The answer is author-specific. If the approach works as a way to get your creativity flowing and to get you thinking about your characters in a productive way, then go for it. I certainly wouldn't include the "interview" in the story.
If I have nothing else to write, I usually write down questionnaires. I did a few interviews back when I was younger (grade five or something), but they weren't serious interviews, so nothing came out of it. I'm starting to reconsider interviews though. Since I'm suffering from creative drought, I can't really write anything except questionnaires and even essays D:
People often need mental models to understand complex things, and my mental model for understanding my characters is that they're, well, _characters_. People, with personalities. No, they aren't really, they're really just figments of my imagination, but I can't say, "You're just a figment of my imagination! Do something interesting!" and have something interesting happen. Yes, in theory I could say, "What would be interesting? Ah, yes, that. And what kind of personality would do that? Yes, traits X, Y, and Z would work. And perhaps just a little of trait Q. And how would those traits affect the actions that I've already decided would be interesting later? Oh, yes, I'll need trait K, modified a bit by trait N. OK, I'm ready to write now." Doesn't work. Not for _me_; maybe it works for you. I need a mental model where I pretend that my character is an actual person. And to get to know that person, I need to run them through their paces. The exciting event that I've planned for the "onstage" part of my story may not be what I need to flesh out that mental model; I may need for them to do something altogether different, so that I can watch them (yes, yes, I know that I'm making them do everything; my _model_ is that I'm watching them do it) and see how they act, and learn more about them. As another way of looking at it, look at your dreams. You create your dreams; you make every single character and object be and do what it does. But you're not usually aware that you're doing so, right? When you enter a dream, you don't usually start with a blank slate and then tell yourself, "Ok, now I want to dream about college, and I'd like to dream about going to an exam in a class that I forgot to attend all semester. Now, let's start drawing the cobblestones of the quad..." No, usually the dream appears to make itself. OK, this is going to get weirder: Expanding on that, I quite often have dreams where I know that I'm dreaming--I have since I was a child. And, of course, knowing that I'm dreaming means knowing that I create the dream, in every last detail. So that in theory, I can change the dream, in every last detail, and dream whatever I want. When I was a child, that knowledge was incomplete, so my 'editing' of the dream was the lightest of touches - I might think, "Hey, it'd be cool of this book were candy," and I'd eat a page of the book, and it would taste good. Or I'd just romp around the dream, secure in the knowledge that I could do whatever I pleased with no consequences. That worked really well for me; those dreams were delightful. As an adult, my knowledge that I'm creating the dream is more complete, and I find myself trying to edit the dream in detail. I'll try to make a sunny sky, or edit the power poles out of the landscape because I want a medieval plot, or change what I'm wearing, or something of the sort. And it rarely works--I'll make all the light poles vanish, and when I turn around, they're back again. Those dreams are generally very frustrating. My fully conscious editing of an imaginary world is unsatisfactory, because apparently fully conscious creativity simply doesn't work for me. For _me_, and presumably for many other people, creating an imaginary world requires a mindset where a part of my mind believes that that world is real. (Edited to add: But I _can't_ get my bleeping dream-self to remember that and stop meddling!) ChickenFreak Edited to add: That doesn't mean that I do character interviews, aside from my recent experiment down in the Review Room - which actually turned out to be very useful, because it's the first time I've ever seen Henry angry, and I've been wondering what his not-so-supportive, not-so-compassionate side looks like. But I do other things where I pretend that my characters are real people.
That's a great idea--there is always more to learn. I agree with chickenfreak. I did something like an interview with a couple of my characters--where she just talked and I picked up all the details in a stream-of-consciousness style of monologue. Of course I've changed some of the things that I originally recorded. We do create the characters, but it isn't solely the conscious mind's doing.
its interesting concept and i might have a go at it. only i wouldnt have a clue where to start and although i can imagine it being alot of fun making my characters interveiw themselves. sometimes i think of something about my characters but then i realise thats not like them and so thats the only thing id be worried about with this; because id run away with myself and would see a character which isnt actually what i imagined. especially as i have so many different characters from different stories. so maybe i could do it if i made sure it was in a more controlled enviroment. might be a bit tricky though. be like trying to keep small kids under contol in nursery hehe :s
