Can The Pope Win Eurovision?

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1:56Hello and welcome to this episode of the Rest is Entertainment, questions and answers edition. Element of special here, I'm Marina Hyde. Element of special here being about the programme. Sorry, yeah, if I try to introduce anything to that opening sequence, it just does derail still, doesn't it? Doesn't it say, and I'm Richard Osman. Yes, Richard Osman. Always have been, always will be. Now. Now, for the second half of this questions and answers edition. This is an absolute mess so far. It is, it's a dog's breakfast. However, we have got something of a Eurovision special. So many of you sent your questions in and we were able to put them to entities known as the Two Martins.

2:30Martin Green, who's the director of the Eurovision Song Contest, and Martin Österdahl, who is the Eurovision Song Contest executive supervisor. We had some great questions. They've given us great answers as well. So that'll be after the break. But first, let's do some non-Eurovision questions. Is that crazy? I have a question for you about fake languages, Marina. Now, this comes from Sammy. Sammy has neglected to give us a surname. And the whole problem is that's where you have to give surnames. Otherwise, Martin Green and Martin Osterdahl, we wouldn't know who was who. No. That's why we use surnames.

3:01So Sammy McLammy, let's say, like a Scottish David Lammy. Sammy McLammy asks, my question is how much work goes into making fake languages on TV shows? Are they just saying any old gibberish or is there actually a lot of work that has gone into the making of it? Oh, OK. I happen to know quite a lot about what are called conlangs, constructed languages. When you hear these things on TV, it obviously ranges from the equivalent of people going rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb, and it is just obvious gibberish, to really sophisticated, constructed languages. Like Tolkien is one of the first people who does this in The Lord of the Rings and Cimmerillion and all things like that.

3:34There are various different languages, but even Elvish languages, there's two of them, Quenya and Sindarin, and they're the most developed ones. I'm literally losing the will to live. Well, they're quite like Welsh and Finnish. Tolkien was an amazing linguist and he was a professor and everything. Nonetheless, they're not completely codified. You couldn't learn to speak it from the books. But what he did was he created root words and therefore the films, when they came to them, were able to work on those roots. You'd have words that connote things to do with water and words that can, I don't know, connote things to do with stopping.

4:05So you'd put them together and you'd have someone who's like a lock keeper or a dam builder or something like that. You don't hear the word connote that often, do you? Well, I don't know why. Listen, it's great. I love it. Well, anyway. Honestly, my language skills, genuinely, after this podcast, is so much better than they were. I think you're not being entirely serious, and I quite deserve it. That's fine. Now, AI can obviously create you one of these languages so quickly now, and they can just whip you up anything. But many were created before AI would do it for you. Like, Woodship Down has Lapin.

4:34That was quite sophisticated. Klingon. Now, Klingon in Star Trek. You can learn that, right? Yeah. Mark Ockrand was the person who created that. and there's a whole grammar, vocabulary very developed. As always, there's kind of university courses and actually if you study linguistics at university, you can look at certain... Like Navi from the Avatar films. They actually took some time. You know, James Cameron had to be so fastidious about building the world. You can study the building of that language. Imagine how disappointed you'd be in your children if they went to university and they studied Navi.

5:04They'd go, what are you learning? Mechanical engineering. Navi from the Avatar films. Well, maybe they'd be doing... No, but they're doing linguistics. Well, hopefully they would be. Game of Thrones obviously had quite a few. They had Dothraki and High Valyrian and things like that. HBO developed those languages because in the books they didn't really exist. In George R.R. Martin's books, they didn't really exist. What is HBO and Dothraki? I don't know. They spend no time watching it, which makes me feel, you know, someone needs to really tell them to do that instead of go to war the whole time.

5:31District 9, that had a lot. Do you remember District 9? The aliens, they descend on basically Johannesburg. And Parseltongue in Harry Potter, that is basically gibberish, but it's sort of mesmerising and kind of whispery and you kind of want to listen to that. Navi, I said, didn't I? That was a guy called Paul Frommer. Dr. Paul Frommer developed it with all its special syntax and phonetics and all of that. Minionese is the last one. Yeah, beer coffin. There's quite a lot of nonsense in that as well as kind of little bits from other languages but it's sort of funny and that's why it works because you can recognise...

6:03It's like a sort of form of kind of comic Esperanto in a weird way. So there's lots of different ones but now, as I say, I mean, you could just get AI to kind of knock you up a language. I don't know if anyone's actually done that, but it's relatively easy compared to before when they would kind of enlist all these people to create something so that people could speak in these languages to make authentic. Like the greatest made-up languages really are Pingu's language and the Clangas' as well, which are lovely because they just have the rhythm of speech, but making noises, like when Charlie Brown's talking on the telephone.

6:32Those are the languages I understand because we recognise the rhythm of a joke. We recognise the rhythm of a question. All of those things, you realise, how much of language is rhythm when you just sort of, you know, you could do a podcast that was, you know, just going to...

6:49Oh, those kind of strange ethereal noises of the clangers, like the music of the spheres. Do you know what? I nearly did the clangers and I thought, I don't think the microphone could take it. No, I know. I was thinking, no, I won't chime in here. Now, of course, people try and understand where it can be codified since the advent of the internet, which came after things like Klingon was invented. Yeah. but people have tried to codify all these languages and there are lots of different, as I say, there are even university courses. I reckon you could do an entire, I'd love for someone to do this, it must be doable, do an entire episode of The Rest is Politics, put it into Pingo language, listen to it and still have a pretty rough idea of what Rory and Alistair were talking about.

7:28What a challenge. You've suddenly laid down a gauntlet there. If someone could do just a little exchange from the two of them in Pingo language. Send it in. We'd love to see it. I don't know why I didn't say our podcast. I do. Anyway, have you got a question for me? Yes, I do have a question for you. It's about fake languages. I just asked it to you. Sorry if it's confusing. Can I ask you about the darts, Richard? Yes, I was going to say, should we take it in turns? Can I ask you about the darts and walk on music? Gareth Parton has asked. Good surname. Strong surname. And actually a nice greeting at the start.

8:02Good day, Richard and Marina. I wonder where he's from. I'm living in Melbourne, Australia. brackets British expat and I enjoyed the Snooker World Championships from afar what would your intro music be and what would your Monica be? Monica's I always think it's confusing that Monica is also someone's name yeah if you've got Monica Monica is your Monica I did Let's Play Dance for Comic Relief and my walk on music was I Wish I Was a Little Bit Taller by Ski Low which is great I've talked about this before I'm sure I had Britain's tallest woman was my bodyguard and a guy who was seven foot two as well and I was the big Frimley Giant because it was a Frimley Green but I think if I really was a professional dance player I'd like to be called the Chiswick Flyover which doesn't make any sense but I think no I love it though there's something about it that I love it I think it sounds pretty good how about you I would be Marina Nowhere to Hide because oh that's clever but I know my music so wait a minute so your nickname is Nowhere to yeah okay which sounds like a horror film Nowhere to which is honestly it's made like 18 times it's budget sounds like it's a real indie thing that won like some golden bear claw somewhere I cannot wait for Nowhere 3.

9:06Okay. Now, my music is not even a contest. It would be the theme from Stingray, Marina, Aqua Marina. Oh, clever. Do you remember? Yes. Now, that was written by Barry Gray, performed by Gary Miller and the Barry Gray Orchestra. And I would ask them to do something with the lighting so it all felt like we were, as it came on, you know, Marina, Aqua Marina. Really good, yeah. What are these strange enchantments that start whenever you're near? It would all be blue, like the lighting, so it would feel like we were underwater as I came in. Marina, nowhere to hide. Do you think they would be able to do that in all the venues?

9:36I would make it a condition of my attendance. They tend not to do kind of underwater type things. It's just actually a really basic lighting effect that you could do in a student theatre, Richard. And I'm pretty sure, unless you're saying they can't manage it, which I'm pretty sure they could. Yeah, if Barry Hearn is listening. Barry, could you do an underwater light effect for Marina? Barry will tell us. And also tell us how much it costs. He'll say, I'll do it. It'll cost you. The best dance nickname is Mark Frost, who was called Frosty the Throw Man. Yeah, you're right. It's unbeatable. But it's amazing having Luke Humphreys and Luke Littler because you think obviously the first Luke is always going to get the coolest nickname.

10:16So Luke Humphreys is Cool Hand Luke, which is a great nickname. And then Luke Littler comes along. They've still got Luke the Nuke. Yeah. It's still there. I mean, that's a good first name. They're long and strong. They've got plenty more, I think. Yeah, haven't they just? And yet can't think of one off the top of their head. What, Luke? Yeah. Luke, I am your father? Yeah. That would be a good one. That's a drama. Yeah. Luke, stop and listen. Luke at what I'm about to do. Yeah. Luke, I'm really good at darts. Luke who's talking, Luke who's talking too. Yeah, yeah. Luke Humphrey should have been called Luke who's talking, and then Luke Littler should have been called Luke who's talking too.

10:51Come on, guys. You know what? We're not the seniors too. Yeah. Rob Walker there, who does all the walk-ons at the snooker and kind of ramps up the audience and stuff. But he's the one, he comes up with the nicknames. for all the players. He kind of invents them. So the older ones, obviously Hurricane Higgins and Whirlwind White, and now Xiao Xin Tong, who is the world champion, is the Cyclone. We've been waiting for a while for a Cyclone. James Watanau was the Typhoon, I think. But yeah, he makes them up. He fits you with your... He fits you with your... And if you're the first time playing at the Crucible, he'll give you his name.

11:22Like Luca Bressel, who was the world champion a couple of years ago, he came up with the name, the Belgian Bullet. It often is the country you're from and something that suggests velocity. But now in some snooker tournaments, they have walk-on music as well. You can always tell a lot about players from the walk-on music that they use. The snooker's nicknames are not quite as good as darts nicknames, I have to say. I agree with you on that. The Wizard of Whishaw. It's John Higgins. Mark Williams is the Welsh potting machine. It sounds like something you get at a garden centre. It really just sat, yes, just right at the end by the till.

11:54Ronnie, of course, has got the rocket and that's great. That is pretty much unimpeachable. The worst one of all, of course, is Mark Selby, who is the jester from Leicester. And you're like, I mean, I love Mark Selby, but he's not Michael McIntyre. So will Rob Walker not brook the idea of people being able to come up with their own names? Well, there was a time in snooker pre-Rob Walker. I know it's difficult for modern fans to appreciate that. And so a lot of those are heritage nicknames. But now if you're playing in your first tournament, he will assign you a nickname. I think he should loosen his vice-like grip on the nomenclature and people should be able to just chime in with their own thing.

12:30I love it, but also you can tell some of the names don't age brilliant. Like when Ding Jun-Wi was the first big Chinese star in snooker, immediately he was called Enter the Dragon. And you're like, okay, I sort of get it. And now the nicknames tend to be just about the person rather than... Oh, they've got one from over there. Yes, exactly. Dart nicknames in general, which people come up with themselves, I think are slightly more evolved than snooker nicknames. And of course the darts walk on music. So the big thing in darts, apart from the World Championship and all that, is if you get to play in the Premier League, it's eight people each year who get to play in the Premier League.

13:05And it's a big tour around the country. Huge numbers, like big money as well. So if you get into that eight-player league, you're making an absolute fortune. And there's a guy called Nathan Aspinall, nicknamed the Asp. And he would have been on the bubble, just on the cusp of, you know, is he seventh, eighth, ninth? What would he be? But his walk on music is Mr. Brightside. and people go absolutely nuts when it's played. The whole place absolutely goes off. And there are people who said, you know what, because he was on the cusp, having Mr. Brightside as his walk-on music was the thing that just knocked him into eighth place in that league.

13:39So they can be very, very lucrative pieces of walk-on music. Luke Humphries was accused of stealing his I Predict a Riot. I remember, yeah. Because he's from Leeds, and Kaiser Tief's from Leeds. And there was a player a while back who used I Predict a Riot, but it sort of suits Luke Humphries better. But yeah, so if you're the ninth best dance player in the world, my advice would be choose a great piece of Wacom music and you'll double your earnings. Now, I absolutely love that. We've got a huge number of questions about Eurovision. Do you think we should go to a break now so that we can fully service this particular banquet of questioning?

14:10I have to say, even if you're not a Eurovision fan, there are some fun questions and some fun answers as well.

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15:55Welcome back, everybody. Now, it's Eurovision Song Contest this weekend. It's the semifinals all week as well. We have so many questions about Eurovision that we felt like we had to get some experts to talk to us. So we've got Martin Green and Martin Österdahl. Let's just get a little clip from both of them so you understand exactly what it is they do, what's different they do, and also just because we get to enjoy Martin Österdahl's wonderful Swedish accent. Well hi Marina and Richard, thanks for having us on, it's great to be here. My name is Martin Green and I'm the director of the Eurovision Song Contest.

16:29Yeah, hello and thanks for having us on. I'm Martin Österdahl, I'm the executive supervisor of the Eurovision Song Contest. So I primarily look after the show itself, everything that happens on stage, everything in the contest. Yeah, he gets the fun stuff. I think the best way to start, I look after the brand. So I'm looking at it sort of more of a year round thing. And, you know, constantly in conversation with my colleague here about what we can do for the future. Patsy Davis. This is a good one to start with, I think. It seems like the most complex gig of all time to plan, organise and execute on the night given it's live broadcast to not only every European member state but all over the world.

17:09Can you talk through how it all works and approximately how many people are involved from performers to country point hosts jurors and the in-between? Surely it must be one of, if not the, biggest TV event in the world. Martin and Martin. Well thanks for that question Patsy. How many hours do I get? Well how to explain, first of all there are 37 this year 37 delegations which are representing their country. They come from the national broadcasters or the state broadcaster of each country. They come in a group of 25, 27, 29 people. So it's 37 times all those people. But then, of course, also backstage, we have a production crew, and the production crew is usually a couple of hundred, like 500, 600 people.

17:53And on top of that, you have everyone else working with the host broadcaster organization, which adds several hundred more. and then you have an additional 400 or 500 working from the city. You have a similar number of volunteers, probably even more volunteers. You have international and national press, sometimes more than 1 ,000. All in all, one way to measure the amount of people that actually one way or another contribute to these shows is to count the badges that we're all wearing when we're inside the venue area. And in that system, we typically print around 10 or 11 or even 12 ,000. We're actually up this year.

18:35There are 14 ,000 accredited people to Eurovision this year. I think what some viewers probably don't realize is, yes, we have two live finals and a grand final. But each of those shows have two dress rehearsals with a full audience and an extra dress rehearsal with no audience to begin with. So we run the show 12 times in five days. by the end of the week the show is so long that the audience coming out and meeting the audience coming in um uh and i you know there's a great way to put this if you do the brits uh at the o2 in london let's say you're in and out of that venue in four days we are in this venue for seven weeks um and uh that kind of gives you an idea of the complexity of it you've got a live audience 37 acts, 37 live links into the show to do the voting.

19:25I said to someone the other day, I've produced an Olympic opening ceremony and this is far more complicated. I remember when I first produced this show back in 2013, we had Lady Gaga's world tour as the biggest event after us coming in. And I think that world tour, which was the biggest of that time, had 37 semi-trailers of technology. We came in to Malmo Arena at that time with 97. We are now over 200 semi-trailers of technology that are unloaded in the initial week of those seven or eight weeks that we're in the venue. We're the biggest music show in the world. I mean, you know, it's not spin.

20:07You know, 160 million people watch us. We have votes from 150 countries. The engagement on our digital now, which is the modern phenomenon, is just off the charts. and there's a great stat which is 35 % of our audience is under 25 and for a lot of broadcasters that is a holy grail and we're continuing to see kids engage in this. We've got Roblox this year as well, Eurovision's on Roblox so it continues. I love Martin and Martin. Yeah, so do I. Isn't that amazing? But that is genuinely extraordinary. As he says, it's bigger than doing an Olympic opening ceremony and I have to say that when they were saying it's the biggest thing in the world, you're thinking okay things like the Olympics are a bigger technical challenge if we've discussed on this before but not all telescoped onto sort of one live event that's across the fortnight or whatever.

20:59Yeah that we just sit down and go on social media and say oh my god I can't believe what Moldova are wearing and those guys have to just give you like every single thing 14 ,000 security passes. It would actually be quicker just to give people passes if they're not allowed in. I just it would be yeah that is enormous. I'm actually interested in another question then, jumping off the back of that, because given that they have that many people watching, 160 million people, Nina Marriott says, which European country likes Eurovision the most by population share? I always assumed it would be Sweden.

21:32Actually, by the way, I saw a really funny interview with Remember Monday, the UK entry, and they were talking about meeting the Swedish entry. And the Swedish were like, yeah, no, we're like a real null points country. And they're like, no, no, sorry, sorry. By the way, you're like topping the leaderboard. I can't remember what Ireland is it. Brits are the nort point country. Come on, guys. You are not a nort point country. No way. You are Eurovision royalty. So here's Martin and Martin to answer your question, Nina. Well, they're all quite big. I think what I know is that I think it's Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK who have huge audiences.

22:06Obviously, it's all proportional. If you want to look at Cher, Iceland is like 60 odd percent of the viewing public are watching us. And then you go into things like our digital audiences where we had like six billion different interactions last year. So that half of the show, because I see half of everything we do is digital now, is just exploding because we have this perfect format. We are still one of the last appointment to view linear television events where people will sit down at eight or nine o 'clock with a group of people to watch it on the Saturday May. But we produce 37 new pieces of content every year and all their derivatives.

22:49And we therefore have this perfect format for digital as well. So our numbers are just extraordinary and really interestingly growing. So Iceland, the answer there. Doesn't surprise. I love the Icelandics. Amazing. I can't believe we're not going to be together for this contest. It's all wrong. I'm having to lie fallow for a year, party-wise. Yes, you normally have a Eurovision party. I'm living in a building site. I told you not to buy a building site. I said buy a house. I told you. On so many other matters, I should have listened to you. Yeah, the rest is property. I'll tell you what we also want to know, Martins.