Swedish TV star is Eurovision ‘hero’

It could only happen at the Eurovision Song Contest— TV presenter preforming an electro-pop ballad dancing in front of a black screen with animated gnomes, wins the final.

Sweden’s Mans Zelmerlow did just that — waltzing off with the coveted prize in Vienna, after beating Russia and Italy in the world’s biggest international music show.

The 28-year-old singer and TV presenter had been a bookmakers’ favourite and did not disappoint with his song Heroes.

Sweden has won the 60-year-old competition six times, more than any other nation apart from Ireland. Sweden won most recently in 2012 with ‘Euphoria’ by Loreen and now gets to host the contest again next year.

This year’s theme was Building Bridges, which many artists interpreted as an appeal for tolerance in performances that included a gay kiss scene by Lithuania.

“We are all heroes no matter who we love, who we are or what we believe in,” Zelmerlow told the crowd in Vienna after getting a hug from last year’s victor, bearded drag queen Conchita Wurst of Austria.

He beat Russia’s Polina Gagarina, whose song ‘A Million Voices’ reaped top scores from most former Soviet satellite states that earned angry jeers from the crowd in Austria.

“Please remember our motto is building bridges and that music should stand over politics tonight,” presenter Alice Tumler told the audience.

The annual kitsch-fest was watched last year by more than 195m people in 45 countries, or more viewers than the Super Bowl.

This year China broadcast the world’s longest running music competition, a fixture in the gay calendar, live for the first time.

While viewers are often puzzled by the inclusion of countries outside Europe such as Israel, which qualifies thanks to membership of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), this year the net was cast even wider. To mark 60 years since the first Eurovision in 1955, Australia was given a wild card entry and singer Guy Sebastian and his up-tempo song ‘Tonight Again,’ a big hit with the crowds in Austria, finished fifth.

Recent hosts have spent an average of €25m on staging the event. But EBU media director Jean Philip de Tender said it was possible to host it for €11m, allowing the host nation to break even.

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