Poll: Who should host Eurovision 2020 in The Netherlands?

Rotterdam is the chosen one and the city is now preparing for Eurovision 2020 non-stop. So now it’s time to move on to another important question regarding the contest: Who will NOS/NPO/AVROTROS choose to present the semifinals and final? Below we have listed some options based on what the Dutch media landscape has to offer in terms of presenting talent. Who would you like to see in the greenroom and who on the big stage?

Earlier we asked our readers who they wanted to host if a Eurovision personality were given the gig. Unsurprisingly, Duncan Laurence came out on top followed by his mentor Ilse DeLange. In this new poll, we look at other possible candidates to host the shows. The NPO/NOS/AVROTROS group might be temped to choose someone from their own stable. But based on media reports and the strong opinions of fans, it’s clear the Dutch have many more personalities to choose from. From a Game of Thrones star to an iconic sports presenter, here are 22 names we have in mind.

1. Anna Nooshin

Lifestyle and fashion expert Anna Nooshin is known for her appearances on the daily television show RTL Boulevard – next to our friend Aran Bade – where she assesses the best of the day’s lifestyle and fashion news. Holland’s Next Top Model added Anna Nooshin to the team as a juror for the social media part of the show. In an addition to being a presenter, host and juror, she is also an author, writer, accessories designer and contestant on different team-based shows on television. In early September it was announced that Anna had joined the Magic 100 – a team of known- and unknown Dutchies – to brainstorm about the creative concept for the Eurovision Song Contest 2020.

2. Art Rooijakkers

After studying journalism, Art Rooijakkers started his career as a journalist with local broadcasters. He graduated to national TV rather quickly. Art is best known as the presenter of “Wie is de mol“, one of the most-watched TV programs in the Netherlands. The journalist/presenter has won many prizes for his work.

3. Carice van Houten

Carice van Houten is a Dutch actress and singer. She started her acting career in the movie Minoes, in which she played a cat who transforms into a woman. After that she starred in several more serious Dutch movies like De Gelukkige Huisvrouw and Zwartboek. Internationally she is mostly known for her roles in movies like Valkyrie and the series Game Of Thrones, where she portrayed the mysterious red woman who got up to all sorts of trouble (including going topless when invoking spells). The international audience would recognise this star — and some Eurovision acts may well end up star-struck!

4. Chantal Janzen

Chantal Janzen is one of the most popular TV faces in the Netherlands. Her repertoire includes endless jobs across music, presenting and acting. She played in different (Dutch) musicals, such as Saturday Night Fever, Beauty and the Beast, Petticoat and Wicked. Chantal has also hosted big television shows: Holland’s Got Talent, Dance Dance Dance and The Voice of Holland and even the German edition of The Voice Kids. Chantal also hosted her own television shows, the most prominent being “Chantal blijft slapen” (Chantal stays over). The multitasker has released her own media platform and glossy magazine ‘&C’ too. Chantal recently gave an interview to the “De Coen en Sander Show” on Radio 538, where she announced that she has not been asked to host the Eurovision Song Contest 2020. She added: “I would do it, but I always think they will choose someone from the NPO”.

5. Dionne Stax

Known as the relatively young female face of the news, Dionne Stax has amassed a large following among the Dutch public. She can hold her nerve: she has frequently served as the live election results presenter, delivering the incoming results from every municipality in the Netherlands, a broadcast that lasts through the night and into the morning. In 2016, she made history as the first journalist to interview the Princesses of Orange-Nassau. Recently she signed a contract with AVROTROS to present entertainment programmes, like DNA Onbekend (DNA Unknown), leaving her news career partially behind.

6. Eva Jinek

Eva Jinek was born in Oklahoma and raised in Washington D.C., but her Czech parents wanted her and her brother to partially grow up in Europe, which brought the family to the Netherlands. She first became active as a journalist covering American news, presenting American election results and day-time broadcasts for NOS Journaal. Later she moved to KRO-NRCV where she was given a slot to present her journalistic talk show Jinek, which became hugely successful. Being in the public eye led the media to focus on her private life. As a figure for empowered woman, she faced several personal attacks but stared them down bravely. As a result she became the first journalist to win the Gouden Televizier Ster, the prize for best female presenter.

7. Geraldine Kemper

Television host Geraldine Kemper started off as a presenter for the public broadcaster and worked on different shows for BNNVARA, including Try Before You Die, Spuiten en Slikken — a weekly talkshow about sex and drugs — and Proefkonijnen (Guinea pigs), a show about finding answers on unusual questions by experimenting. This year she will be interviewing different candidates for The Voice of Holland, as a backstage reporter.

8. Herman van der Zandt

With his modesty and quick wit, Herman van der Zandt is one of the finest faces within the news department of NPO. He rose to prominence as the presenter of the country’s main current affairs programme, NOS Journaal. Now Herman serves as a sports presenter for NOS Studio Sport. Over the past few years, he presented a live talk show from France in lieu of the Tour de France as well as quiz programme Met het mes op tafel. He knows that being a presenter on television is not an easy job, and has encountered technical errors and even an attempt to hijack his news broadcast. He kept his cool.

9. Humberto Tan

A qualified Master of Law, Humberto Tan started his career as a football journalist. He became the face of the football results on different broadcasters, first on NPO, later for commercial stations. It was therefore slightly surprising to some that RTL picked him to present the country’s first late night talk show, RTL Late Night. However, it was a good choice, as RTL Late Night became a huge commercial success owing largely to friendly and funny Humberto. At the end of RTL Late Night in 2018, Humberto became host for entertainment shows Dance, Dance, Dance and Holland’s Got Talent. During Eurovision 2018, he referred to Wiwibloggs as Pee-Pee Bloggs following our reaction to Waylon’s performance. The man made us laugh, too.

10. Jan Versteegh

Jan Versteegh is one of the Netherlands’ most famous TV personalities. He has made travel programs, participated in game shows, and presented his own programmes. Jan also had a few roles in movies such as Gek van Oranje. He also lent his voice to the Dutch version of various movies, like Smallfoot and Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation. But this talent can also sing. He has released an album, It Takes Swing

11. Linda de Mol

Linda de Mol is the queen of Dutch television and the sister of Dutch media tycoon John de Mol who invented TV shows like Big Brother and The Voice. In The Netherlands she is mostly known for shows like Ik Hou Van Holland and Miljoenenjacht. But the international audience may recognise her from small presenting jobs in the United Kingdom. She’s well known in Germany as the host of Traumhochzeit. Add it all up and Linda has enough knowledge to steer an international audience. Bonus: she speaks several languages.

12. NikkieTutorials

Dutch beauty vlogger Nikkie de Jager gained international fame with her cosmetic and lifestyle vlogs on YouTube. NikkieTutorials – that’s her username – she started making make-up tutorials and quickly built an empire with more than 12 million subscribers on YouTube. Nikkie went viral because of her video about the Power of Make-up. Inspired by RuPaul’s Drag Race, she uploaded a video that showed one half of her face glammed up, and the other half all natural. The movement was joined by other influential make-up professionals. NikkieTutorial is one of the most popular beauty vloggers in the world. The vlogger showed interest in being a host for the Eurovision Song Contest 2020 in a tweet.

13. Özcan Akyol

Özcan Akyol is best known as a writer with major publications like AD. His debut novel was well received, helping launch him into the literary scene. Özcan regularly offers commentaries on talk shows. He also presents his own TV programmes, including his five-part series De neven van Eus. Known for his humor, he reminds several of our bloggers of look-a-like Assi Azar, the Israeli host of ESC2019.

14. Rik van de Westelaken

For years, Rik van de Westelaken was known as the well-mannered news presenter of NPO’s NOS Journaal, even being nominated as the country’s best dressed man in 2007. He handled several difficult broadcasts about national and international tragedies with poise and empathy. These included the day-long broadcast about the 2014 national day of mourning, after the MH17 airplane disaster for which he received an Emmy nomination. In 2016, the general public saw the human side of him as he won the popular game show Wie is de Mol? This led him to land a contract with AVROTROS in 2018. Since then he’s fronted Wie is de Mol? and current affairs programme EénVandaag, and he was one of the hosts of Pride 2019.

15. Romy Monteiro

Romy Monteiro is the daughter of Dutch singer Antje Monteiro. She started her career just a few years ago when she took the leading role in the musical The Bodyguard in The Netherlands and she also showed her singing skills when she took part in The Voice Of Holland. Lately Romy has shown herself to have more skills when she took on several hosting jobs, for example the Dutch National Final for the 2017 Junior Eurovision. Romy has been considered a possible contender to represent The Netherlands so there are multiple possibilities in which we could see her on the stage in Rotterdam.

16. Rozemarijn Moggré

Rozemarijn Moggré is a Dutch radio/TV journalist and TV presenter. After graduating with a degree in journalism, she started with the local TV station RTV Utrecht. Here she presented shows like U Vandaag and Vitamine U. After RTV Utrecht she moved to the NOS, where she presented NOS Jeugdjournaal (daily news program for kids) and event broadcasts like the yearly carnival celebration and Dance4Life. After NOS, she switched to broadcaster WNL, where she presented Goedemorgen Nederland (Goodmorning Netherlands). Eurovision fans might already recognize Rozemarijn: she presented the press conference given in Rotterdam after it was announced Rotterdam won the bid.

17. Sharon den Adel

We’re talking about the front-woman of  Within Temptation — the band that Eurofans dream of as a potential candidate to represent the Netherlands at Eurovision. The symphonic-metalband came together in 1996 and started off with Sharon and her now husband Robert Westerholt. The members came and went, but Sharon always stayed. Their biggest hits “Mother Earth” and “Ice Queen” can still be heard on different Dutch radio stations. Sharon was also on Belgian TV, where she participated in the music program Liefde Voor Muziek, where artists perform covers

18. Sophie Hilbrand

Sophie Hilbrand is known for hosting different television shows on the public broadcasting channels, but also for her acting career in movies and commercials. Her role on Spuiten and Slikken, a talk show about sex and drugs, which was later presented by Geraldine Kemper and Jan Versteegh, gave her a mass audience. She’s already had her own show, in which she battled television personality Ruben Nicolai to being “the best homo universalis”. Since then she’s hosted several television shows, including The Roast of Gordon (member of de Toppers, Eurovision 2009).

19. Sylvie Meis

Acting, modelling, presenting and designing sunglasses and lingerie: Sylvie Meis does it all. Sylvie played a role in the Dutch serie Costa! next to Yolanthe Cabau van Kasbergen. She joined TMF, the Dutch version of MTV, as a host and started modelling on the side. She became internationally famous when she started dating soccer player Rafael van der Vaart, who she later divorced. She successfully fought breast cancer. Later, Sylvie decided move to Germany to continue her career as a presenter for different television shows, but she always came back to her home country, because her career in the Netherlands never stopped!

20. Tim Hofman

Tim Hofman is a multi-talent. He is a TV host, blogger, journalist, poet and columnist. He is well known for the reporting on his Youtube channel BOOS. Tim is known as a rebellious presenter who addresses problems in a unique way. This way of presenting is appealing to young people, who are his biggest fans. Tim’s shows often deal with social topics such as illness, refugees and politics.

21. Winfried Baijens

Winfried Baijens is a Dutch news presenter and radio host. He initially started his career at NOVA, a TV program that focused on making short documentaries on current affairs. NOVA aired until 2010. In the year during and after NOVA, Winfried shifted his focus to presenting news broadcasts, mostly for the NOS. As a radio host, he presented shows likes Winfried’s Woonkamer (Winfried’s living room) and BNN today.

22. Yolanthe Cabau van Kasbergen

Or should we say Yolanthe Sneijder-Cabau? Yolanthe is known for her stunning looks, acting career and relationships with famous Dutch people. Yolantha’s first memorable television appearance came in the early 2000s with acting jobs on television shows Costa! and Onderweg Naar Morgen. Since then she’s acted in different Dutch movies and hosted different shows on television. Yolanthe used to be in a relationship with the Dutch Eurovision Song Contest commentator and singer Jan Smit. Not long after their relationship ended, she started dating professional soccer player Wesley Sneijder, to whom she is legally still married, even though they announced their break-up earlier this year.

This post was co-written by the following wiwi’s: Esma Jansen, Mike Bos, and Renske ten Veen.

Who is your favourite to present Eurovision 2020? And which presenters would you like to see join forces to co-host? What’s the ideal number of presenters? Are there any other names that should be in the mix? Let us know what you think in the comments below.

You can find all of our other polls here.