The 70th Eurovision Song Contest holds its Grand Final at Vienna's Wiener Stadthalle on Saturday May 16 at 21:00 CEST, with semi-finals May 12 and May 14. [1] Thirty-five broadcasters will compete — two fewer than 2025 and the smallest field since 2003. Twenty-five countries reach the final.

Hosts Victoria Swarovski and Michael Ostrowski front the night, with Emily Busvine in the green room and the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra opening the flag parade. JJ, last year's winner with Wasted Love, returns to perform The Queen of the Night. The interval act stitches together Lordi, Verka Serduchka, Il Volo and Erika Vikman in 70th-anniversary tribute. [1]

The geopolitical line is sharper than the staging. Belgium's Flemish broadcaster VRT 1 announced it will not travel to Vienna over Israel's continued participation, with commentator Peter Van de Veire instead calling the show from Brussels. [2] The EBU has held the line: Israel competes; the entrant is still predicted sixth in Eurovisionworld's odds, behind Finland (31% favorite), Sweden, and Romania.

Saturday May 16 is also the 12:01 a.m. EDT expiry of OFAC General License 134B — the wind-down for Russia-origin oil already on tankers as of April 17 — and the Amsterdam open of Harry Styles' Together, Together tour. [3] Eurozone Q1 inflation printed 3.0% with energy up 11%; the Eurovision audience has been carrying the war's cost-of-living weight for months. The contest's official tagline of "United By Music" runs against an EBU that has spent the cycle litigating which kinds of unity it can afford.

-- CAMILLE BEAUMONT, Los Angeles