Belarussian singer Ivan plans to take next month’s Eurovision Song Contest by storm — performing completely naked with a wolf at his side.
However, his plan might prove too much even for a show known as an annual celebration of weirdness, held this year in Stockholm next month.
The act by the lanky 21-year-old with a mane of reddish-blond hair was dreamed up by Viktor Drobysh, a well-known Russian producer with a strong Eurovision track record.
Photo: AFP
“It’s undoubtedly an experience, a great experience,” Ivan, whose real name is Alexander Ivanov, said in an interview at Drobysh’s Moscow studio. “Especially as I have never performed on stage before in my birthday suit and with wild animals.”
The problem? It is not clear whether the act is to be allowed to go ahead.
Eurovision bans animals on stage and while there is no rule on nudity, contest spokesman Paul Jordan told reporters this is “not appropriate” for a family show.
Drobysh insists the performance is an artistic statement.
“It’s not about vulgarity or sex at all. We want this to be art, not porn,” he said, as the studio staff — with a bit of irony — tinkered with a future track by Ivan with the chorus, “I want sex, sex, sex.”
“I think the beauty that will be in our performance is comparable to that of Rodin’s The Thinker,” Drobysh said, evoking the French artist’s famous nude sculpture. “Can you imagine The Thinker wearing jeans?”
Eurovision, now in its 61st year, features acts ranging from the brilliant to the bizarre and pulls in a TV audience from around the world. Its finals are set for May 14.
“The final version of the song will be confirmed later,” Belarus state television and radio company spokeswoman Svetlana Kraskovskaya told reporters. “What you see is one of the options,” she said of a promo video of Ivan singing his contest entry, Help You Fly, in which he appears naked with a trained shewolf named Shakira by his side.
Ivan has been dubbed in some reports as possibly the songfest’s weirdest contestant yet, something he takes as a compliment.
He said he and Drobysh thought long about possible costumes, but ultimately decided on none at all, to show “nature and man are together.”
Working with a wolf brought another challenge.
“The first rehearsals were very scary, but all the same we made friends,” said Ivan, adding that the sausages he fed her helped. “She liked my smell and started rubbing up against me.”
Drobysh is pushing for the act, and as the man behind Russia’s Buranovskiye Babushki, a choir of elderly ladies who won second place in 2012 when they charmed the audience with their mix of authentic peasant outfits and disco beat, he has made a name at Eurovision.
He said the Belarussian state television company “is working on all the legal questions,” although its spokeswoman told reporters that Drobysh himself is in charge of negotiations.
Eurovision “will take a decision” after seeing a “second-by-second outline of the routine,” Drobysh said.
Some online commentators in Belarus have expressed shock at the planned performance.
“That’s a fine way to present Belarus, in the spirit of the times: with a bare arse,” wrote one, hinting at the country’s economic woes.
“We kicked up a fuss about Conchita,” wrote another, referring to bearded Austrian drag queen Conchita Wurst who won in 2014, “but we are disgracing ourselves in front of the whole world.”
Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg was deported from Israel yesterday, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs said, the day after the Israeli navy prevented her and a group of fellow pro-Palestinian activists from sailing to Gaza. Thunberg, 22, was put on a flight to France, the ministry said, adding that she would travel on to Sweden from there. Three other people who had been aboard the charity vessel also agreed to immediate repatriation. Eight other crew members are contesting their deportation order, Israeli rights group Adalah, which advised them, said in a statement. They are being held at a detention center ahead of a
A Chinese scientist was arrested while arriving in the US at Detroit airport, the second case in days involving the alleged smuggling of biological material, authorities said on Monday. The scientist is accused of shipping biological material months ago to staff at a laboratory at the University of Michigan. The FBI, in a court filing, described it as material related to certain worms and requires a government permit. “The guidelines for importing biological materials into the US for research purposes are stringent, but clear, and actions like this undermine the legitimate work of other visiting scholars,” said John Nowak, who leads field
‘THE RED LINE’: Colombian President Gustavo Petro promised a thorough probe into the attack on the senator, who had announced his presidential bid in March Colombian Senator Miguel Uribe Turbay, a possible candidate in the country’s presidential election next year, was shot and wounded at a campaign rally in Bogota on Saturday, authorities said. His conservative Democratic Center party released a statement calling it “an unacceptable act of violence.” The attack took place in a park in the Fontibon neighborhood when armed assailants shot him from behind, said the right-wing Democratic Center, which was the party of former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe. The men are not related. Images circulating on social media showed Uribe Turbay, 39, covered in blood being held by several people. The Santa Fe Foundation
NUCLEAR WARNING: Elites are carelessly fomenting fear and tensions between nuclear powers, perhaps because they have access to shelters, Tulsi Gabbard said After a trip to Hiroshima, US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard on Tuesday warned that “warmongers” were pushing the world to the brink of nuclear war. Gabbard did not specify her concerns. Gabbard posted on social media a video of grisly footage from the world’s first nuclear attack and of her staring reflectively at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial. On Aug. 6, 1945, the US obliterated Hiroshima, killing 140,000 people in the explosion and by the end of the year from the uranium bomb’s effects. Three days later, a US plane dropped a plutonium bomb on Nagasaki, leaving abut 74,000 people dead by the
RSS