Eurovision Song Contest 1987

Eurovision Song Contest 1987
The Eurovision Song Contest 1987 was the 32nd edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in Brussels, Belgium, following the country's victory at the with the song "J'aime la vie" by Sandra Kim. Organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster (RTBF), the contest was held at the Centenary Palace on 9 May 1987 (also Europe Day) and hosted by French-Belgian singer Viktor Lazlo.
Twenty-two countries took part in the contest with and returning to the competition after their absences the previous year. This set the record for the highest number of competing countries up until that point.
The winner was with the song "Hold Me Now" by Johnny Logan, who had also won the contest. He was the first performer to have won the Eurovision Song Contest twice.
Location
The contest took place at the Brussels Exhibition Centre (Brussels Expo) in Brussels, Belgium. These are a set of exhibition halls built from 1930 on the Heysel/Heizel Plateau (Heysel Park) in Laeken (northern part of the City of Brussels) to celebrate the centenary of Belgian Independence. The Centenary Palace, where the main stage was located, is one of the remaining buildings of the Brussels International Exposition of 1935. Currently, it is still being used for trade fairs, as well as concerts, usually for bigger acts and artists.
Participating countries
The 1987 Eurovision was the biggest contest to date, and it was also the first in which 22 countries competed. Only , and failed to compete out of all the countries which had entered the contest in the past. The large number of participating countries caused some problems for the EBU, which ranged from the available dates for the rehearsals to the readjustment of the duration of the televised finale. Due to this situation, after the contest, the EBU set the limit of participating countries to 22. This was a problematic question over the next five years as new and returning nations indicated an interest in participating, but they could not be accommodated.
Returning artists
Bold indicates a previous winner.
Format
Host broadcaster rule
By 1986, Belgium has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 30 times since making its debut at the first contest in along 6 other countries. Before Sandra Kim's win, Belgium was the only one of the 7 founding countries to have never won the contest and had only twice finished in the top five (with Tonia's fourth place in and Jean Vallée's second place in ).
Sandra Kim's Eurovision victory in 1986 occurred amidst a complex political situation in Belgium. The country was undergoing massive constitutional reforms in which the Belgian state was transitioning from a centralized to a federal system. This was due to rising tensions between the two major linguistic regions of Belgium, Dutch-speaking Flanders and French-speaking Wallonia. Both regions had had independent broadcasters since 1960 (BRT in Flanders and RTBF in Wallonia) but had still agreed to jointly host the contest in the event of a Belgian victory. While the triumph of "" in 1986an entry sent by French-speaking RTBFreignited a sense of national union across all Belgian regions, the two regional broadcasters weren't able to overcome their disagreements and joint host the competition. During the production of the event, BRT eventually withdrew from the project and RTBF organised the contest alone as host broadcaster. BRT remained in charge of the selection of the Belgian entry for the contest. Thirty-three years later, in her academic study "Which Belgium Won Eurovision? European Unity and Belgian Disunity" published in 2019, the scholar Julie Kalman describes how, as a consequence, the host country images in Eurovision 1987 mostly showed footage of Wallonia.
Host city selection process
During the selection process of the host city and venue, a joint committee was created and had members from both broadcasting companies. The committee decided that a potential place for the contest was the Royal Theatre of Antwerp, as both locations proposed by RTBF (the Palais du Centenaire in Brussels and the in Liege) would have required heavy renovation work to meet the proposed date for the contest. Nevertheless, RTBF demanded the event to be held in Brussels with the argument that the city symbolized more than Belgium itself, in addition to its federal functions as the capital of the country (with almost all governing bodies of the European Union also located there). On 6 October 1986, seven months ahead of the contest, RTBF surprisingly and one-sidedly announced that the Palais du Centenaire was chosen as the host venue for the Eurovision Song Contest 1987. The Flemish newspaper , published that BRT proposed instead to host the contest at the Cirque Royal, near the Royal Palace of Brussels, adding that RTBF would be solely in charge of organizing the contest if BRT's counteroffer was not chosen. However, RTBF moved forward with its plans and confirmed that the Palais du Centenaire was the official contest's host venue. BRT was offended by the choice of Brussels as the host city, and withdrew from the organization, but kept the duties to choose the host's country contestant.
Budget
Holding the contest in Belgium caused several legal changes in the country's system and forced the implementation of most of the modern rules and regulations on the monetization of public television. This led to the authorization of advertising, sponsorships and marketing actions in the two public channels in the country. As a consequence, the RTBF was also allowed to sell sponsorship quotas for the event, setting a new precedent for the Eurovision Song Contest.
For RTBF, this decision was a relief as the event was almost entirely funded with private funds. This opened the doors to the commercial potential of the event itself, starting a period of modernization and increased interest for the event. Apart from the latent tensions, after the end of the contest the then-president of the BRT Cas Goossens praised RTBF for their "perfect organization" while at the same time regretting that the two broadcasters weren't able to collaborate. He added that the cost of hosting Eurovision would have been difficult to justify to the Flemish taxpayers.
Contest overview
Spokespersons
Each country nominated a spokesperson who was responsible for announcing the votes for their respective country via telephone. Known spokespersons at the 1987 contest are listed below.
An Ploegaerts
Guðrún Skúladóttir
Colin Berry
Ljiljana Tipsarević
Detailed voting results
12 points
Below is a summary of all 12 points in the final:
Broadcasts
Each participating broadcaster was required to relay the contest via its networks. Non-participating EBU member broadcasters were also able to relay the contest as "passive participants". Broadcasters were able to send commentators to provide coverage of the contest in their own native language and to relay information about the artists and songs to their television viewers. Known details on the broadcasts in each country, including the specific broadcasting stations and commentators are shown in the tables below.
See also
Eurovision Young Dancers 1987
Notes
References
External links
1987
Music festivals in Belgium
1987 in music
1987 in Belgium
1980s in Brussels
May 1987 events in Europe
Events in Brussels