In a joint interview with “Le Monde”, Leïla Slimani, Patrick Boucheron, Fanny Herrero, Damien Gabriac and Thomas Jolly presented the philosophy of the event on Tuesday, July 16, which is intended to be “joyfully anachronistic.”
It looks less stale than the 2023 Rugby World Cup. Ten days before the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games, its creators have revealed a little more about the event, in an interview with Monde this Tuesday, July 16. Under the leadership of director Thomas Jolly, this joyful troupe includes the novelist and 2016 Prix Goncourt winner Leïla Slimani, the historian of the Collège de France and co-author of the best-seller Histoire mondiale de la France (2017, Seuil) Patrick Boucheron, the screenwriter of the successful series Dix pour cent Fanny Herrero, and the playwright Damien Gabriac.
Last month, Libé was able to observe a short excerpt from the event, organized in the strictest confidentiality. As the date approaches, the opening ceremony on July 26 promises to be between deconstruction of chauvinism and celebration of the popular, French and global narrative. With the desire to amaze, and to rediscover the “childhood part of us, the joy of discovery.”
As his main inspiration, Patrick Boucheron cites “the ceremony imagined by Jean-Paul Goude for the bicentenary of the French Revolution, in 1989.” He believes that “the parade thwarted national stereotypes and was not afraid to advocate “global crossbreeding” with an optimism that we have now lost.” At the time, the parade on the Champs-Élysées, which marked the history of live entertainment, had been criticized by the foreign press for its pomp and gigantism, as well as for its discrepancy with the popular celebrations of the event, notably in the book Adieu 89 by the American historian Steven L. Kaplan published in 1993.
Goude’s legacy is also felt in the desire to “speak of the world to France and speak of France to the world,” according to Patrick Boucheron. “I had the idea of a huge show but I lacked a story to address the whole world,” explains Thomas Jolly, who says he had, with these four authors, “the ideal team.”
They also assume a clear opposition to any form of nationalism. According to Patrick Boucheron, “the opening ceremony in Beijing in 2008 was exactly what we did not want to do: a history lesson addressed to the world […] an ode to greatness and a demonstration of strength.” The team declares in unison that they want to do “the opposite” of a Puy-du-Fou-style reconstruction, “the opposite of a virile, heroic and providential story,” for Boucheron. Even if the Epinal image of Emily in Paris and Amélie Poulain does not disappear for all that. “We had to play with the clichés, these American views on France, but without making fun of them,” qualifies Thomas Jolly.
A giant ceremony in all humility
In fact, the Olympic parade of July 26 wants to break with past examples, by leaving a “simple” stadium and taking place on the Seine and around the emblematic buildings of the capital. “The monuments coexist in a joyful anachronism that poses a thousand questions […] “Since when have we been French?” asks Thomas Jolly. On the banks and bridges, 3,000 dancers and actors will offer twelve artistic tableaux, while national delegations will parade on boats. According to an indiscretion from Thomas Jolly, the ceremony will also take place “in the sky”. Let’s hope that the rain doesn’t force everyone back to the Stade de France.
Still with the idea of going beyond the traditional norms of these ceremonies, Fanny Herrero explains that the group “wanted to counter our natural tendency to lecture.” Leïla Slimani explains: “There had to be joy, emulation, movement, excitement and sparkle, and not just those famous traditional philosophical values that France willingly exhibits with sometimes too much confidence…” Moreover, she wanted to play on “the image that the French can have in the world […]that of very self-confident people.” The creative team “does not [voulait] “There is no seriousness in this ceremony. There is a lot of humor,” adds the successful author.
A lightness that is all the more welcome in the current political situation. If the National Rally had come out on top in the legislative elections, “the show would have become something completely different: a sort of resistance ceremony,” admits Thomas Jolly. “We infinitely need this peaceful and shared moment, this time finally suspended, far from this violence that is breaking out everywhere,” continues Leïla Slimani. “I have the very great hope that the spectators will agree to let themselves be carried away. As Thomas says, we will all be there, alive, in the world, at the same time.”