In this week’s newsletter there’s all the artist speculations and confirmations across the continent as Russia secures the early favourite spot, while we highlight some of the top tunes you should be listening to from across the National Finals.
Read the latest edition of the newsletter here.
In Robertson’s Reflection this week, editor Ben Robertson looks deeper beyond the headlines of Petra Mede and Måns Zelmerlöw hosting Eurovision, to assess what we can expect from them and their rekindled collaboration with scriptwriter Edward af Sillen.
We’ve already been promised, via the words of Måns and Petra, a little window of what to expect for next year’s hosting. It will tone down on the flash and the expensive props and instead focus on their personal touch with the thousands assembled into Globen come May. Måns pushed the point that there will be lots of show with lots of humour, which is exactly what you expect from an af Sillen script. The show numbers in Melodifestivalen are an creation of his era through Melodifestivalen history, demanding their hosts to take centre stage and lead a chorus with laugh-along lyrics at every corner.
Part of the success story is that his humour blends a professional slickness and a classical poking at stereotypes. Take the saccharin-spiced Greatest Hits show where the Swedish script teases the appearance of neighbouring Finns, the ever-running joke that Norwegians do shockingly bad at Eurovision and Petra grabs one moment to shine with her impeccable spoilt brat French accent. Expect too many a cliche to be re-hashed, and we’ve already been promised that the style will be a continuation of 2013’s epic.
Read all the views of Ben in the full newsletter, and don’t forget to subscribe to get this sent straight to your inbox as soon as it is published.
A very well written article! Well done. Should be read by every single person who is involved with the script and presentation of ESC 2016!
There are many fans who found Petra Mede’s “gay jokes” very stereotypical. Including gay fans themselves. And several of fans don’t fit into this at all, as there are many straight male fans too. Not to mention many female fans. And nopes – it’s not about being “homophobic”. Which I think my gay friends would agree with me with.
ESC has always been – and should remain so – a show for all kinds of people. The fact that it has this huge mainstream appeal, is also the reason why it has been popular with millions of people since 1956. If it suddenly becomes treated like a show for target groups, it will lose the mass appeal. And that way it might also be less looked upon as “something for everybody”, which again might make it some overall appeal to all kinds of people. Sorry, but stereotypes are never something that things benefit from. No matter what.
One can try to write off her “jokes” as banter or something like that. But it’s something deeper too, which is harder to make excuses for. Why should anything be labelled as “gay” or “straight”? There are indeed not few male gay fans, esp. in the ESC-audience, fair enough. (for some strange reasons, it seems like straight fans are less likely to watch the final live, given past experience). There is no such things as “gay” or “straight” entertainment. Why put up boxes and divisions anyway? It’s like saying that “football is straight”, or that “blues rock is straight”.
It’s the music – and the show itself – which is the important bit. Not sexuality!
I hope for a better script in 2016!
Thanks a lot for sharing this brilliant article. Food for thought.