Playing with fire

"Playing with fire" is a song by Romanian singer-songwriter Paula Seling and Romanian born-Norvegian singer-songwriter Ovidiu Cernăuţeanu as Ovi. The song was written by Ovidiu Cernăuţeanu under his writing-name Ovi Jacobsen and it was produced by himself and Norvegian producer Simen Eriksrud. Additional mixing was provided by Seling. The duo performed the song as the Romanian entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2010 after winning the Selectia Nationala 2010 on March 6, 2010 at the Globus Circus, Bucharest. The song was selected from 16 participating songs at the Selecţia Naţională 2010. It gained the maximum number of points from both the juries and the televotes. This is only the third time both judges and voters have a common sense in Eurovision in Romania and the last time since 2006. The song passed the semi-final and qualified for the great final. They finished on the third place (second runner-up song) on May 27, 2010. Following Ovi and Seling's performance during the Eurovision final the song entered some major European charts, including the VG-lista or the UK Singles Chart. An accompanying music video was shot for the video in April, 2010 in Romania and in Vienna, Austria. It premiered in time for Easter and it managed to gather over 5 million views on YouTube as of 2012.

Background
In early September, 2009 Paula Seling was member of the jury at the Golden Stag festival. There she met Ovi (by then a contestant) and congratulated him for winning the People's Choice Award. Ovi wrote "Playing with Fire" in late 2009. In November, 2009 he asked Paula Seling (Golden Stag winner in 2002) to sing the song along with him. They recorded the song from November 21 to early December, 2009 and submitted the song as their entry in the 2010 Internal Selection for the Eurovision Song Contest. In January it was announced that "Playing With Fire" passed the pre-selection and qualified to the National Final. On March 6, 2010 the duo was present to perform their entry. Seling was also in the competition with another song, a collaboration with Kamara Ghedi. "Playing With Fire" received most of the votes both from the juries and the audience, being the first time this is happening since 2006 when Mihai Traistariu won the selection with Tornero. It was chosen to represent Romania in the Eurovision Song Contest 2010 held at the Telenor Arena next to Oslo, Norway.

Shortly after "Playing with Fire" won Selecţia Naţională 2010 there were reports that the song was registered in Norway as being co-written by a Norwegian composer, Simen Eriksrud, which would have broken TVR regulations as participants and songwriters must all be Romanian. This was followed by calls for the song to be disqualified and a new national final held to select another song. Eriksrud, also Ovi's producer, confirmed that Ovi was the only songwriter, with Eriksrud and Ovi only sharing publishing rights as his producer.

Marina Almasan, the Romanian Head of Delegation, confirmed on 11 March that Ovi was the only writer of the song, after consulting with TONO, the Norwegian copyright association, Ovi's record label, and the Romanian Copyright Office.

Eurovision Song Contest 2010
"Playing With Fire" was chosen to represent Romania at the Eurovision Song Contest 2010. It passed through the second semi-final on May 27, 2010. Seling and Ovi performed "Playing With Fire" as the nineteenth song in the final of May 29, 2010 after "Allez Ola Olé" by Jessy Matador (France) and before "Lost and Forgotten" by Peter Nalitch and Friends (Russia). The song was acclaimed live and received twelve points from Moldova, as well as ten points from Spain, Norway, Portugal and Sweden. It only got nul points from eight countries. The song finished as the second runner-up, third placed with a total of 162 points, only behind "Satellite" and "We Could Be the Same" (Germany respective Turkey).

Reception
he song received mostly favourable reviews. The music critics noticed that "Playing with Fire" was the favourite songs for both the juries and the televoters, saying that it would be the best Romanian entry since Tornerò. The day after the National Final, an article appeared in Bravo magazine, in which some Romanian music critics talked about Ovi's song and their performance. Dalma, another contestant on the National Final started a campaign against Seling and Ovi's winning. She, along with other participants, said that they tried to vote but they weren't able to, so it must have been a boycott against the other artists. So far, Seling and Ovi haven't commented about the incident. In the "OK!" magazine's first Romanian issue, Monica Anghel compared "Playing with Fire" with ones of the most known Eurovision winning songs. The song was lyrically compared to Kesha's "Tik Tok" for the "Don't stop/Make it pop" lines while musically it was compared to the work of Sandra with Seling's high notes being compared with some that Mariah Carey would perform.

"Playing with Fire" first entered the Romanian Radio Airplay Chart in late March 2010, where it managed to enter the top forty. In the official Romanian Top 100 it debuted at number sixty-nine and it has since moved only one position higher to its peak at number sixty-eight in late May. Prior to Eurovision, the song entered the Norvegian Airplay Chart, peaking at number-eighteen there. After the duo's performance at Eurovision the song re-entered the Romanian Top 100 and debuted at number twenty-eight on the Finnish Download Chart where it lasted for five weeks on the top forty. In Sweden the song entered the Sverigetopplistan at number thirty before moving a position higher to its peak of number twenty-nine. It has then left the chart. It was also present for a week during the Swiss Singles Chart at number fifty-one. In the UK Singles Chart it debuted at number two-hundred the week after Eurovision, selling over 1,500 downloadable units. It has then exited the chart, with 1,200 sales less. "Playing with Fire"'s highest position was at number-twelve Norwegian VG-lista. The next week it dropped out of the chart. The song also entered the European Digital Chart at number sixty-six.

Track listing

 * CD single (Norway & Romania)
 * 1) Playing with Fire - 3:00
 * 2) Playing with Fire (Official Remix) - 4:51
 * 3) Playing with Fire (Karaoke/Instrumental) - 3:00
 * Digital download single
 * 1) Playing with Fire - 3:00

Own Eurovision Song Contest
The song was selected to represent Faroe Islands in the Own Eurovision Song Contest 20 held in Timisoara, Romania.