EW’s TV critic recalls the night in 2001 when His Purpleness slammed the door in her face
Cmon.
Prince cant be dead.
Hes just messing with us.
Credit: Tim Mosenfelder/Getty Images
That was my first impulse when I read that Prince haddied at the age of 57.
Maybe it was because I didnt want to believe this magical hologram of a human was actually mortal.
Guys like Prince didntdiein anelevator.
They just levitated into the next earthly realm, no elevator necessary.
Besides, wasnt Princealwaysmessing with us?
Wasnt Prince messing with Charlie Murphy when he wore aZoro-key in outfitto a pick-up basketball game?
Or maybe I just assume thats the case because Prince messed withmeonce.
At least, I think thats what he was doing.
I guess now Ill never know.
It was June of 2001.
One of his reps called my office and asked: Would I like to go?
I was 22 years old.
This was my first adult job.
Before this, the biggest interview Id ever done was with a small-town psychic.
I had no idea what I was doing.
Would you like to ride it home?
It wasnt that I didnt want to talk to him.
It was just that I had no ideahow that was possible.
Id heard that Prince was tired of talking about certain subjects in interviews.
The Warner Bros. legal battle.
His name change to a symbol.
His semi-recent decision to become a Jehovahs Witness.
He was eager to just talk about the music again.
Princes rep told me there were rules about the questions I was allowed to ask.
Could I ask about the upcoming album?
There may notbean upcoming album, the rep told me.
Could I ask if he was ever going to release those lost tracks he recorded with Miles Davis?
No personal questions were allowed.
Wasnt I just told that there might not be an upcoming album?
Could I listen to this album, which may or may notbean album, before I interviewed Prince?
No advance copies were available.
It didnt matter anyway.
There were about two dozen journalists packed into a room, and most of us were locals.
Our tape recorders were confiscated upon entry.
Prince does not like to have his voice recorded.
We had to take notes.
So was Cheryl Johnson, who wrote a column for the newspaper that often traded in Prince gossip.
(Princes Billy Jack Bitch is about her.)
Those of us who remained were fresh meat, having never written about Prince before.
Most of us were young.
Many of us were female.
Prince was in an excellent mood when he entered the room.
His hair fell to his shoulders, looking as if it had been freshly flat-ironed and feathered.
Everything he had on perfectly matched that shirt: red pants, red platform boots.
If I had to guess, Ill bet his underwear was red.
The first person to wish me a happy birthday gets dropped in the alligator moat.
This was going to be fun.
He was ready to talk about the things he wasnt supposed to talk about.
(But … wasnt Miles Davis dead?
And didnt his estate get paid for use of his music in the series?
Prince ranted good-naturedly at President Bush for charging him too much for property taxes.
He gushed about the beautiful deer he sometimes saw running around outside Paisley Park.
And then things got weird.
Prince started talking about the Bible.
Psalms is a beautiful book, he told us.
Its like a piece of music.
There are very clear roles in the Bible about male and female roles in society.
He didnt elaborate on what that meant until later.
Twenty-first-century women do not want to live by a role, he said.
They want to say to men, Lets switch our roles.
But things dont work that way.
You have to know your role and make it work.
Its the same thing with the music industry.
You have to find the good roles that work and go with them.
You have to understand: he was talking to a room full of women.
Women who were music writers.
Women who were working in what was absolutely viewed as a mens role.
To me, this was heartbreaking.
And honestly, I was a little afraid Id get kicked out of the room.
But later, I went back to my office and wrote a column.
It was terribly written.
Hey, I was 22 years old.
The day after my piece was published, Princes rep called.
Hed be at Paisley Park later that night.
He wanted to talk.
I couldnt get there fast enough.
When I arrived, Paisley Park: A Celebration was already in full swing.
It was nearly impossible to find a parking space.
Its big and box-like and nondescript.
But inside, its a fairy tale.
The hallways are painted like a blue sky, with clouds floating above your head.
Theres a black piano that looks like some kind of avant-guard Corvette.
There are two recording studios, an indoor basketball court, and a gym.
(I desperately want to know what Prince wears on the treadmill.)
Theres a play room, with black lights and stars painted on the ceiling.
And there are performance spaces.
Alicia Keys and Common were scheduled to play in one that could hold a few thousand people.
As fans gathered before the stage, waiting for the concert, I spotted Erykah Badu in the crowd.
Instead, Im told I have to wait.
I waited for hours, without any explanation.
Finally, I was escorted to a small conference room.
And suddenly, there was Prince.
He came up from behind me, as if hed teleported in from another dimension.
He startled me, perhaps on purpose.
He was wearing platform boots and walking with an elaborate cane.
Or, rather, he didnt walk.
He literallybeckoned me with his finger, a stern expression on his face.
We sat side by side on a couch, each looking forward, not making eye contact.
He just wanted to talk.
At first, he was friendly.
He wanted to discuss my column.
He wanted to explain what it means to be a Jehovahs Witness.
He felt that I was misinterpreting his point that women needed to know their place.
He really just wanted me to understand where he was coming from.
He was a good listener.
But when it became clear that I wasnt seeing things from his perspective, his tone changed.
At one point, he was scolding me about my ignorance when a pretty young dancer entered the room.
Hell-oooo, Prince purred at her.
She winked at him.
Then he went right back to his anachronistic lecture on gender studies.
Things got so heated that Prince finally decided hed had enough.
Abruptly, he got up from the couch, when I was still talking.
And he was gone.
I sat there for much too long afterward.
Was he fetching a Bible?
Did he need to place a call to the Watch Tower Society?
His point whatever he viewed his point to be had been made.
Eventually, I walked back to the concert space, still feeling kind of numb.
Alicia Keys was on stage, playing How Come U Dont Call Me Anymore on the piano.
My hands were shaking a little bit.
I watched her there, still processing everything, when I felt someone behind me.
And there at the back of the room was Prince.
Now … its possible that I was reading this wrong.
Alicia Keys was on stage why would his attention be on me?
Then again, the whole night felt so surreal that nothing was out of the question.
Why would Prince care what a 22-year-old journalist from a small local alt-weekly thought about him?
No one who mattered was reading my column.
Why would he take time out from this epic three-night party to talk tome?
Since then, Ive learned that every music writer in Minneapolis has a story like this.
But maybe there is no subtext.
Maybe Prince just genuinely wanted us to understand each other.
Prince was not like other musicians.
He wasnt like otherpeople.
Picking a favorite song is like picking a favorite child, he often claimed.
They were all essential to the larger plan.
And maybe every person was, too.
He always knew what he was doing.
