EDWIN@EDWINJBERNARD.CO.UK
An experienced journalist and broadcaster, I specialise in two distinct areas: celebrity interviews and sexual health.
I was a founding contributing editor of gay lifestyle magazine, Attitude, and served as both their US and Health Editor until 1996, continuing as their HIV columnist until 1998.
I also spent the 1990s as an entertainment journalist, living in Los Angeles, San Francisco & Vancouver, contributing to the UK's most popular newspapers and magazines, including Sunday Magazine, You Magazine, Daily Mail, Daily Express, Hello!, OK!, Woman and Woman's Own, as well as the style magazines Sky, The Face and Time Out.
Since embarking on a career in the media in 1984, I have worked as a music, TV, film and celebrity journalist; a TV and film section editor on several magazines; a radio broadcaster; a music TV researcher.
I am currently the editor of AIDS Treatment Update from HIV information charity, NAM.
Click on the links below to see examples of my work.
HEALTH + GAY LIFE
CELEBRITY INTERVIEWS (FILM)
CELEBRITY INTERVIEWS (TV)
Born in September 1962 and raised near Blackpool, the seaside playground in the North West of England, I knew early on that I was fascinated with music, film, TV and celebrities. CELBRITY INTERVIEWS (POP)
CELEBRITY FEATURES
A BRIEF HISTORY
After graduating from the University of Warwick with a B.A. (Hons) in Film & Literature in 1984, my first job was as a disc jockey on the pirate station, Radio Caroline, located on an old trawler in the English Channel.
Back on dry land, I settled in London and took up my first journalistic position as staff writer on Black Beat International, a monthly music magazine from the publisher of The Voice and The Weekly Journal, to which I also contributed. A year later, I joined the writing staff of The Street Scene, a weekly dance lifestyle magazine. Between 1986 and 1988, I contributed weekly to Record Mirror (rm), covering soul and dance music as well as film & TV.
I moved into TV production in 1988, as a researcher for Sky Television's music department. That year I also wrote and produced a radio documentary about the wildly popular music producers Stock, Aitken & Waterman, excerpts of which can now be heard on the SAW tribute site, Cafe 80s, and wrote the sleeve notes to two of their best-selling Hit Factory CDs. During the same year, I was also a weekly guest film and video reviewer on Johnny Walker's radio show for BFBS.
Returning to print journalism full time in 1989, I became TV Editor of best-selling pop weekly, Number One; wrote the press and publicity notes for the seminal AIDS fundraiser, Red Hot & Blue; and penned the souvenir brochure for activist pop star Jimmy Somerville's 1991 tour. That year I also helped launch a new youth lifestyle weekly, Rage, as their Media Editor, as well as contributing regularly to TV Guide (UK) and TV Times.
In 1992 I relocated to Los Angeles to cover the Hollywood film industry. A few months later, the LA Riots occurred: you can read my reports for The Weekly Journal here.
During my two years in Los Angeles and another two in San Francisco, I was part of the Hollywood Foreign Press corps and regularly interviewed celebrities, visiting movie sets and attending screenings and junkets all over North America. I contributed to many of Britain's most popular and stylish magazines including Sky, The Face, Time Out, Smash Hits, Sunday Magazine, Just Seventeen and more! Some of the best of this work can be seen on this site.
During my time in San Francisco, I also became a founding contributing editor to the groundbreaking gay lifestyle magazine, Attitude. As their US Editor from 1994-96, I covered topics as diverse as film, music, travel and sexuality. As their Health Editor from 1994-96 - and then as their HIV columnist until 1998 - I covered all aspects of gay men's health, with a special focus on sexual health. You'll find plenty of my work on Attitude on this site, too.
From 1995-2001, I resided in Vancouver, B.C. on Canada's West Coast - also known as Hollywood North or Brollywood. From there I worked for the features agency, Juliet Wilson Associates, providing celebrity articles for syndication to many of the best-selling magazines and newspapers in the United Kingdom as well as a plethora of publications worldwide.
In 2002, I moved back to the UK, taking up residence in Brighton, and focused on writing about sexual health. At first I freelanced for NAM, Positive Nation and POZ, and then, in Janaury 2004, joined the staff of NAM (part-time) as editor of AIDS Treatment Update, and contributing editor of aidsmap.com. I have also edited the last two editions of NAM's Treatments Training Manual, and contributed to both NAM's HIV/AIDS Treatment Directory and the AIDS Reference Manual.
