Duncan Laurence did not show up at Schiphol yesterday, where his protégés Mia & Dion waved goodbye to the press on their way to Liverpool. “He is afraid of critical questions.”
It was a huge media event when Duncan Laurence left for the Eurovision Song Contest in 2019: the entire team, including mentor Ilse DeLange, took a photo in the departure hall of Schiphol. How different it was yesterday with Mia & Dion: they were completely alone at the airport. And mentor Duncan? Nowhere to be seen.
“Where’s Duncan?”
RTL Boulevard is critical of it. The voice-over of the show section yesterday evening: “They have to do without them at the moment of goodbye creative director Duncan Laurence, who avoids all press through the side entrance. And that while his own support Ilse DeLange did not leave his side for a moment four years ago.”
Reporter Aran Bade on the spot to Mia & Dion: “Is Duncan there?”
Mia: “There is indeed. He is already checking in with Jordan.”
Aran: “We don’t speak to them here anymore?”
Dion: “I don’t really know. We arrived with just the two of us.”
Afraid of questions
It’s unbelievable, Aran says at the desk. “If you compare it with the Dutch national team: we are leaving with three injured players and a national coach who is not there.”
Colleague Lex Uiting: “By that national coach you mean Duncan Laurence, of course. You’ve been hanging out there for a few days now. At least: you are critical. (…) So he wasn’t there again this morning. Why is it so important that he is here?”
Aran: “I think he has a kind of fear of critical questions. The main thing he needs to be here for at this farewell moment is because these are two of his protégés. He recently said to Khalid & Sophie: ‘I know how tough and intense the Eurovision Song Contest is.’”
Anxious Duncan
That’s when you should support Mia & Dion, says Aran. “He took his luggage to the AvroTros, he put this number there and AvroTros went along with it. They have said, ‘How good, you know how to win, you know the pitfalls, we will go there with confidence.’ And that he is not there now…”
He continues: “The AvroTros says to me: ‘That’s because Mia & Dion have to shine. They now have to show that it is their moment.’ But with Ilse in 2019 there was a general feeling of a group with a flag. I actually wanted to see this feeling this morning, that we are all behind it.”
“Duncan was just – and I think that’s a shame – anxious about questions we have, for example about him blaming the technique for not singing well live. So that is not true at all.”
Dying swan
Duncan also gets it for his choosing Show news. Guido den Aantrekker denounces his ‘silly performance’ at Khalid & Sophie. “He sees this a bit as a private hobby. He sat there like a kind of dying swan with a plunging neckline down to his pubic area, very much drawing attention to himself with the sob in his voice.”
And Ilse DeLange told Renze op Zondag yesterday that she still hasn’t spoken to Duncan. She was everywhere at the time, unlike he is now. “It came naturally to me. I feel very responsible then. (…) I think that is also necessary with new talent. You have to support young and experienced talent with expertise.”
Another yellow card for Duncan…
Duncan could count on his mentor during his departure from Schiphol in 2019: