Medvedev lauds "British atmosphere" of Olympics opening ceremony
LONDON. July 28 (Interfax) - Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has praised Friday's opening ceremony for the London Olympics and said Russia will use the experience of it for the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi but suggested that the Sochi games have a shorter opening ceremony.
"We were assessing all that was happening from the standpoint of the future, of our ceremony in 2014. It will be different, of course, because it's Winter Olympics. It shouldn't be as long as that, but in any case our producers will analyze certain canons and criteria that reflect the trend of getting such events ready," Medvedev told the newspaper The Times.
He said he had brought a large Russian delegation to London with him, which includes "some key government leaders who are in charge of the organization of the Sochi Olympics." He was referring to Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak.
The purpose of the Russian delegation's visit "is not only propaganda of our ideas but also exchanges, cooperation with our partners," Medvedev said. "I think it will be very, very useful."
Medvedev described Friday's opening ceremony as "a grandiose and well-organized spectacle."
"What is most important, it seems to me, is that it was a British show," he said. "The organizers were able to create an absolutely British atmosphere. In my view, what dominated this event - aside, of course, from the ideas of sport, the ideas of Pierre de Coubertin, various historical reminiscences - was the idea of British music, which was presented in all its glory. In view of the fact that British music is loved and listened to in many countries of the world, including the Russian Federation, it seems to me that it was a situation where it was possible to find the right kind of language, the right code for communication with large numbers of people."
Medvedev made a special mention of the performance of Mr. Bean (Rowan Atkinson). "It was really funny. I hadn't expected that I would laugh at the opening ceremony for the Olympic Games," Medvedev said.
He said he had been seated during the ceremony between the leaders of Romania and Rwanda, in the order of the Latin alphabet, as planned by the ceremony organizers. He also said he was only able to get to his hotel by 2 a.m.
Asked what underlay decisions on how much time to give the team of each country for marching through the stadium during the parade, Medvedev said: "I don't know what kind of lobbyism it was, but the Americans and British were shown a lot. The Americans brought out their entire delegation, they didn't spare anyone, - our guys had left to go to bed and the Americans were still walking along the path."
Medvedev expressed general approval of the Russians' uniform because there was "something fresh" about it but said the "a la russe" design that was used for the third time could have been replaced with something else.
"There are things that get repetitive. When it was for the first time - but this was the third time already. To my taste, something more restrained could have been used," he said.
"On the other hand, I can say as a lucky possessor of one of these uniforms - it's quite high-quality," Medvedev said.
Asked what kind of opening ceremony he would like the Sochi Olympics to have, he said: "We don't have such well-developed music as they do, and we definitely shouldn't put our main emphasis on the musical part. We need something else - it should be some kind of play on Russia as the largest country with its entire beauty. Secondly, it should involve visual effects that would stick in one's memory."
Medvedev suggested that the Sochi opening ceremony should not take three hours, as the London ceremony had done. "But that is not part of the style of Winter Olympics anyway," he said.
