Rio de Janeiro "treated the world to an extravaganza of Brazil’s rich culture during the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games on Friday night," from bossa nova jazz to "bottom-wiggling funk music from the favelas, as it sought to show its best side," according to Ahmed & Leahy of the FINANCIAL TIMES. The four-hour spectacle that launched the first South American games "was watched by tens of thousands of people" inside the Maracanã football stadium, and billions on TV around the world. The "cheerful but relatively low-key opening" allowed Brazilians to forget for a short while "the harsh backdrop to the Games -- including a deep recession, a corruption scandal at state-owned oil company Petrobras and a political crisis as leftwing President Dilma Rousseff battles impeachment." Yet political "intrigue was never far away." Rather than Rousseff, "her nemesis, interim president Michel Temer, presided over the ceremony but did not appear on TV screens in the stadium." When the crowd heard his voice over the speakers declaring the Games open, "he was booed." The ceremony was "more subtle" than London’s £27M "theatrical spectacular" four years ago. Hard-up Brazilian authorities "opted for a show that reportedly cost half that staged by Britain’s capital" (FT, 8/6). REUTERS' Milliken & Stauffer reported the opening ceremony was "a reflection of Brazil's tough economic times." In one of the world's "most unequal societies, the spectacle celebrated the culture of the favelas, the slums that hang vertiginously above the renowned beaches of Rio" and ring the Maracanã. There was "no glossing over history either: from the arrival of the Portuguese and their conquest of the indigenous populations to the use of African slave labour for 400 years." Home to the Amazon, the world's largest rainforest, "Brazil used the ceremony to call on the 3 billion people watching" to take care of the planet, plant seeds and "protect the verdant land that Europeans found here five centuries ago." The show drew "homegrown stars, like supermodel Gisele Bundchen," who walked across the stadium to the sound of bossa nova hit "Girl from Ipanema" and "tropicalia legends Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil." Everyone performed for free (REUTERS, 8/6).
EARNEST CELEBRATION: In L.A., Meredith Blake reported Rio "proved it can throw a party on a budget." Creative Dir Fernando Meirelles -- the filmmaker behind "City of God" -- "seemed eager to downplay expectations, particularly following the spectacles" staged in London in '12 and Beijing in '08. But as Rio "ably demonstrated in a vibrant ceremony," only a "fool would discount Brazil’s ability to put on a show." What the ceremony lacked in "terrifyingly synchronized drummers or parachuting monarchs, it made up for with joyful music and dancing," an earnest celebration of the country's multicultural heritage and "an unapologetic call to action on climate change" (L.A. TIMES, 8/6). In London, Barney Ronay reported on a "clammy night," Rio 2016 "did what it could." Best of all the ceremonials "were agreeably short," colored at the edges by "a minimum of hectoring cant about saving the world and believing the children are our future." The best bit "came at the start when Samba great Paulinho Da Viola appeared in a gleaming blue suit and strummed the national anthem," like the world's most "impossibly handsome" super-patriotic gameshow host. This was "an agreeably stripped-back affair, a little hip and ragged and pop-up where London was muscular and polished." The "only really jarring note was the preachy green politics dolloped in on top" like a Miss World contender talking about helping kids "who don't read good at the end of the swimsuit round" (GUARDIAN, 8/5).
NO DRAMA: In London, Dave Kidd opined "it might not have lived up to the triumph of London's opening ceremony." And it might have been "rather cut-price and low-key compared with the technological spectacular" of Beijing as well. But the opening night of the Rio Olympics "captured the atmosphere of Brazil, spoke up for saving the planet and provided more technicolor afro wigs than a Marge Simpson convention" (DAILY MIRROR, 8/6). USA TODAY's Christine Brennan wrote "oh Rio, you sandbaggers you." For months, even years, "we thought you couldn’t pull this off." We heard "all about your many problems." And then you give us "an opening ceremony for the ages." What is next, "a problem-free Olympics?" With a budget that organizers said was "12 times less than London’s and 20 times less than Beijing’s," the Rio opening ceremony was "exquisitely choreographed as a boisterous show, a poignant social statement and a bold challenge to the world." Who "needs money when you have a conscience?" (USA TODAY, 8/6).
