Eurovision may have been canceled for 2020, but Netflix is trying to fill that gap with Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga, its new movie starring Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams. Though the film focuses on the fictional band Fire Saga and their fake single "Volcano Man," it does include enough Easter eggs and nods to the real-life competition to keep Eurovision heads happy, including a big singalong featuring a whos-who of former contestants.
So far, Eurovision fans have spotted the following references in the movie:
Spinning wheel
In one of Lars Erickssong's (played by Ferrell) outlandish routines, we see him trying to perform whilst spinning inside a giant wheel. This is a reference to a real performance from the 2014 Eurovision Song Contest that saw Ukrainian entry Mariya Yaremchuk's backing dancer in a similar contraption, which apparently was meant to represent how time moves forward on the clock of love.
Trolls
One performer seen in the Eurovision movie is in full trollface, looking like a cross between Lord of the Rings and Dancing With the Stars. This is a tribute to the band Lordi, the Finnish band who won the contest in 2006 with a record-breaking 292 points for their song "Hard Rock Hallelujah," which they performed in full monster prosthetics.
Abba
At this point, Abba are basically the patron saints of Eurovision. The band won the contest in 1974 with their song "Waterloo," and then went on to become one of the biggest bands in the world. In the Netflix movie, watching this performance is the thing that makes Lars want to enter the competition, and the 2020 contest opens with a group rendition of their song.
U.K. winning
In Eurovision: The Story of Fire Saga, the competition is being held in the U.K. following a British win of the contest—something that the movie jokes, is very unlikely.
Though the United Kingdom has won the contest five times (making them joint third on the all-time leaderboards), they have not won the contest since 1997, and most of their 21st-century entries have placed near the bottom of the leaderboard. Since 2000, the U.K. has been in last place four times and has not reached the top 10 in the finals since 2009.
Graham Norton
The cast of Eurovision includes Graham Norton, playing himself as a Eurovision commentator. In real life, the Irish TV presenter has commented on the song contest for the BBC since 2009, and has become well known for his sometimes savage takes on various acts.
The singalong
Eurovision fans have particularly enjoyed the singalong sequence in the movie, which features cameos from some of the biggest and best acts from recent Eurovisions. Among the contestants viewers have spotted are:
- Conchita Wurst, the bearded drag queen who won in 2014 for Austria with "Rise Like a Phoenix."
- Alexander Ryback, who won Eurovision 2009 for Norway (beating Lordi's all-time high score record) with "Fairytale" and came 15th with "That's How You Write a Song."
- Loreen, who won for Sweden in 2012 with "Euphoria."
- Jamala, who won for Ukraine in 2016 with "1944."
- Bilal Hassai, who came 16th in 2019 with "Roi," representing Israel.
- Netta, who won for Israel in 2018 with "Toy."
- Elina Nechayeva, who came 8th for Estonia in 2018 with "La Forza."
- John Lundvik, who came 5th for Sweden in 2019 with "Too Late For Love."
The stage
Eagle-eyed Netflix viewers have noticed that the stage that the contestants perform on is a very accurate replica of the actual stage of the 2019 contest, held in Tel Aviv.
Errors
Though the references to real Eurovision have been appreciated by fans, many other viewers have pointed out that a number of acts' performances would have got them disqualified if this was the real contest.
Sweden, for example, has more than six people on stage, while other acts perform songs longer than three minutes and take longer than 30 seconds to get off the stage–all things not allowed in the current rules.
Elsewhere, the semi-final results are revealed before the final, and Norton commentates over the songs themselves, both of which do not happen in real life.
Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga is streaming now on Netflix.
