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By Raymond Zhou My friend Zeng Jian recently posted an article railing against one component of the celebrity entourage, i.e. the publicity person and his or her fastidiousness with which reporters' questions are vetted. Zeng is a veteran reporter that covers China's showbiz and he works for one of the biggest portal sites. That is to say, he probably gets more respect than the average workman on the beat. As he complained, reporters were rarely asked to submit a question list when he first started out in the business. Of course, a diligent person would prepare at least a page of questions in advance just for himself or herself. It could be scribbling only the writer could recognize. However, a new practice has come into being: Reporters have to file the questions to the P.R. firm, who would forward it to the assistant to the star. And they would ask you to revise the questions, add something here or delete something there. Mostly deletions, though. Zeng's griping got a lot of responses from his WeChat circle of friends. I chuckled, but did not add to the spool of incriminating tales. The most famous story in recent memory of publicity screening that hurt more than helped its client is the one involving movie star Tang Wei. She divulged in an early interview that her favorite dish is pork braised in brown sauce. Her PR team deemed this innocuous detail unfit for her public image and forced the reporter to change it to mushroom and vegetables. The reporter spilled the beans and Tang was viewed as hypocritical. In later interviews, reporters were strictly forbidden from touching upon this topic. In the end, Tang came out to clarify that she indeed likes the pork dish. | 
