In November, French media reported that broadcaster France 2 had ditched national final Destination Eurovision. Now it appears that the broadcaster may have reverted to internal selection. French media is reporting that France 2 has internally selected singer-songwriter Tom Leeb as France’s artist for Eurovision 2020.

The news was reported by French newspaper Le Parisen. The paper says that France 2 first called for song submissions, from both French songwriters and foreign songwriters. Once the right song was found, the broadcaster then looked for a singer to match.

That search led France 2 to upcoming singer-songwriter Tom Leeb. As the son of noted French comedian Michel Leeb, Tom also has a background in comedy and acting. But in recent years, his focus has moved to music.

However, as Le Parisen notes, France 2 would not give a comment on the possible selection of Tom Leeb for Eurovision 2020.

Who is Tom Leeb?

Tom Leeb is a singer-songwriter from Paris. He comes from a notable family of artists. His father is the well-known French comedian Michel Leeb and Tom’s sister Fanny is an established singer and star of The Voice 2013.

Tom is a man of many talents, having worked as is a singer, actor and also a comedian. He spent five years in New York, studying theatre, cinema, dance and singing.

He previously performed alongside his father in a theatrical adaption of Mrs Doubtfire. Tom has also made appearances on French television and has acted in films alongside established stars such as Jean Reno.

He also performs as a comedy duo with fellow funnyman Kevin Levy. As Kevin & Tom, the pair have a popular YouTube channel, including skits and songs.

But lately, Tom has been focusing on his music. He has played support gig for international stars such as Sting and Tom Jones. His music inspirations are other male singer-songwriters, such as Ben Howard, Matt Corby Bon Iver and John Mayer — all English-language performers.

In 2018 he debuted with a self-titled EP, and last year he released his album Recollection. Both recordings were English language and showcased Tom as a contemporary singer-songwriter. A version of Tom’s single “Are We Too Late” has clocked up over 25 million views on the YouTube audio clip.

If Tom has indeed been selected to represent France in Rotterdam, it seems likely that he will perform a song in the same ‘male singer-songwriter’ style.

France goes back to internal selection

After months of speculation, broadcaster France 2 appears to have gone back to internal selection for its Eurovision act. France’s new Head of Delegation Alexandra Redde-Amiel previously told Le Parisen that the broadcaster wanted to have “more control over the process with an in-house selection.”

France last used internal selection from 2015 to 2017, with good some results. That era included Amir being selected with his song “J’ai cherché”, which gave France a sixth-place finish in the Stockholm grand final. The following year, Alma earned a decent 12th place finish in Kyiv with “Reqiuem”.

What do you think? Should France internally select its act for Rotterdam? What sort of song would you like Tom to perform? Tell us your thoughts below!

Read more France Eurovision 2020 news here

45 Comments
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Tom
Tom
4 years ago

I am readyyy but we have a lot of boys already, it will be sausage party ? :/

stv14
stv14
4 years ago

Not impressed at all … the voice isn’t very original and I don’t have high expectations about it (but I don’t see future 😉 ). if FranceTélévisions wants to get higher than the previous ones, they’ve made a wrong decision. So for me … Next !!!

Étoile
Étoile
4 years ago

He isn’t confirmed yet. For the song it won’t be in English (totally). I can understand that foreigners don’t know that but in France since he’ll be like our others artists «  our ambassador » at ESC, he has to sing in our language. Also many will boycott the contest which is too Americanized already enough and France 2 doesn’t want bad ratings and polemics. For Indila, she had a one-hit with dernière danse and maybe tourner dans le vide and we moved on, especially since she has had a 4/5 years’ hiatus. We’ll see if France 2 confirmed or not… Read more »

FanESC
FanESC
4 years ago
Reply to  Étoile

Lol, I guess you’re not french. “Dernière Danse” is Platinum, “Tourner dans le vide” and “SOS” are Gold. These 3 + Love Story have more than 100 millions views, which made her the first french female artist to get every single from an era with more than 100M on youtube, her album was Diamond. So no, she isn’t a one-hit wonder.

Étoile
Étoile
4 years ago
Reply to  FanESC

Je ne partage pas votre perception de son succès sur le long terme j’entends et j’ai temporisé son succès de l’époque en raison de sa longue pause. Je n’ai juste pas la même manière de voir les choses que vous, tout simplement. Et si je suis bien français!

Moi
Moi
4 years ago
Reply to  Étoile

I’m not French so I’d appreciate some insight on why some people in France think the contest is too Americanized. I mean, your average US viewer seems to laugh at how tacky ESC performances are, so I don’t really see why some people would say that. I also don’t undersand why France 2 is in charge of Eurovision instead of the main channel France 1 . At least it’s not France 3 anymore…

Georges
Georges
4 years ago
Reply to  Moi

Simply because France 1 doesn’t exist. In fact there’s TF1 (Télévision Française 1) but this is a private broadcaster. The public one here is France Télévisions (with France 2 actually the main channel) so it’s quite understandable that the public channel is in charge of the event in France.

FanESC
FanESC
4 years ago
Reply to  Moi

TF1 used to have the right to broadcast the contest until 1982 because they thought was less and less important every year and is getting tacky, so France 2 (Antenne 2 at this time) recovered he right for the contest.

DimiSpice
DimiSpice
4 years ago

Checked out the previews of his 2019 album, and I get Jack Savoretti vibes from him. I like his voice. Hoping for a good song now too, if he’s the one for France. Bonne chance!

Polegend Godgarina
4 years ago

okay but this new oranie abbes wiwi editor looks like someone i’d stan

Heyhoe
Heyhoe
4 years ago

Eurofans be bitching and bitching, announcing bottom 5 as usual. You don’t have the song and in any case it’s not going to be written by him or taken from his repertoire so assuming the genre based on his previous work is pointless.

Cyxcy
Cyxcy
4 years ago

In live session it’s very interesting…. Not only does the guy sing super well, but the cameras will love him too. Not just the cameras, I think. 😀

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Bi7Ns_YVEE

T.J.
T.J.
4 years ago

Well, the comedian part is not funny at all.

Kris
Kris
4 years ago

Why no comment on whether this guy is straight or gay ? D’oh

T.J.
T.J.
4 years ago
Reply to  Kris

Because not relevant.

Dawid
Dawid
4 years ago
Reply to  T.J.

In post about Jeangu it’s suddenly 100% relevant though

sakis julien
4 years ago

en France les fans sont decu moi je revais indilla maelle ou Maximilien phillippe bof il est mignon mais ses chansons sont tres ennuyeuses

Fan
Fan
4 years ago
Reply to  sakis julien

Ouais ça serais trop bon d’avoir choisi Indilla, je l’aime beaucoup. Mais je crois qu’elle ne veut pas vraiment participer au festival, ou parfois c’est TVFrance qui ne veut pas des artistes déjà bien connus pour représenter la France

(UK)ame 2020
(UK)ame 2020
4 years ago

I’m sorry but his music is literally background noise, or track no. 5 on an album. People on here seem to care more about his “sexual” look than his musical talents!

Hopefully France don’t choose him or otherwise he gets slaughtered in the televote!

Cyxcy
Cyxcy
4 years ago

It makes me weird if it is Tom, because we are about the same age and that suddenly I “saw” him at the theater, etc, to grow at about the same time as me. But he is a very good singer, he will have no problem to speak english in an interview, and he is an handsome man (in short: they pick an “Amir effect”.) . There remains one question which is the most important: the song. If it is top we will have everything good (and it is interesting to be, otherwise the abandonment of Destination Eurovision will be… Read more »

MikolasFan
MikolasFan
4 years ago

sorry for off topic, but just few minutes ago official twitter account of Ukraine at Eurovision posted twit (then deleted it in few minutes) with list of participators , Tayanna and Onuka were on front pic, but the link was broken and they deleted the post

Dawid
Dawid
4 years ago

buT Is HE gAy? hE’S hoT!!

Anyway, seriously speaking, good luck to him

Dawid
Dawid
4 years ago
Reply to  Dawid

Hi people who voted this down. This is how you look like. Liked it?

Vangelis vt
Vangelis vt
4 years ago

He is super sexy but the song is bland and it could be any country really. With another internal selection I was hoping for something even better in the line of french pop that they tried to establish in 2016 and 2017.

Kenan
Kenan
4 years ago
Reply to  Vangelis vt

You do know that that isn’t his eurovision song right? It was uploaded a year ago.

Kosey
Kosey
4 years ago

Top tip for Tom – come to Yorkshire – we don’t pronounce the “h’s” there.

musimakeup
musimakeup
4 years ago

Could be both a good pic and a good pick. Yes. I’m out. French can do bad play on word too 🙂 lol plus sérieusement je serais curieuse de voir ce que ca donne en francais. xoxo

RoboESC
RoboESC
4 years ago

Uhm hello gorgeous… but wait… English? Didn’t see that comming from France

poe-tay-toe-chips
poe-tay-toe-chips
4 years ago
Reply to  RoboESC

I bet he’ll probably still sing his esc song in french is this is true.

Cyxcy
Cyxcy
4 years ago
Reply to  RoboESC

Remember “Divine” and Sebastien Tellier…. Not a good place at the contest but a real success in charts.

Bella
Bella
4 years ago
Reply to  Cyxcy

Also sparked a huge debate at the French Assembly because the French entry was not in French, if I recall correctly?

More importantly, I never believed that the language could make or break an entry. A bad song will be bad in any language. Also, because France’s entry in English was a commercial success 10 years ago is no guarantee that their entry would do well now.

KESC
KESC
4 years ago

Well.. he is hot!!
I hope that they stick to French

AndersP
AndersP
4 years ago

Bonjour Tom!!! Ouf!

FanESC
FanESC
4 years ago

Finally some news. French eurofans aren’t very enthousiast about it but people outside the fandom in France on social networks are quite happy, surprisingly. Mainly because “unlike Bilal, he can sing”, lol. France 2 doesn’t want to confirm or make any comments, so we’ll likely get a confirmation tomorrow or next week at the later. About the song, I really don’t know… They found the song among hundreds of songs from french or foreigners authors and composers and then found the artist and it is a “perfect match”, according to Le Parisien (they didn’t hear the song, though). Let’s hope… Read more »

musimakeup
musimakeup
4 years ago
Reply to  FanESC

I agree. i’d be disapointed if he comes with a copy paste or something too close to Duncan. Anyway it’s France, Whatever they choose people will complain lol but he has a nice voice and a nice style I love it.

john McLane
john McLane
4 years ago
Reply to  FanESC

Lol same reaction to this.
I have bad feelings. France will going back… to the tail !

ESC is feeling: the good song with the good year
and France is completely out of sync this year, as decades…

NickC
NickC
4 years ago

I mean he is OK, certainly easy on the eye, he also has a great voice, but if you ditch a great national final like Destination Eurovision, ditch it for for a superstar, like Mika, ZAZ, Indila….not for this. I doubt he will bring Eurovision Glory, certainly not a year after Duncan.

FanESC
FanESC
4 years ago
Reply to  NickC

Duncan, Netta, Salvador Sobral, Jamala, Conchita left the chat, lol. Were they popular before their participation ? I think that you can answer alone.

Jo.
Jo.
4 years ago
Reply to  NickC

It’s not really that hard to top DE, since it failed twice to produce a top 10 hit for France. If the guy has a good song, let it be.

Erasmus
Erasmus
4 years ago
Reply to  NickC

Amm I’m sure he’ll do better than Bilal, who had the worst vocals (after Sergat of course) last year. Loved MM though

hugo
hugo
4 years ago
Reply to  Erasmus

Serhat had the right vocals for his song. Like Leonard Cohen was not Luciano Pavarotti, so what?

musimakeup
musimakeup
4 years ago
Reply to  NickC

It’s funny you mention Indila. I’ve been saying she’d do it for yeears. And this year she’s coming back with some new material, and concerts in eastern europe if I’m not wrong. That’s why I was soo convinced they would announce it was finally her this year.

FanESC
FanESC
4 years ago
Reply to  musimakeup

Indila already said a few years ago that she wasn’t interested at all in the contest.

Milan S.
Milan S.
4 years ago
Reply to  FanESC

…which actually means she is afraid of the contest (as many others).

Cyxcy
Cyxcy
4 years ago
Reply to  musimakeup

Except that everyone has completely forgotten Indila in France. Here she is just considered a “one hit wonder”. And new singers appears every year from “The Voice” etc. For the teens of 2020, Indila is already prehistory.