The days of backing an outsider to win Eurovision (semi-finals: Tue & Thu 21:00 on DR1 & SV1), during the final itself are long gone. Every year Google Analytics predicts the winner based on the number of searches for that song in the aftermath of its screening, so if you want to arrange an opportunistic family-only sweepstake, just check who the bookies have as favourites ahead of the voting – they won’t be wrong.
In the meantime, you’ll enjoy it more if you watch The Secret History of the Eurovision Song Contest (DR1, Mon 23:35 & Wed 23:15) and Facing The Music: Eurovision in Azerbaijan (BBC World, Sat 10:10 or 22:10). The programmes are respectively about the political pasts and presents of both the competition and Europe. Indeed, the two are so linked that of the seven countries who contested the first ever edition in 1956, six went on to become the founding nations of the EEC one year later.
The followers of the founding father of Kumare, a new ‘religion’ in Phoenix, don’t realise that their guru is a fake. New Jersey-born journalist Vikram Gandhi fools thousands into believing he is the one with made-up chants and fake yoga positions, but unlike Borat, he does eventually come clean on camera.
The Mayor of the Sunset Strip (DR2, Sat 17:00), about music guru Rodney Bingenheimer, is an open book from the start – it’s a revealing, fun comb-through of the last 50 years of popular music.
Elsewhere, Scandal (K4, Mon 21:00) is the kind of decrepit US political series that shows why they were so desperate to snap up Borgen; we’ve got the premieres of the second season of the US version of The Killing (K5, Sun 22:00) and series four (don’t miss ep five – the canal trip) of Peep Show (BBC Ent, Fri 23:45); Extraordinary Women: Maria Montessori (DRK, Thu 21:00) will be of interest to readers of our community columnist Isabelle Valentine, who runs one of her schools; Michael Palin and the Mystery of Hammershøi (DRK, Sat 20:00) is an accessible study of one of Denmark’s greatest ever artists; and if you’re not one of the millions who own 21, tune into Adele – Live at the Royal Albert Hall (DRHD, Tue 20:00) to find out what all the fuss is about.
