On Tuesday, February 4, the Benidorm Fest grand finale will choose who will represent Spain at Eurovision in 2023. Eurovision and Benidorm, Benidorm and Eurovision: the couple works so well that it is hard to understand how nobody came up with it before. Today the photo is sought, the tremendous local skyline outlined behind the petite beauty of Chanel, it is surprising that she is capable of becoming so great on stage.
We have everything so recently, that it produces a certain strangeness to be here again (“I have many memories, good and bad”, he does not forget to clarify the moral winner of the last festival). One suffers from the formality in the suit of President Puig, of Mayor Pérez, the latter untied, like the president of RTVE, José Manuel Pérez Tornero.
The marriage is perfect because both Benidorm and Eurovision, Benifest, enjoy extreme international popularity and tend to irritate snobs. The city and the contest live comfortable in the exaggeration. So many people suffering endless queues at British airports to get to these beaches, so many cameras and microphones for the advance of whatever they come to tell us, everything seems as out of measure as this hot summer.
It is about presenting the second edition of this contest aimed at choosing the Spanish representative in the next edition of Eurovision. There is a signing of papers, a protocol between the Generalitat Valenciana, the Benidorm City Council and RTVE - bureaucracy - and a glamor that comes from the hotel by bus provided by Chanel and her dancers. The Madrid press has come in Bermuda. Please.
Like last year, there will be three galas: two semi-finals and the "grand final" on February 4. It will be presented by Mónica Naranjo, who tells us about it remotely from Mexico. She and Chanel exchange compliments and cyber cuddles. Everything will be broadcast by Radio Televisión Española, of course, that's what it's done for. And they will sell tickets to attend in person, between 20 and 60 euros, small change for eurofans. Naranjo says goodbye quickly because she doesn't understand anything. It will be the heat, which affects the signal, says one.
The president of the public entity recalls that last year's promises have become a reality: millions of young people have been involved, the whole of Spain has achieved a record audience, "supporting Chanel" (elegantly forgetting that not everyone supported, ahem ). “From grandparents to grandchildren, outside of social networks, it is possible to summon everyone in a moment of synchronicity”. And here is a long list of thanks. Apart from an insufficient red fan, it is the only thing that is distributed among the present audience.
The mayor, Toni Pérez, recalls the somewhat unusual success of this alliance -we provide this, because he is from the PP and Puig from the PSOE, and today they are not discussing the tourist tax, another festival miracle- and assures us that here It's great, even if we don't think so. This vital optimism is one of the keys that make this extraordinary tourist capital attractive.
Ximo Puig closes formally. He recalls how extraordinary -it is the word of the day- that was the whole of last year, and how the Benidorm Fest was "a magnificent lever" for all the participants. It didn't cost much for someone to name Rigoberta Bandini, Tanxugueiras and company, but they don't appear in the script. "Thanks to all of you who make this great story possible -why not say it- of love", concludes the president. If we already said it.
