino like strawberries?”
She answered, “Yes! I love them!”
Then the reporter changed tack: “There are rumors that you’re dating your manager. Do you like him?” She waved her hands frantically: “Absolutely not! I don’t like him!”
…Finally, when the written interview was published, the headline read: Exclusive! Hoshino Haruka Passionate Confession: I Love My Manager So Much! Especially!
No, no, why am I thinking about him again? Skip it! It’s working hours now.
The last few paragraphs of the article were about avoiding sensitive and overly explicit topics, maintaining a good attitude, and similar notes—basically nothing substantial, just basic principles.
After reading them, Haruka put down her phone and took a deep breath.
Well, it was a bit more complicated than she had imagined.
But at least she had read through the whole thing carefully, so she wasn’t completely clueless.
She now knew the basic flow: hairstyle and makeup, clothing confirmation, shooting, interview.
Just follow the steps.
The problem was—
During the shooting and interview, she had to maintain not just “procedural correctness” but the fact that she was Hoshino Haruka.
When Matsumoto Hidetoshi faced a camera, he basically just had a “blank stare + no idea where to look.”
He’d been teased many times for having zero sense of the camera.
And as far as she knew, the original Haruka was famous for her “natural camera sense.
” He was at a loss for words—he didn’t know what “camera sense” meant or how to describe it, but he knew that “feeling”—the moment Haruka was on camera, she just “lit up.”
Sometimes the photos from the camera looked even better than she did in person.
Also, during the interview, reporters would ask various questions.
Although most could be prepared with a script in advance, some were always on-the-spot follow-ups that required improvisation.
That meant she had to answer using Haruka’s language habits, Haruka’s way of thinking, and avoid saying anything wrong about any detail concerning “Haruka’s past.”
In other words, she needed a reference sample—to know how Haruka did interviews.
So what then? Keep learning on the fly.
She picked up her phone again and searched for something else:
“Hoshino Haruka interview”