The Eiffel Tower is seen behind a Paris Olympics canvas, from the Trocadero plaza Thursday, July 18, 2024 in Paris. (AP Photo/David Goldman)
The opening ceremony for the Paris Olympics is set for Friday (Saturday morning, Philippine time).
Instead of a traditional march into a stadium, about 10,500 athletes–including delegates of the Team Philippines–will parade on more than 90 boats on the Seine River for 6 kilometers (3.7 miles). This will start the ceremony, not mark the end of it, another break from tradition.
SCHEDULE: Team Philippines at Paris Olympics 2024 (PH TIME)
What time does the opening ceremony start?
The ceremony starts at 1:30 a.m. Philippine time on July 27 (1:30 pm EDT/7:30 p.m. CEST July 26) and is expected to last more than three hours.
Where is the opening ceremony being held?
A full moon rises behind the Olympic rings hanging from the Eiffel Tower, Monday, July 22, 2024, in Paris, France. The opening ceremony for the Paris Olympics is Friday (Saturday, PH time). (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)
The parade starts at the Austerlitz Bridge beside the Jardin des Plantes and follows the course of the Seine from east to west. It makes its way around two islands in the center of the city before passing under several bridges and gateways.
Athletes aboard the boats will get glimpses of several Paris Olympics venues including La Concorde Urban Park (3X3 basketball, breaking, BMX freestyle cycling, skateboarding), Invalides (archery, athletics — marathon finish, road cycling — time trial start) and the Grand Palais (fencing, taekwondo). The parade ends at the Iena Bridge, which links the Eiffel Tower on the left bank of the Seine to the Trocadéro district on the right bank.
READ: What we know about the Paris Olympics opening ceremony
The ceremony’s finale is at the Trocadéro. There, among other ceremonial procedures, French President Emmanuel Macron will deliver opening remarks.
How and where can I watch the opening ceremony?
President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. grants a photo opportunity with officials and Philippine Olympians and Philippine Paralympians as they were sent off for Paris Olympics 2024. –HANDOUT PHOTO
In the Philippines, official broadcasters Cignal TV/One Sports Digital will carry the opening ceremony that will feature Team Philippines in the Parade of Nations. Tokyo Olympics silver medalists Nesthy Petecio and Carlo Paalam will serve as the flag bearers for the Philippines.
According to One Sports, the opening ceremony will be aired on its Facebook & YouTube accounts, free-to-air channel One Sports, One Sports+ and Cignal TV Pop-up channels 1 & 2 on cable TV, and Pilipinas Live via streaming. It will be featured on the 2:30pm telecast on RPTV.
READ: Team Philippines in Paris Olympics 2024: Meet the athletes
In the United States, the ceremony will air on NBC and stream on Peacock and NBC Olympic platforms — NBCOlympics.com, NBC.com, NBC app, NBC Olympics app.
About 220,000 invited and security-screened spectators are expected to fill the upper tiers of the Seine’s banks, and an additional 104,000 paying spectators will watch from the lower riverside and around the Trocadéro plaza.
Those in Paris who could not get tickets will be able to watch the ceremony on 80 giant screens set up throughout the city.
What happens if it rains at the opening ceremony?
Well, onlookers and athletes will get wet since there is no roof over the Seine.
According to the latest weather forecast, there is a small chance of rain. Meteo-France, the French weather service, is predicting overcast skies from midday onward, with light rain expected in the morning. The weather should improve in the afternoon, but the weather service warned Thursday that showers could hit the Paris region in the evening.
If it rains, the ceremony is expected to go on as planned.
Who is performing at the opening ceremony?
The show has been designed by theatre director Thomas Jolly, a 42-year-old prodigy known for hit rock-opera musical “Starmania”.
He brought on board a creative team that includes the writer of French TV series “Call My Agent”, Fanny Herrero, as well as best-selling author Leila Slimani and renowned historian Patrick Boucheron.
The show has been split into 12 different sections, with around 3,000 dancers, singers and entertainers set to be positioned on both banks of the river, the bridges and atop nearby monuments.
A tribute to Notre Dame cathedral, in the process of being renovated after a devastating fire in 2019, is guaranteed, possibly with dancers on its scaffolding.
Starting at 07:30 pm (1730 GMT), two-thirds of the ceremony will take place in daylight — the weather forecast shows cloudy skies and moderate temperatures — and will end with a light show.
The music will be a mix of classical, traditional ‘chanson francaise’, as well as rap and electro.
Franco-Malian R&B star Aya Nakamura is set to be one of the star performers despite criticism from far-right politicians, including Marine Le Pen, who suggested in March that an appearance by her would “humiliate” France.
Lady Gaga and Celine Dion have both been spotted in Paris, fuelling rumors they will appear.
French electro superstars Daft Punk have turned down an invitation to play, while globe-trotting French DJ David Guetta has been overlooked — much to his irritation.
What’s the message?
Asked to sum up his message last week, Jolly said it was “love.”
Despite the risk of irking conservatives, he said his work would be a celebration of cultural, linguistic, religious and sexual diversity in France and around the world.
“I think the people who want to live together in this diversity, this otherness, are much more numerous, but we make less noise,” he told AFP.
It is fair to assume it will be nothing like the widely panned retro-styled opening ceremony of last year’s rugby World Cup, which featured a succession of French cliches from baguettes to berets and the Eiffel Tower.
And don’t expect a three-hour tribute to French greatness to rival the nationalistic pageantry seen at the Beijing Games in 2008.
“The opening ceremony in Beijing in 2008 was exactly what we did not want to do,” Boucheron told Le Monde newspaper.
What will be the big moments?
With so much still under wraps, it’s hard to predict.
The performance by Nakamura, after so much controversy about her role, will be a major moment so soon after parliamentary elections that saw the anti-immigration far-right gain a historic 143 seats in the national parliament.
Jolly has strongly hinted that a submersible or submarine will emerge from the waters of the Seine at some point.
The identity of the final torch holder who will light the Olympic cauldron in the gardens in front of the Louvre museum also remains unknown, although triple gold medal-winning sprinter Marie-Jose Perec is among the leading contenders.
The biggest moment of all might simply be the end if everyone gets home safely.
The ceremony has given French police cold sweats ever since it was unveiled in 2021 because of the difficulty of securing so many people over such a vast urban area. –with reports from INQUIRER.net