The Grand Final Jury Show is the one that really matters because what I watched tonight provides 50% of tomorrow’s result.
The programme begins with a video seeing Kalush Orchestra make their way from Kyiv to the Subway and onto an underground train before being transported into the arena. Throughout this Stefania plays with cutaways to UK celebrities, including Sam Ryder playing Stefania on his electric guitar on the top of Liverpool’s historic Liver Building and UK 2009 composer, Andrew Lloyd-Webber, giving his own rendition on the piano, amongst some other surprises. Once in the arena, Kalush continue to perform on stage, and also throw in their new single Changes as well.
The Flag Parade is quite similar to Tel Aviv 2019 in format, with four different Ukrainian Eurovision songs being performed throughout. Additionally, over the catwalk sections, instrumental versions of songs by The Chemical Brothers, Euthymics, S-Express and Blur – all well-known British classics – play. I think it could very well be the best Flag Parade ever. It’s really tight.
The presenters then come on, joined now by Graham, and introduce the show. They also point out that Luxembourg are returning to Eurovision next year, where Graham voices an incredibly uninspired sarcastic gag “just what we need… another country”. I know that it’s all tongue in cheek but it feels counter-productive to start off a 4-hour extravaganza with negativity from one of the hosts.
The first postcard plays and we’re into the tight Eurovision running order that we’re all so used to. There’s a few interruptions along the way including a lookback at Junior Eurovision 2022, which features Lissandro only by pre-recorded video and there’s also a gag where Mel Giedroyc reenacts Poland 2014, but it was just a stand-in with a sticker saying “Mel Giedroyc” tonight.
The interval, despite being the same length as most of the recent ones, feels far briefer than the last few years. That’s mainly because there are only two interval acts this time, but the second one is twice as long as normal. The first comes straight after the first recap and is Sam Ryder performing his new single, Mountain, with Brain Taylor from Queen. Unfortunately, coming minutes after Mae Muller, it has quite the detrimental effect on her performance, essentially completely showing it up. Sam puts on a compelling show and makes his four minutes very entertaining.
The second interval is The Liverpool Songbook and features a number of returning Eurovision artists from the past five years giving their own rendition on famous Liverpool hits. This includes Mahmood performing Imagine by John Lennon, Netta performing You Spin Me Round by Dead or Alive, Daði Freyr performing Whole Again by Atomic Kitten (which the audience go WILD for), Cornelia Jakobs performing I Turn to You by Mel C and Duncan Laurence performing You’ll Never Walk Alone by Gerry and the Pacemakers. Sonia also features between Cornelia and Duncan to perform her Milstreet 1993 runner-up, Better the Devil You Know, which is it’s own type of Liverpool classic.
Additionally, the interval features an interval with Harrogate 1982 host, Jan Leeming (or her stand-in tonight), as well as a video explaining how the scoring works and a video about the megastars Eurovision has begun producing presented by Björn Ulvaeus.
The voting followed in much the usual manner but quite entertainingly the fake winner was the United Kingdom, leading to much jubilation amongst the several thousand Brits in the arena.
The Grand Final of Eurovision 2023 airs at 8pm on BBC One.
