Anthony Mason on Alchemy and the Art of the Interview

There are interviewers who ask questions, and then there are interviewers who understand that the question is only a doorway to something bigger.Anthony Mason has spent decades walking through those doorways for CBS News, sitting across from presidents, artists, musicians, actors, writers, and people who have lived right up next to history’s major events. But for many of us, Mason’s work has been especially meaningful in the world of music. His conversations with artists like Bruce Springsteen, Aretha Franklin, Dolly Parton, Paul Simon and so many others have never felt like celebrity check-ins. They come across as attempts to understand something a little deeper.That same spirit is at the center of his new series, Alchemy with Anthony Mason, a long-form interview program filmed in his New York living room. The fact that we find ourselves in Mason’s apartment is meaningful. This is not a desk, not a studio, not the usual promotional network machine. It is a room built for deeper conversation. It’s an opportunity for an artist to think out loud and maybe find some unexpected answers.The real subject of Alchemy isn’t fame; it’s transformation: how artists keep working when the world has already decided what they are supposed to represent.In this conversation, I wanted to talk with Anthony Mason not only about the people he has interviewed, but about the act of interviewing itself. How do you create trust? How do you move past the polished answer? How do you ask a question that gives someone room to discover what they really think?From one interviewer to another, this was a treasured chance to speak with someone who has practiced the craft at the highest level and who still seems deeply curious about the magic that can happen when two people sit down and really listen to one another.