As the Paris 2024 Olympics approach, the opening ceremony as it is presented could be turned upside down.
On July 26, all eyes will be on France with the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. This ceremony is intended to be grandiose, with an open-air parade on the Seine, a first in the history of the Olympic Games. It was also one of the essential elements of the Paris 2024 dossier. But did the organizing committee see too big?
For now, the plan remains the same, the ceremony will take place on the Seine with thousands of spectators. But in reality, the question of a different opening ceremony due to certain terrorist threats is on the table and is quite disappointing. This plan was also presented to the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, as option B, as explained by Le Monde and AFP.
In detail, the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games could be reduced to a crossing of delegations of athletes on the Pont d’Iéna, between the Eiffel Tower and the Trocadéro. “The idea is to go and pick up the athletes at the Olympic village in Saint-Denis and take them by bus to the foot of the Eiffel Tower”, all this without an audience as indicated by a senior official. The Head of State had admitted for his part a few weeks ago that the event could be “limited to the Trocadéro”, or to the Stade de France “because that is what is traditionally done”. A statement refuted a few hours later…
For now, the transformation of the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games is totally hypothetical, “it is a scenario that maintains a semblance of ceremony, but the probability of it happening is slim,” a security source explained to AFP. Unless a very specific threat is detected a few days before…
In the meantime, technical rehearsals are having trouble getting started due to the flow of the Seine and its pollution. The committee must also gauge the presence of a hundred boats in three rows and 6 kilometers without any problems. The artistic aspect is still very secret, under the leadership of Thomas Jolly, even if the latter has revealed some details.
“We went to draw from each of the sites, the monuments, almost every stone tells something about our history of France, the history of Paris, a story that is linked to the world. As the world will be in Paris that evening, what do we say to all of us gathered together? These are two billion people, a quarter of humanity, who will tell each other things. The authors designed this story with me,” explained for L’Equipe.