We’re wrapping up a pretty relaxed first day at the press center with the day’s final two rehearsals. We will be back tomorrow for the second part of the first semi final!

Belarus
The good news? Zena is really good at that dancing and singing together thing and singing in general. The bad news? Everything else.

It’s all very random. She’s wearing a tight bodysuit with a messy pattern on and boots that don’t quite match. Her dancers don’t seem to be particularly choreographed with either her or each other, it’s pretty dark which feels too gloomy for this song, and there’s no obvious hint to the idea behind the staging and backdrop choices. There are a lot of things happening on the stage, but it looks like someone in the stage control room brought the kids to work and they keep asking what all the buttons do and clicking them. I do want to know what the red button does, though!

Serbia
You know what is my favorite kind of staging to write about? The one in which I can throw in ton of geeky bookish references. This one is a song of ice and fire, as we start with Nevena going all Elsa on stage turning everything around her into ice, before she morphs into the wicked witch from the west and appears in a swirl of fire to melt all that ice. She does all that while standing in one place, wearing her black dress, belting her vocals and commanding the stage and the cameras.

Most of this is just getting the shots right – in the first run through her head got cut at some point – but it’s generally close to what it’s supposed to be. Personally it’s slightly too dark but there are some on screen elements she interacts with that make it less static than it would have been otherwise. Overall the Serbians should be very happy with things are going.

All photos from eurovision.tv