Taylor Swift’s stage didn’t work out as planned at the start of “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived” during Saturday’s show in Dublin.
When the pop icon appeared in the opening lines of the track The Department of Tortured Poets — “Was any of that true/ Staring at me with starry eyes/ In your Jehovah’s Witness outfit/ Who the fuck was that guy?” — concertgoers noticed that the stage was not working properly. The elevated section Swift was on had not lowered when she was supposed to, leaving her momentarily stranded.
Swift was unfazed by the ruling.
Fortunately, she didn’t have to wait long for one of her dancers, Jan Ravnik, to lend her a hand and help her down.
In a close-up video of Swift Tortured poets A fan-posted concert set looks and sounds like the pop star is trying to hold back his laughter as Ravnik offers help.
The show must go on, and Swift’s three-and-a-half-hour set did just that.
Swift’s Eras international tour was at Dublin’s Aviva Stadium for three dates this weekend. She will then tour Amsterdam for three dates at the Johan Cruijff Arena from July 4-6.
On Sunday, Billboard Swift announced The Department of Tortured Poets remains at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart for the 10th consecutive week in total.
At this point, Swift has performed most of the 31-track collection live on The Eras Tour at least once. Tortured poets The show’s section includes tracks “But Daddy I Love Him,” a brief sample of “So High School,” “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?” and “Down Bad,” which segues into “Fortnight.” It concludes with “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived” (usually with a working stage) and “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart.”
Other songs from the album have had their live debut in Swift’s acoustic section, in which she offers two surprise performances. This weekend’s firsts included “The Albatross” on Saturday and “Clara Bow” on Sunday for Stevie Nicks, who was in the VIP tent filming Swift’s song on her cell phone.
Watch clips below of Swift expertly handling the problem on Saturday’s stage.