With Eurovision 2023 in full swing, just days away from the first show, let's see how all of this has been made possible.
Earlier today, we saw the Turquoise carpet followed by the opening ceremony, hosted at St George’s Hall in the heart of Liverpool.
Liverpudlian television personality Sam Quek and Ukrainian television presenter Timur Miroshnychenko welcomed 37 delegations to Liverpool, with 400 of the world’s media and thousands of fans lining up to see the acts walk on the Turquoise carpet, which is over 100 metres long.
Take to the stage
Eurovision 2023 will see nine shows in total across six days at the M&S Bank Arena in Liverpool. But what does that mean for all the lighting, rigging and sound equipment?
In the arena, there are over 600 rigging points, 140 tonnes of steel ground support structure, with 1km of additional steel truss work being added. In addition to this, there are 200 custom staging decks, 950 square metres of staging for the main stage and 500 square metres of staging for the green room, which is surrounded by 200 metres of secure fencing.
Love Shine A Light
Eurovision 2023 will see 8 miles of cabling for lighting, sound, video, and SFX (special effects), along with over 2,000 specialist lighting fixtures.
The arena will be well and truly lit up, as the arena boasts 165,000 channels of lighting control across 3 operators, 23,700 individual light sources, and 2,500 automated state of the art colour-changing robotic lights.
The lighting team will use 9 consoles to run 28,000 lighting cues, with 15 follow spots being operated by 10 professionals and 5 theatre technology students from LIPA & Cheshire College.
Sound of Beauty
Of course, a live show wouldn’t be anything without it’s sound, right? Well, for Eurovision 2023, there’s 150 microphones, and over 1,200 individual streams of audio.
P-P-P-Power!
An impressive 1 megawatt UPS power (uninterrupted power supply) will be in effect for the contest, alongside 60 miles of cabling around the arena, 150 distribution boards, and 5,000 man-hours dedicated to power works.
Eurovision 2023 is expected to pull in over 160 million viewers across the world, with over 8 hours of live television and 50 live feeds in total. A total of 29 commentators will be broadcasting live from the arena.
Now that the artists can be heard and seen on stage, they also need to look the part too, and in the words of Konstrakta, “Koja li je tajna zdrave kose Meghan Markle?” The secret is deep hydration of course… and a good hair and make up team to match.
The hair and make up team for Eurovision 2023 has used over 100 wigs and hairpieces, 1,000 litres of hairspray, over 3,000 makeup brushes, and 5,000 hairpins to create the looks for all of the 37 artists.
But what about their outfits I hear you say? The costume departments have also been working alongside the hair and make up team, with 150 metres of costume rails full of costumes. (That’s equivalent to three Olympic sized swimming pools in length!)
The costume department has also manufactured 482 costumes across the three live shows, using 20,000 metres of thread. 47 of these outfits took 250 metres of fabric to manufacture! All of the manufacturing has been done in both the United Kingdom and Ukraine.
BBC Director of Unscripted, Kate Phillips assures us that they’re working hard to make Eurovision 2023 unmissable television: “As these statistics show this is one of the biggest events the BBC has ever produced. Coming straight after such a significant and spectacular moment in history, we aim to produce an unforgettable and utterly joyful Eurovision, on behalf of Ukraine. Like the Coronation, Eurovision has so many skilled and talented people from across the BBC working on it. Our brilliant team in Liverpool are making sure that all three live shows are simply must see TV, for audiences across the UK, Europe and beyond.”
The live shows of Eurovision 2023 begin on Tuesday 9th May at 20:00 GMT with semi final 1. The second semi final will take place on Thursday 11th May at 20:00 GMT, with the final at the same time on Saturday 13th May.
Are you interested in the ins and outs of a production like Eurovision? Have any of these facts and figures surprised you? Let us know in the comments below!
