Iggy Azalea feels the love — and hate — online

Is it possible in 2016 to be famous without becoming integrated with your online haters, media ranters and trolls?

Let’s ask Iggy Azalea, frequent easy target of overreactors.

“No, I don’t think it is possible to totally avoid (haters) the way you could before. I guess it’s the double-edged sword that comes with having the ability to talk with (fans) that do really love you,” the Australian pop-rap star answers in a lighthearted mood.

Azalea, 25, has 26 million subscribers to her personal media (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube), and yet another hit song, “Team.”

On Sunday, she will co-headline “CBS Radio’s SPF” at The Cosmopolitan’s Boulevard Pool with Alessia Cara, Lukas Graham, Fifth Harmony, Kygo and Mike Posner ($57-$123).

Let’s recount some of the fame hurdles Iggy Azalea has cleared. A rival rapper once publicly, cruelly requested Azalea commit suicide. Hungry freelance writers regularly sell long stupid think pieces to news sites when Azalea tweets opinions about anything. Her fiance, Nick Young of the L.A. Lakers, said he cheated on her, in a video made public by a teammate.

And on Wednesday, she was sued for $1.5 million by a former producer claiming he discovered and nurtured her. I talked with Azalea before the suit was filed.

But there’s also an oddity in being beloved on a massive level, so I asked her how it feels knowing many music listeners fell rabidly in love with her.

“I still think it’s a little strange, sometimes” she says. “You kind of get railroaded into it, don’t you? It’s not a smooth transition.”

When she talks with fans online, she doesn’t think of them as being in love with her.

“Then when I meet them at shows, I realize they are,” she says, laughing at the unusualness of public living. “It’s very surreal. I don’t think that ever wears off.”

Did her show business teams ever put her through a conference of experts to teach her the procedures of coping with the ups and downs of fame?

“Nooo,” she says. “No procedure. Just figure it out.

“But even if they did warn you, I don’t think you can really prepare for it until you are there, dealing with it.”

In interviews, Azalea seems like a happy and together person.

“Yeah, sometimes, I think it’s my job to be happy and together,” she says merrily.

She comes across as one of those people who seem so strong, others might say, “She doesn’t need my help.” Is this correct?

“Exactly,” she says. It took “a lot of convincing, behind the scenes” for the music industry to give her opportunities. That’s partly why she presents herself as a “self-assured, very strong” woman, to “reassure other people the risk is worth it.”

“It’s hard to show doubt, because doubt can be the difference between somebody taking that risk or not (on her). So I think I just got in the habit,” she says, still shining her good mood.

Doug Elfman can be reached at delfman@reviewjournal.com. He blogs at reviewjournal.com/elfman. On Twitter: @VegasAnonymous