Nick: Italy in a bucket.
“Can we have ‘Rome’ please, in blues and golds?”
“What do you mean, ‘Rome’?”
“Oh, you know. Rome! Google Image it, you’ll get the idea!”
And so, dear reader, it came to pass that a bunch of 6 year olds spent a morning doing cutting and gluing with some standard issue Italian antiquities and called it a backdrop.
“And for a choreography, we’re thinking Herreys, in suits, not dancing. Can you film that?
“Ummm… Are you sure you know what you’re doing there, Rai?”
“Remind me again who won Junior back in November? Oh, that’s right, it was US. We, Rai, are on a winning roll! Worship our elite winning skillz!”
And so, dear reader, it came to pass that Il Volo spent three minutes on stage looking like they thought all they needed to do was turn up and be classy and they’d have this thing won.
It’s only a first rehearsal, of course, but for an ante-post favourite it may all be going a bit Amaury Vassili at this point.
Rosé: Il Volo take flight..
The Italian boys are on!! Ignazio with bed head, Piero with stubble and Gianluca looking gorgeous as usual. Textured white shirts, crisp suits and red (yes red) shoes! They are in stunning voice, as we knew they would be and are still oozing charm. The backdrop is a little ‘in your face’ with columns, statues, lions and clouds rising up on the big notes. It’s all very black and white with the odd splash of oranges and blues and the clouds are depicted subtly in the stage floor. The boys stride around the stage at about the two minute mark with a casual nonchalance and close up shots that I love and then the camera pans back down the stairs showing us them all coming together to belt out the last chorus. I absolutely love this and would love it to win. I think these boys’ absolute charm could do it for them but it won’t be a runaway. Vocally perfect at only 70 percent. Bravo Italia!
Phil: Italy…. It’s not winning you know…
The main question with this one is, who is it going to beat?
Will it beat Russia? – No, not on this performance, Russia are going to kill it with kindness.
Will it beat Sweden, No, it’s not good enough.
Will it be Slovenia. No.
For me it doesn’t look effortless, it looks like going through the motions and thats even with my “it’s a first rehearsal” head on It’s static, it’s a touch turgid, it’s Eurovision Cliche’s for beginners and to top it off, RAI have decided to put famous Italian landmarks in the background…. is this the Irish equivalent of Irish dancing in every performance? – It will get Top 10, and possibly top 5, but ere is no way this is the best song in the contest and will probably NOT win.
Il Volvo, as we are now calling them, are a safe pair of hands for a broadcaster that doesn’t want to win but go close to justify it’s existence in this contest. That’s what you’re gonna get.
Monty: Italy – it’s very Italian
Italy are the first of the Big 5 to go today. There’s a lot of excitement about this, it’s seen as a genuine contender. The boys are in suits with red shoes. They could be a metaphor for being trapped in the never-ending Eurovision bubble (or a nod to the 1972 host Moira Shearer’s most famous film role). The first run through (and remember this is a technical first rehearsal) was fine vocally, but the choice of backdrop is questionable. We have a variety of Italianate sculpture and columns. You can picture the production meeting: make it look classically Italian. It couldn’t be more Italian if you strung up some Parma hams and handed out pizza round the audience (mmh, pizza….). It’s hideous. It’s way too big for a start: two walloping great lions vie for attention alongside rearing horses and a Venus de Milo. Smoke billows behind them as the two money shots are hit sonically. I expected so much better than this. It’s still powerful, it’s still bold, it’s still probably the best example of this genre we’ve had at the Contest, but they need to have a word in somebody’s shell-like about that projection. It could be the difference between a win and a loss.