Maia & Alex Shibutani In-Depth Interview

[VIETgrlTerifa]

Absolute Skating's Reut Golinsky did an in-depth interview with the Shibutanis right after their gala performance at Worlds. There is a lot of content covered here and they talk about their thoughts on Worlds, the process in creating programs, working with collaborators, what sort of stories and statements they want to make with their skating, how they want to build bridges between figure skating and other worlds, and how other skaters have helped them out in their journey.

You can see a small appearance of the Shibs doing this interview with Absolute Skating in their Worlds Vlog here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n26f4r_PccE&t=9m22s

http://absoluteskating.com/index.php?cat=interviews&id=2017shibutani

Here's some insight as to how Tatiana Volosozhar, Maxim Trankov, Stephane Lambiel and others have really helped them:

I really love your exhibition program you performed just now before our talk. I wonder why you chose to work with Stéphane Lambiel as he doesn't have much experience with ice dancers.

Maia: Stéphane is a skater that we've always respected so much, his skating is so beautiful and inspiring...

Alex: In isolation, not knowing him...

Maia: ... just watching. And then we met him more officially when we did Denis Ten's show.
Alex: Well, we met him for the first time I think at Worlds 2011. He was talking to Marina and she introduced us to him. Then we met him again very briefly while we were on tour in Japan for Mao's show, "The Ice", he came to visit.

And then in Kazakhstan...

Alex: Yes, all of our perceptions of him as a skater but also more him as an artist really shone through in our time spent together. And it wasn't just hanging out. We aren't afraid to ask people questions and he was very generous with his time, talking to us about how we can grow and what he would like to see from us. We had some very deep personal conversations with him and Tatiana and Max (Volosozhar/Trankov). Never thought when I was a kid that I am going to get to Kazakhstan, and it's through this crazy thing called "figure skating" that we end up there with Tatiana and Max, Olympic champions, and Stéphane Lambiel, someone who we watched in 2003 at the World Championships! It was one of the turning points before last season where we had a lot of success...

Maia: It was one of the moments that was really important.

Alex: We were able to have these really insightful thoughtful conversations with people who've accomplished so much and had very interesting things to say about us personally and what their impressions of us [are], what they hoped we could accomplish. So we took that to heart and it inspired us...

Maia: It was one of those moments where the fact that they took the time to speak to us really meant a lot.

Alex: It went beyond being nice, it went beyond them just saying like "oh, keep going" or "keep working hard" or "we like your skating". They were really invested.

Maia: And it was at the right moment because prior to that we'd already taken the steps to develop the programs for that season, we already worked with Peter Tchernyshev, so we were moving things in the right direction. But it just felt like another...

Alex: ...vote of confidence.

Maia: And then we worked with Stéphane last early summer.

Alex: Maia knew that she wanted to work with Stéphane, she felt really strongly about it and so she told me and got in touch with him. After the conversations that we had had it made a lot of sense that we would work together. Actually tomorrow we're leaving in the afternoon to go directly to Switzerland to work with Stéphane. (You can check Maia and Alex's recent vlog about the time they spent in Switzerland)

 

[brightphoton]

Alex: We could have gone home to rest, we were already planning on going to Los Angeles after the Four Continents to work on our programs more and so two days at home would have been great. It would have been understandable for us to say, "no, we need to go home after these challenging competitions - Nationals and the Four Continents". But we knew that it was such a responsibility that we were honored to have been asked to do and we would grow and learn from it.

Those two are so enthusiastic. It makes me feel bad I don't watch ice dancing, because they are such good ambassadors for our sport.

What are their chances for Olympic gold?

 

[VIETgrlTerifa]

Those two are so enthusiastic. It makes me feel bad I don't watch ice dancing, because they are such good ambassadors for our sport.

What are their chances for Olympic gold?

Most people think they are fighting a hard battle for the bronze and that gold belongs to either Virtue/Moir or Papadakis/Cizeron.

 

[olayolay]

They're so media-trained and such dull interviews at this point.

 

[Seren]

They're so media-trained and such dull interviews at this point.

Harsh much? I think they sound focused, they know what they want and are working hard for it. I don't think that's dull.

 

[Hyena]

They're so media-trained and such dull interviews at this point.

I'm a big Shibs fan and I find their in-person interviews pretty stilted, but I love this interview. Their intelligence, passion, and drive really come across. I loved their discussion about working with Stephane.

 

[Mrs. P]

Maia's basically been media trained since the Shibsibs intermediate days. I think they just talk a certain way that comes off as staged or dull.

In any case, I think this interview actually was really enjoying to read.

 

[VIETgrlTerifa]

They even spoke about post-competition press conferences being dull in this interview. What I like about Alex and Maia is that they provide substance to what they're saying and it's not just sound bytes, and they speak with an eloquence that is rare in this sport. In-person, it may come off as stilted and careful and I do agree with that. But this interview I felt gave us a lot.

 

[brightphoton]

Yes, I do find myself skimming a lot when I read their interviews. They speak like politicians, so 70% of their speech is generic feel-good media-friendly phrases, ie, media training. Lots of people in PR are like that and encourage it, so I won't fault them for it.

But you know what, they're really enthusiastic and involved with promoting figure skating to the general public and social media, which is more than you can say for most skaters.

 

[Barb]

Yes, I do find myself skimming a lot when I read their interviews. They speak like politicians, so 70% of their speech is generic feel-good media-friendly phrases, ie, media training. Lots of people in PR are like that and encourage it, so I won't fault them for it.

But you know what, they're really enthusiastic and involved with promoting figure skating to the general public and social media, which is more than you can say for most skaters.

Exactly. They were fans since kids, they went as spectators in Worlds 2001 and 2003, they used to watch the GP series, Maia was big fan of Michelle K., Alex was not too much into figure skating but all the exposition and seeing to Maia skating, influenced him. I just think they would like inspire to other people like they themselves were inspired by other skaters, or at least to give the opportunity to people of to know the sport. And reading comments in their social media accounts, they are succeding it, people who don't usually watch skating, they are watching them. And it is even more impressive considering they are getting it without need of scandals, dramas, butt pictures, girlfriend/boyfriend pictures, I mean, they know all about social media, and they chose the difficult way.
And I don´t understand how, they talking about the emotional impact that it was a conversation with Tat, Max and Stephane could be considered dull. Same they talking about their creative process, especially because they are so passionate about it.