Every Olympic organising committee has to think about what they stand for. How do they want their Opening Ceremony, and by association their Olympics, to be remembered? How to best represent those most nebulous of things, the Olympic values? How to set the tone for the sporting extravaganza that is the next fortnight?
The most recent Opening Ceremony, in Paris 18 months ago, seemed to deliberately court controversy and want to split opinion – remember Marie-Antoinette being decapitated and the row over the ceremony being ‘ungodly’?
