German Olympic Sports Confederation President Thomas Bach stands beside Britain’s Queen Elizabeth as she declares the London 2012 Olympic Games open during the opening ceremony Friday. (REUTERS)
Musician Paul McCartney performs during the opening ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games. (REUTERS)
Seven young athletes, the final torch bearers, hold up the Olympic flame prior to the lighting of the cauldron during the opening ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games. (REUTERS)
RINGS OF FIRE: Massive Olympic rings, illuminated in a shower of pyrotechnics, are raised above yesterday’s Opening Ceremony. (AP)
FANTASTIC: Dozens of Marys were Poppin’ overhead and a giant Voldemort lorded it over everyone yesterday as the Games paid tribute to some oversize British originals. (Reuters)
(AP)
RINGS OF FIRE: Massive Olympic rings, illuminated in a shower of pyrotechnics, are raised above yesterday’s Opening Ceremony. (
)
Blimey!
It was Anarchy in the UK last night as the London Olympic Games began with a wacky opening ceremony that was weirder and wilder than a Monty Python skit.
The blockbuster event featured a bizarre array of uniquely British images —from Beatles look-alikes dressed like “Sgt. Pepper,” to grazing sheep to the queen palling around with James Bond and appearing to jump from a helicopter.
Titled “Isles of Wonder,” the $42 million event unfolded before a crowd of 60,000 at Olympic Stadium in East London.
The Opening Ceremony’s strangest moment was provided by Queen Elizabeth II herself, when she hammed it up in a video presentation with James Bond actor Daniel Craig.
The queen was filmed leaving Buckingham Palace with the silver screen 007 and hopping into a helicopter with him for a ride to the ceremony. Even her two pet corgi dogs made an appearance.
The video ended with a double dressed as her highness jumping from the chopper and descending with a Union Jack parachute.
The real queen, her hubby Prince Philip and International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge were then introduced, and a children’s choir performed “God Save the Queen.”
The show then oddly featured a salute to British health care, that included hundreds of children being rolled around in hospital beds. Later, the stadium was attacked by Lord Voldemort from “Harry Potter” in a nod to the nation’s children’s literature.
That was followed by a salute to UK pop music that featured musical moments such as a performance of the Sex Pistols’ “God Save the Queen,” dancers holding up David Bowie masks and clips from the violent drug film “Trainspotting” set to rave music.
At one point, a parade of men dressed as the Beatles from their “Sgt. Pepper” album cover entered the stadium under inflatable yellow submarines.
Some of the show’s moments appeared to be like a middle school text book brought to life — such as a graphic history of the Industrial Revolution and the women’s suffrage movement.
Actor Kenneth Branagh, dressed in 19th-century garb, recited Caliban’s speech from Shakespeare’s “The Tempest,’’ telling all: “Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises.” Paul McCartney closed the event by singing “Hey Jude.”
The Olympic spectacular was created by Danny Boyle, the English director of “Trainspotting” and the Oscar-winning “Slumdog Millionaire” — which cost only $15 million to make.
Boyle had the daunting task of following the acclaimed Opening Ceremony put on four years ago in Beijing by “House of Flying Daggers” director Zhang Yimou.
While the Chinese event was on a breath taking, epic scale, Boyle’s ceremony was packed with quirky plays for laughs, such as “Mr. Bean” — actor Rowan Atkinson — fooling around on a synthesizer as the London Symphony Orchestra played “Chariots of Fire.”
Acting as Mr. Bean, Atkinson daydreamed that he was in the iconic scene from the 1981 “Chariots of Fire” film in which runners train on a beach.
The popular slapstick character couldn’t keep up, so he jumped into a car and took the lead.
The Olympic torch was carried to the stadium up the Thames River on a boat that was being piloted by soccer star David Beckham. The Olympic cauldron was lit by seven teenage British athletes.
The cultural tributes preceded the traditional march of athletes — 10,500 competitors, from 302 nations and territories, playing 26 sports taking the Olympic Stadium floor.
The US flag was marched into Olympic Stadium by two-time fencing gold medalist Mariel Zagunis.
Before hoisting the Stars and Stripes, Zagunis said her biggest thrill of the day was a visit by First Lady Michelle Obama.