Interviewer: ... And now we've got the woman of the hour herself, Video of the Year winner Ione James...
Ione James: Oh, come on. Hello!
I: You're looking very pink tonight.
IJ: You're looking very sparkly! Seriously, I could see your earrings from way over there, they drew me to you like a moth to a flame.
I: Are they blinding? There's a lot of bling going on, yeah.
IJ: No! They're gorgeous! But then I'm not the best person to ask about blinding, I tend to cover myself in so much glitter and sequins that I'm basically a reflective surface at all times. I'm probably accidentally beaming messages to aliens every time I leave the house.
I: That sounds like a good plot for Hollywood's next celebrity parody film.
IJ: Yeah, like This is the End, but with glitter and aliens.
I: Exactly! You hear that, viewers? Someone get on that. Okay, but we've got to talk about your award. This is the first time you've won video of the year.
IJ: Yeah, this is the first time, so I'm kind of reeling a little bit. I really like this moon man. The colors are speaking to me.
I: The pink part sort of matches your outfit. Let's talk about the video, though. Tell us a little about that process, that video process. It was treated like a blockbuster. Were the VMA's something you had in mind when you were putting it together?
IJ: The VMA's are kind of always in the back of your mind when you're making a video, right? They're such a staple. But I was mostly just thinking, "I want to walk in front of some CGI explosions."
I: That's a good priority. You've got a lot of people in this video...
IJ: A lot. I managed to shoehorn as many of my friends in as I possibly could, I know.
I: How did you get everyone involved?
IJ: I just asked my friends. That was it. I can't take credit for all of it, because the video was completely Joseph Kahn's vision, but with the girls, most of them were pretty keen to do it and they were very hands on. They were collaborative in every step of their process, so it was a really cool thing to do, to get to kind of merge the personal and the professional worlds with my friends like that. It makes winning a lot more worthwhile, because it's not just a video, it's this fun memory of my friends.
I: I don't want to bring it up, but... there's been just a little bit of controversy regarding the video itself, as well as the song.
IJ: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I think it's interesting, and I think it's a good thing, too. You know, that there's a dialogue going. It was kind of a teachable moment, I guess. I mean -- I think it's important that our perspectives keep evolving, so I like that these are things people aren't afraid to talk about, to make me view things from another angle. I get it. I do think it's important to note that I never ... it wasn't meant to be a statement. It was just, like, "let me do something where I can pull in a ton of my friends and we can have fun pretending to be action stars for a couple of days." But I get it might have been something of a missed opportunity in other ways. I appreciate the conversation and the criticism. I had a lot of fun with my friends on this video, that's all it really was to me.
I: And it won Video of the Year.
IJ: And it won Video of the Year!
I: A lot of those friends are here with you tonight, too. You had the most of the cast with you and then some.
IJ: Yeah! They're -- where are they? They're somewhere. Probably looking for Britney.
I: I can't hold that against them. That's a pretty good priority to have. Did you see her during the show?
IJ: Like in the audience? Yeah, a little, she's always really lovely. I love Britney. Everyone I was with tonight loves Britney. I guess it's probably more fair to say that everyone in the entire place probably loves Britney. She's very much what I think of when I think of the VMA's from when I was younger, the ones I remember watching.
I: I can see your publicist is trying to pull you along, so --
IJ: Oh, just ignore her. I do most of the time. No, I'm just kidding. I'm sorry, Brooke. I'm in trouble for that, I can already tell.
I: I'll let you go in a minute so you don't get too much trouble, but we need to quickly talk about Wildest Dreams.
IJ: Oh, yeah! How did we get this far without talking about it?
I: There's just so much going on. But tell us about it just really quickly, it's kind of a different look for you.
IJ: Literally, I've got a dark wig and everything. No, um, Joseph Kahn, you know, the genius behind Bad Blood and Blank Space directed this video as well, so that kind of set the bar from the very beginning...
I: Is that going to be a regular collaboration that we can expect in the future?
IJ: Oh, I hope so. I love working with him. He has a really unique vision in his work, and not just in his music videos but the stuff he does outside of music videos as well. But for this video we just -- the idea was to do something different, maybe a little unexpected. The song itself surprised some of my fans when the album first came out, so we wanted to kind of use that surprise here and keep with the tone of the song. Joseph shot a lot of the video's footage in Africa, so the proceeds from the video and its views will be going to wild life conservation, so that makes the video particularly special.
I: That's great, you get to release a video and fund a good cause -- okay, okay, I can see your publicist glaring at me, so I'm gonna let you go. Have a good time tonight!
IJ: Thank you so much! Have fun!