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  • 6 months ago
Mariah Carey breaks down her most iconic music videos, from "Obsessed" to "All I Want For Christmas Is You." Watch as Mariah gets into all the nitty gritty details of every music video shoot, explaining how it all came to life and why they chose certain outfits and makeup looks.

Director: Sydney Malone
Director of Photography: AJ Young
Editor: Jeremy Ray Smolik
Talent: Mariah Carey
Producer: Noel Jean; Natalie Campbell
Production Manager: Andressa Pelachi
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Talent Booker: Paige Garbarini
Camera Operator: Shay Eberle-Gunst
Sound Mixer: Lila Rowel
Production Assistant: Fernando Barajas
Post Production Supervisor: Jess Dunn
Supervising Editor: Rob Lombardi
Additional Editor: Gerard Zarra
Assistant Editor: Billy Ward
Associate Director of Programming and Development: Logan Tsugita
Transcript
00:00I've never been in drag before, but in this video, I was.
00:05Hi, I'm Mariah Carey, and I will be breaking down
00:08some of my most iconic music video looks.
00:18This is Honey.
00:22That was me talking in the beginning of the music video.
00:26Because they couldn't get a voiceover person,
00:29and so I just went in the studio and did it.
00:31So Honey is definitely one of my favorites that I've done.
00:35Serge Normand and Laura Mercier did the makeup
00:39for the first go around.
00:40So Serge and Laura kind of created the looks.
00:44Joe Z was the stylist.
00:45He put together these looks like the one in the jets on the jet ski
00:50and the white bandeau top and a little skirt,
00:54and the one on the beach that was kind of like a sandy brown.
00:58I love this one. I love the hairdos that they did.
01:01You know, all of it.
01:03Those little Gucci shoes.
01:05We knew we were going to do a couple different looks,
01:07and one of them would be the smokey eye, you know, kind of a smokey eye.
01:11And I loved it. This is like so much fun to have done.
01:15Even though I did the jet skis myself,
01:17like I was actually on the jet ski running from the bad guys.
01:20It was fun to film, but like when we were in that boat
01:22and the gangsters were chasing and trying to find me and all that,
01:26it was like five in the morning.
01:28So we did two days of a lot of work.
01:32This is All I Want For Christmas Is You.
01:36I had no idea the impact the song would have on the genre or my career, any of it.
01:45So actually we had to make it look like it was on Super 8,
01:49but it was filmed on like regular video camera.
01:53So then we just, you know, made it look even more like authentic film back in the day vibes.
01:59That's my dog Jack. He could jump really high.
02:04It was just like a sweater and jeans.
02:06It wasn't like a whole bunch of ensembles, except when I'm outside in the red suit,
02:11which I still have for the cover of this album.
02:14It's like a Santa suit that you put a long Santa suit.
02:17Someone asked me like, do you still have that one?
02:19I'm like, yeah, I use the same one every year.
02:22It was definitely not chic and effortless to film in the snow.
02:26I was freezing in a tiny little Santa suit ensemble.
02:31My hair froze like it was actually frozen hair.
02:34I'm not even exaggerating.
02:35The two braids, I did my own hair for that.
02:38And I think because these were two different days, that was my makeup job as well.
02:43But on the other day we had Billy and Sid.
02:51This is Always Be My Baby.
02:53So this video, Always Be My Baby, was filmed at my camp.
02:58It's called Camp Mariah.
02:59And it's a camp for part of the Fresh Air Fund and for underprivileged kids.
03:05So we just brought the kids out there and shot the video there,
03:10inside one of the little houses that they have.
03:13And then I got on my tire swing, going back and forth over the water.
03:18I was just figuring out my hair situation.
03:21So in this video, it's kind of like curly with the bang that goes, that's a swoop bang.
03:27I don't know.
03:28I was figuring out how to get that together.
03:31And just in like dark jeans and a dark jean top.
03:34It wasn't like very glamorous, but you know, we brought people there.
03:38We kind of had a little party and it was fun.
03:41I do enjoy directing my own music videos.
03:44But sometimes it's best to have somebody there that that's all they do.
03:48And they're going to be focused on the completion of the video, making sure it's right.
03:53It's just easier to do it now.
03:54There seem to be more things I have to do.
03:57And so that's what we kind of lean towards.
04:04This is Touch My Body.
04:05I love this video.
04:11It's like one of my favorites of the ones that I've done.
04:14I actually love the song.
04:15It was my 18th number one record.
04:18We were looking for who to cast and Jack from 30 Rock's name came up.
04:23And I was like, oh my gosh, that would be amazing.
04:25So he joined up with us and he just made the comedy easy because he's a professional comedian.
04:33I think that the outfits are just sort of like to feature the body in this video.
04:38Oh, I like this outfit with the unicorn.
04:41That one's cute.
04:46This is Obsessed.
04:48Yeah, I just figured you need a stalker.
04:51I'll be your stalker.
04:52I've never been in drag before, but in this video I was.
04:56And that's actually Patrick Demarchalier there taking the pictures.
05:00If you like Devil Wears Prada, Meryl Streep's always looking for Demarchalier.
05:05Did Demarchalier confirm?
05:08Demarchalier.
05:09Demarchalier.
05:09It took a long time to do both ensembles.
05:13And then we had that outfit that was different.
05:15The little one in the middle with the brown t-shirt.
05:18It takes a while, but it was a lot of fun.
05:21We belong together.
05:31This video and the video It's Like That were both filmed within a few days of each other.
05:38And we wanted to make them starting a story and ending a story.
05:43Eric Roberts was kind of like playing the bad guy.
05:47So if you watch It's Like That video, you see that Eric Roberts is kind of like,
05:52there's something going on.
05:53We don't know what it is.
05:54He's the bad guy.
05:56So Wentworth Miller there, he was playing the young guy that I was wanting to be with,
06:02instead of getting married and all the stuff that's going on here.
06:06We actually really did the shower scene.
06:08I wasn't like nude or whatever, but we wet my hair and just used makeup that was waterproof.
06:20This is Type Dangerous.
06:25I can't tell you the overall concept except, you know,
06:29my character is sort of like a Bond person.
06:33There's one guy who's got a knife behind his back.
06:36It's cute.
06:36I love the video because I love all the different looks.
06:39It was really all Christopher's idea, I have to say.
06:42I mean, some things I like more than others.
06:44Like I don't really usually love like all the dark, smoky eye and all that stuff,
06:49but you know, he was really into it and wanted me to try it.
06:52So I tried it and I think it came out good.
06:54You had the online celebrity Mr. Beast at the end of this video.
06:58Well, actually that was, that was Joseph.
07:01He was just really excited for it so he had to add an extra day onto the video
07:06so Mr. Beast could come and make a moment.
07:14This is Vision of Love.
07:18It's very interesting to sit here and look at all the videos
07:20that I've done from then till now.
07:24I knew the lighting wasn't right.
07:26That was the first thing.
07:27I know nobody's going to believe me that I knew that, but it's true.
07:30I just didn't like, there was no frontal key light.
07:34I didn't understand what they were doing.
07:35It was completely orchestrated by the label since I was a new artist.
07:39I really didn't know what to do.
07:41I didn't even have a good outfit.
07:42I mean, it's like, it was just like my natural hair at that time.
07:49And I hadn't gotten into blowing it out and pulling it straight.
07:52It's definitely not one of my favorite videos, but it represents a lot to me.
07:59This is Emotions.
08:01This is my first video from my second album.
08:05I just wanted to have a good video.
08:06Like I wasn't sure it was going to happen.
08:08But then we were able to have like a bunch of different people.
08:12Like the extras became like the friends.
08:14And I was in the one shot in the car in the Aliyah top.
08:18And it was just fun.
08:19Like I was having fun with the dancers, you know, it was cute.
08:24It's not a glam hair or makeup, but I don't know.
08:28I like the way the textures are in this video and it's kind of fun.
08:34I think it's just learn who you work best with.
08:37That's all the way from the glam team to the director or co-director.
08:44I come up the best when I'm just being myself in these videos.
08:48Thank you, Allure.
08:50I hope you enjoyed me breaking down some of my favorite music videos.
08:54And I can't wait to do it again.
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