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Olympic organizers to make it snow indoors

Special effects, plans for opening ceremonies coming together

Whistler will be an integral part of the opening and closing ceremonies for the 2010 Winter Olympics.

That may even include making it snow in the covered B.C. Place Stadium, which will host the opening and closing ceremonies for the Olympics.

“I think there are some extraordinary opportunities audio-visually and in terms of sheer physical effects,” said David Atkins, executive producer of the ceremonies for the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Games (VANOC).

“I think to make it snow in that stadium is going to be not only unique, but incredibly exciting for the audience.”

Organizers are also hoping to make use of the satellite connections that will be in place to link the Medals Plaza in Whistler to the stadium in Vancouver.

“Because of that set-up it would obviously be wise to take advantage of it for the ceremonies,” said Atkins.

“There are lots of things being discussed and there is a lot of opportunity to make sure that it embraces all that.”

VANOC recently held a brainstorming session with 100 cultural innovators from across Canada to get a feel for what is culturally acceptable and what is not when it comes to putting together the opening and closing ceremonies.

While Atkins would not reveal any details he said there was a Whistler presence at those sessions.

“We have had cultural practitioners from Whistler (at the sessions) and there have been incredibly inventive and innovative ideas about how we can connect the two places in the course of the ceremony,” he said.

“But I can’t tell you what they are, of course.”

Discussions about the ceremonies are in their infancy but 80 per cent of the line-up, which will be a star-studded event, must be locked in one year before Games time. The remaining 20 per cent, said Atkins, is kept open so artistic directors can include up-to-the-minute material.

There have been some concerns about how the 2010 ceremonies will be received, coming as they do after this summer’s 2008 Beijing Games.

There is little doubt that the Beijing ceremonies will be the most lavish, the largest and likely the most expensive in Games’ history.

But organizers of the opening and closing ceremonies for Vancouver and Whistler’s 2010 Games see that as a blessing in disguise.

“I hope Beijing goes all out because it will mean… we can create a little pearl here, a gem, that will be more about spirit and the humanity of the Games than it will be about the spectacle of them,” said Atkins.

“I think to a certain extent scale has overcome the content, the form has overcome the content. The budgets for Athens and Beijing…   are just staggering budgets and you have to question whether the final result was value for money.”

VANOC’s budget for the opening and closing ceremonies, to be held in the covered B.C. Place Stadium, is $40 million. Athens, host of the 2004 Summer Games, spent more than any other city in Olympic history, about $105 million U.S. Beijing is expected to spend about the same.

Atkins, speaking at a Whistler Chamber of Commerce luncheon, said the 2010 ceremonies might set a new precedent for Olympic celebrations by bringing them back to Olympic ideals such as peace, and making the world a better place to live through sport.

“(Coming after the Beijing Games gives) us the unique opportunity to redefine the ways these ceremonies are actually performed and to draw them back to their essences,” said Atkins.

“…We have to re-examine the whole process and redefine the whole reason these ceremonies were created.”

Atkins wouldn’t give away any secrets about what the ceremonies will look like or what celebrities will be in the line-up. But he said organizers are committed to including Whistler and it’s likely resort weather will make itself felt, too.

“I think to make it snow in (B.C. Place) is going to not only be unique, but incredibly exciting for the audience,” he said adding that up to 7,000 performers will be needed to pull-off the opening.

A successful opening ceremony can have a great impact on the Games, said Atkins, who produced the ceremonies for the Sydney 2000 Summer Games.

When the opening gala event took place about 85 per cent of tickets were sold. Within 24 hours of the event ticket sales had gone up to 95 per cent, and two days later every sporting event was sold out.

But aside from the financial impact it can have the lasting legacy is in the inspiration it leaves behind in the host nation.

“For me it is mostly about engagement (and) participation on every and any level,” said Atkins.

“It may not improve your bottom line but it will elevate your spirit and it will enrich the lives of all who participate.”

In all, about four billion people are expected to tune in their televisions for the Games, from the opening ceremonies, through the medal ceremonies, to the closing event.

Atkins and his crew will be working to make sure cameras capture every message and theme central to the ceremonies.

Only about one-third of the opening is usually cultural in nature — the rest of the time is spent fulfilling Olympic content obligations which include the parade of the 3,500 athletes expected in 2010.

Since Salt Lake’s Winter Games in 2002 the opening ceremonies have been at night where the cover of darkness allows for a more spectacular pyrotechnic show.

The opening ceremony was first turned into a spectacular event to make up for the boycott of the Moscow Olympics in 1980. Nations around the globe refused to attend the Games after Afghanistan was invaded.

The new format was adopted by all the Games to follow with cultural elements being added to show the world more about the host nations.

Each Games has tried to introduce a unique feature to the event. Calgary had the first automated cauldron, Lillehammer had the torch lit by a ski jumper, and Salt Lake moved the ceremony to the evening. The 2002 Games were also the first to be developed by television producers and were by default the best from a TV audience point of view.

“I don’t think there is a single event in a nations history that can be as galvanizing as an Olympic ceremony,” said Atkins.

“It can also present a new vision of a nation to its people and the world. So it an opportunity to redefine, to deconstruct, some of the myths that exist and the reexamine the symbols and the icons of a country and present them in a new way and certainly that is the journey we are embarking on perhaps here for the Games.

“There is a very keen interest to show the rest of the world a new Canada a very forward-looking Canada.”