This is what went down on the Winter Olympics opening ceremony

On the afternoon of Friday the sixth, the town of Milan was unusually quiet. Many locals had been informed to make money working from home, leaving the streets uncharacteristically empty because the Olympic torch — designed by the Turin-based architect Carlo Ratti and impressed by Italy’s ever-changing landscapes and the hues of the sky — wound its manner by way of the town earlier than lastly arriving on the Milano San Siro Olympic Stadium. By the point the flame entered the world close to the occasion’s finish, the 60,000-plus spectators had already witnessed a sweeping sequence of performances celebrating Italian tradition and creativity.

Milano Cortina Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony

Reaching this second required appreciable logistical ambition. These Video games would be the first in Olympic historical past to not happen in a single, localised location. As an alternative, competitions are unfold throughout 4 most important clusters in northern Italy, with two main hubs in Cortina d’Ampezzo within the Veneto area and Milan, the capital of Lombardy. The San Siro celebration was, in reality, considered one of 4 concurrent occasions, additionally held in Cortina, Livigno and Predazzo. It was a complexity acknowledged by the president of the Organising Committee, Giovanni Malagò, who described the Video games in his handle to spectators and athletes as ‘not with out its difficulties’ — a comment that appeared to allude to the development delays and public backlash that had dominated headlines within the lead-up to the occasion.

Any organisational missteps had been shortly forgotten as soon as artistic director Marco Balich despatched La Scala’s famed dancers prancing onto the stage. Choreographed by the Riva & Repele dance firm to evoke the fluid, dynamic actions of winter sports activities, the performers wore flowing white costumes designed by Massimo Cantini Parrini. Their silhouettes echoed the outsized material of sculptures by the Neoclassical sculptor Antonio Canova, which had been put in throughout what’s normally a soccer pitch.

As swiftly as they appeared, the temper shifted from classical abstraction to a celebration of Milan’s musical heritage. A brand new troupe of dancers clad in bodysuits formed like musical notes adopted the Italian actress Matilda De Angelis — brandishing a conductor’s baton — into centre stage. Offering comedian aid, three performers with enlarged, bobble-head-style masks within the likeness of Giuseppe Verdi, Giacomo Puccini and Gioacchino Rossini whipped up the group, whereas additionally serving a sensible objective: distracting the cameras as units and backdrops had been modified round them.

These musical interludes gave solution to a tribute to Milan’s inventive tradition, as big paint tubes spilled billowing lengths of cloth throughout the stage. Dancers had been painted in daring, punchy shades of fuchsia, yellow, purple and blue, and wore costumes nodding to the town’s icons — together with a number of performers disguised as human-sized Bialetti espresso makers, shuffling playfully throughout the ground.

The pageantry then made room for the night’s most anticipated worldwide visitor: Mariah Carey, decked out in rhinestones and ostrich feathers. The pop star carried out a bilingual medley, shifting from Domenico Modugno’s Nel blu, dipinto di blu to her personal tune Nothing Is Unimaginable, full with glass-shattering whistle notes (and a phonetic teleprompter that shortly went viral on-line). Her look segued into the flag protocol, staged as a stylised runway that includes fashions in Giorgio Armani-designed fits, alongside a short tribute to the not too long ago departed designer. Mannequin Vittoria Ceretti adopted the group carrying the Italian flag, which was raised concurrently throughout the Video games’ dispersed places.

After athletes from all 92 taking part international locations marched behind their flags, a number of theatrical sequences adopted, together with a playful homage to Italian hand gestures starring actress Brenda Lodigiani, and a medley celebrating Winter Olympics previous, led by The White Lotus star Sabrina Impacciatore.

The ceremony’s closing performances had been maybe its most shifting. Devoted to peace, the Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli delivered a solemn rendition of Puccini’s Nessun Dorma, adopted by the Italian rapper Ghali, who — accompanied by a dance troupe comprised of kids and youngsters — recited a poem by Gianni Rodari about resisting the insanity of struggle. Not coincidentally, his phrases had been directed in the direction of the stands occupied by dignitaries and visiting heads of state. The actress Charlize Theron, a UN Peace Ambassador, then took to the stage to ship an identical message impressed by the phrases of Nelson Mandela.

The ceremony culminated with the lighting of the Olympic cauldrons — plural, for the primary time — as twin constructions had been unveiled concurrently at Milan’s Arco della Tempo and in Cortina d’Ampezzo. Created by Marco Balich, their intricate design pays homage to Leonardo da Vinci, who lived and labored in Milan for a number of a long time, referencing the advanced knot geometries that recur all through his work. Rooted in Italian historical past but resolutely forward-looking, the cauldrons will stay accessible to the general public, permitting the ritual of the flame to be witnessed every night all through the Video games.