“When you see celebrities everyday, you realize that they’re just like us,” remarks Michael Yo.
And he should know. The self-described “half-black brother with the Korean mother,” delivers entertainment news, celebrity interviews and gossip daily as the host of Yo on E!, a three-hour live show heard on Sirius and XM Satellite Radio.
With a popular radio show, celebrity friends and TV appearances on the Daily 10, Chelsea Lately, ShowBiz Tonight and Nancy Grace, Yo has come a long way from his high-school days spent toiling inside of Fuddruckers and Taco Bell.
Yo grew up in Houston, Texas, with dreams of becoming a football player. He played football at the University of Arkansas for a couple of years until a concussion took him off the field (he was knocked unconscious for several hours).
His Korea-born mother, a restaurant owner with a high-school education, wanted him to finish college. But his father, who has a Ph.D. in nuclear physics, knew that college wasn’t right for him (“My father has the book smarts,” Yo says, “but my mother has the street smarts). So, Yo left.
Yo never thought of any other professions besides professional football, and the only two jobs he ever had were grilling burgers at Fuddruckers and working at the Taco Bell drive-thru. But Yo met a friend who thought he had the right personality for radio. By age 25, he had his own show in Austin, Texas.
“Radio is hands-on,” Yo says. “You have to have personality, and you just gotta do it — nobody can teach you how to talk.”
He says the biggest challenge in starting his career was getting a chance.
“It’s so hard to get your foot in the door,” he says, “and once you get that foot in the door, you have to be ready for it because the door won’t open again.”
Yo noted that before he became popular on the radio, his mother’s Asian friends were “showcasing” their kids who were becoming doctors, lawyers and engineers and bragging about their achievements or successes. Working in radio may not be a typically prestigious career, but once Yo became well-known, his mother was no longer afraid to “showcase” him.
Now based in Los Angeles, Yo says the best part about his job is going to work to talk.
“It’s great to meet stars who actually want to talk to you,” he admits, “and I even become friends with some of them too.”
Yo’s favorite TV personalities include Carson Daly, Jimmy Kimmel and Ryan Seacrest, whom he especially admires because he has his own production company and is the host of E! News. Yo hopes one day to have a show that is a mix of David Letterman and Oprah — a show that’s funny but helps women too.
Yo says he was most nervous about interviewing Madonna the first time. After four interviews, they now are good friends. His hardest interview was with Avril Lavigne in 2002, when she first became popular.
“She was young back then,” Yo says. “Our interview lasted forty-five seconds, literally. She kept giving one-word answers, so I just let her go. One-word answers kill you.”
Who would he interview if he could choose anyone, living or dead? Michael Jordan. “I never thought I’d have posters of a grown man on my wall,” Yo says.
His advice for anyone who wants to start a career in entertainment: Make realistic goals and build your way up. “So many people get caught up with wanting to be a star,” Yo says, “that they don’t have realistic goals. You have to prove that you can do it.”
