- It is time to... - (cast) Sing it!
♪ (rock music) ♪
(mouse clicks)
♪ (dramatic chord) ♪
- ♪ Feeling your heartbeat ♪
- Is it just like a singing competition show?
- Is this Eurovision?
- Oh, it's Eurovision.
- ♪ Oh ♪
♪ Tell me black or white ♪
- He like Prince but the Thor version.
- I've never experienced this in my life.
All I know is it's very gay.
- ♪ We are, we are, we are ♪ - Eurovision's really big.
- This looks really good. - Oh, this looks cool.
I want to be there!
- I feel stupid for not knowing what this is. - Same.
- This is the cheesiest of music shows.
- (laughs) He's like, "And he turned into energy." Makes sense.
- ♪ ...goodbye ♪
♪ You try to keep me by your side ♪
- ♪ Dona, Dona, Dona ♪ - So these are the different countries?
What is this? Country Idol?
- She's very passionate.
- It's like the Olympics for singing competitions.
- [Inaudible] in Eurovision
I will never understand.
- ♪ O, daĭ mi lyubovta ♪
♪ Daĭ mi lyubovta ♪
- Bulgaria's got-- ooh.
She is lit.
- Look at all these people. It's wild.
- ♪ And never let go ♪
♪ Side by side we walk an open road ♪ - Denmark.
- I'll take your guys's hand. - ♪ Stains of mud ♪
♪ On your skin ♪ - That's just a seizure.
That's a seizure, what you're showing me.
- I don't know what I'm watching, but it's amazing.
- ♪ ...you will know in the end ♪ - Yes, queen.
- ♪ That this is fiction ♪
- I like this one. - I like this girl.
(overlapping speech) - I think she's my favorite so far.
- Belgium.
- ♪ ...your life the best ♪
♪ (song wraps up) ♪ - Woo! Baby!
- Oh, wow. Thank you guys for bringing that.
- Oh my god, I can't believe I've never experienced that before.
So that's what they're all talking about.
- It really reminds me of the show Rick and Morty.
They have the heads come out and be like, "Show us what you got."
As soon as I saw Eurovision, that's exactly what I saw:
the giant heads going from planet to planet
being like, "Show me what you got."
- (Finebros) So any idea what singing competition this is?
- No, zero clue.
- It's Country Idol.
- Yeah, Eurovision.
- Eurovision!
I was not familiar with it until this year,
and then I saw everyone tweeting about Eurovision.
I'm like, "What is this thing?"
- (Finebros) It is something called "Eurovision."
- Eurovision?
- Wait, I HAVE heard of this. Oh.
Just last week, somebody tweeted a picture
of somebody who looked exactly like me who was on Eurovision.
- (Finebros) So Eurovision is somewhat like the Olympics
but for music, where multiple countries
are represented by a singer,
who then competes in a worldwide singing competition
throughout Europe and a handful of other countries.
- Oh. - That's amazing.
I was never a thought at growing up
was never really into the Olympics.
So this is good for those theater geeks like me.
- That's the least American thing I've ever heard of.
America is having competitions that only we're involved in,
and we call ourselves world champions. Least American show.
- (Finebros) So here is this year's winner from the Ukraine.
- Ooh.
- Okay. - 'Kay, I'm excited for this.
- ♪ When strangers are coming ♪
♪ They come to your house ♪
♪ They kill you all and say ♪
♪ "We're not guilty, not guilty" ♪
♪ Men bu yerde yaşalmadım ♪ - I don't see it.
- ♪ (holding note) ♪ - I'll admit,
there was a classic rock vibe before that's kind of disappeared.
- ♪ (harmonizing) ♪
(shaky breaths)
♪ (sustaining note) ♪ - Oh, she can sing.
- Is this supposed to be good?
♪ (instruments join in) ♪ - I can't tell if it's good.
- ♪ (vocalizing) ♪
- Yeah, I get why she won.
- (chorus) ♪ Yaşlığıma toyalmadım ♪
- ♪ (holding high note) ♪
- Okay, she can sing.
- I hear those whistle tones.
- ♪ Yaşlığıma toyalmadım ♪
- All right! Eurovision 2016!
- It's one of those things that, you know,
the song-- it's not what I listen to.
But everything about that performance
is just outstanding and stellar.
♪ (dramatic chord) ♪
- (Finebros) So the Eurovision Song Contest
started all the way back in 1956. - (incredulously) No way!
- 1956?
- I'm just now hearing about it?
- (Finebros) It was started after World War II
as a way to unify a war-torn Europe. - Oh, cool.
- That's beautiful.
- That's wild. What a cool story.
- (Finebros) And using television,
which was in its early days of the medium.
- I think that's outstanding.
- That's incredible. That's probably--
They were probably the first ones to ever do something like that.
- To use the medium of television to unite a continent,
that's phenomenal and so unique.
- But Eurovision has always felt like something political.
I know that here it's really new.
But everyone talks about how there's something political
about the way the countries vote other countries
and things like that.
- (Finebros) So the way this works is that each nation
sends a representative artist from their country
to perform one original song,
and then the countries vote on who's the best.
- Hunger Games, literally with the districts.
- (Finebros) The voting process includes judging panels
from other nations as well as the popular vote from the public.
- So wouldn't you just vote for your friends?
This is like a high school best dress situation.
- There's a lot of political stuff behind everything,
because at the end, even the commentators on TV go like,
"Oh, this is France. We're not gonna get votes from this one."
You know? Because Spanish people and French people
do not get along that well.
- (Finebros) And the show is the largest non-sports broadcast
in the world, as it airs across so many different countries.
- And I've never seen it.
- I can't believe that beat The Walking Dead.
What a world.
- I never even knew how many followers they got on Vine.
If it's more than six seconds, I don't know.
- Hearing stuff like that makes me realize
how ignorant I am to 90% of the world.
- I feel like we need to be more...
- ...engaged... - (both) ...in the world.
- It's like the Olympics.
You want your country to do well
and you want to be represented well.
- It is a very big deal, and it's something that brings
families and friends together that night to watch it.
Like, everyone makes plans.
"Let's get together at someone's house and go watch it."
Eurovision is always there for us.
- (Finebros) So now we're gonna show you a quick compilation
of some of the winners of the contest
from the beginning to now. - (both) Okay.
- Oh, this is gonna be good. This-- (chuckles)
- ♪ (singing in French) ♪
- That's so sweet.
- This is down Gabi's alley.
- ♪ (singing in Danish) ♪ - Looks so classy there.
- I love old stuff like this.
- ♪ Waterloo ♪ - That sounds fam--
- ♪ I was defeated ♪ - Aah!
- ♪ You won the war ♪ - That's... ABBA?
- Wow!
- (intrigued) Oh. Really?
- So used to be a trampoline for bands.
- I love the variety of music here.
- ♪ Ne partez pas sans moi ♪
♪ Laissez-moi vous suivre ♪ - It's the Celine Dion of her day.
(silence)
- (Finebros) It IS Celine Dion. - NO WAY!
- Is that Celine Dion? Are you serious?
- (in disbelief) She won Eurovision?!
- No way!
- Is this how she became famous?
- ♪ How many times can we break the rules? ♪
- See, this is more recent. - ♪ Between us ♪
♪ Only teardrops ♪
- ♪ Rise like a phoenix ♪
♪ Out of the ashes ♪ - Oh. Oh!
- I remember this one.
- Good for you.
- Oh. - That's amazing.
- I'm so mad at myself for never watching Eurovision.
- This is so exciting. I need to learn more about all this.
- (Finebros) It's been this hugely successful thing,
but Eurovision has a lot of haters. - Really?
- I'm sure. - Everyone has haters.
- If you're gonna be like, "this thing that brings us together,
and then we're gonna judge and only have one winner,"
that's the problem.
- (Finebros) Beyond the political controversies,
one of the things said is that the singers
don't properly represent their culture
and are selected to perform in ways
that give them a better chance at winning.
- Well, I do love drama. So that actually adds to it.
- It definitely seemed like certain genres even across time
tended to dominate a little bit.
So it's not surprising to think that,
yeah, there's some bias there.
- I see where they're coming from.
But at the end of the day, it's a competition, right?
Like, there are always going to be people
who are more enthusiastic or more rivalry driven.
It's the rules of life, friends.
- (Finebros) Another controversial aspect
is its role in LGBTQ issues,
where there's been many diverse performers over the years,
recently even winning the competition.
What are your thoughts about a multicultural event
being a platform for social issues?
- Well, if half the people are watching to hate it,
then half the people will hate a gay person on it.
- I mean, you have to include everyone.
Good for them to include everyone.
- They're definitely thinking forward,
and they're not excluding anyone,
which is how any kind of event should be.
- And it's potentially a really good thing.
Potentially, that opens eyes.
- Entertainment is a place where politics can get discussed
and put at center stage, literally.
If there's one country that's so backwards
and behind on the times,
sorry, but you're gonna have to deal with it.
- The great thing is that they're gonna watch it,
and it doesn't matter if they get pissed.
They're gonna have to watch it,
and they're gonna have to deal with it.
I think that's why they take chances.
You can actually bring social stuff onstage and have a voice.
- (Finebros) So finally,
though these are mainly Europeon countries,
it's starting to expand. And for the first time,
Australia was part of the competition this year.
Is this something you think the U.S. should start taking part of
if they allowed it? - Yeah.
- I think America should do it. - I think that would be so cool.
It'd be something different for everybody to turn on their TVs
and root for.
- I feel kinda left out.
Like, come on, world. - Personal, yeah.
- What's up with that?
- To expand it outward to the whole globe,
it does water down the value proposition a little bit, I think.
- We don't care about something until we look good doing it.
- Americans would root very hard.
If they lost, they would throw it away almost immediately.
- In true American fashion,
we would probably ruin it if we were invited.
But I feel like to deny us the opportunity to ruin it is rude.
So I just want us to be involved.
Sorry in advance for how we treat your 60-year-old competition.
- ♪ Thank you for watching ♪
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- In the comments section,
let us know what we should react to next.
- Thanks for watching. I love your faces.
And we'll see you next time.
♪ (end music) ♪