By John Leicester
The Associated Press
SAINT-DENIS, France (AP) — Paris is closing out two-and-a-half extraordinary weeks of Olympic sports and emotion with a boisterous, star-studded show in France’s national stadium, handing over hosting duties for the Summer Games to the next city in line: Los Angeles in 2028.
Speculation was rife that Hollywood star Tom Cruise — seen around town during the final weekend — would feature in the closing ceremony that unlike the rain-drenched July 26 opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Games, basked in hot weather.
Shortly after French President Emmanuel Macron and International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach had taken their seats, the ceremony opened with a singer belting out “Under the skies of Paris” — sung in the past by Edith Piaf and others.
The stadium crowd roared as French swimmer Léon Marchand, dressed in a suit and tie instead of the swim trunks he wore to win four golds, was shown on the giant screens collecting the Olympic flame from the Tuileries Gardens in Paris. There, the Olympic cauldron — powered by electricity instead of fossil fuels — had lit up the French capital for the duration of the Games, thrilling crowds by rising into the skies on a balloon every night.
For Los Angeles, topping Paris could be mission impossible. The French capital made spectacular use of its cityscape for its first Games in 100 years. The Eiffel Tower and other iconic monuments became Olympic stars in their own right, serving as backdrops and in some cases venues for competitions.
But Los Angeles was bringing star power of its own: singer Billie Eilish, rapper and Paris Olympics mainstay Snoop Dogg, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers are scheduled to perform Aug. 11 as part of the handover from the City of Light to the City of Angels.
Each of the music artists is a California native, including H.E.R., who is expected to sing the U.S. national anthem live at the Stade de France, which hosted Olympic track and field and rugby sevens. The audience was expected to top 70,000 people.
As night fell, athletes marched into the stadium waving the flags of their 205 countries and territories — a display of global unity in a world gripped by global tensions and conflicts, including in Ukraine and Gaza. The stadium screens carried the words, “Together, united for peace.” With the 329 medal events finished, the expected 9,000 athletes — many wearing their shiny medals — and team staffers who filled the arena danced and cheered to the thumping beats.
The stadium, France’s largest, was one of the targets of Islamic State gunmen and suicide bombers who killed 130 people in and around Paris on Nov. 13, 2015. The joy and celebrations that swept Paris during the Games as Marchand and other French athletes racked up 64 medals — 16 of them gold — marked a major watershed in the city’s recovery from that night of terror.
The closing ceremony also will see the last medals — each embedded with a chunk of the Eiffel Tower — hung around athletes’ necks.
Fittingly for the first Olympics that aimed for gender parity, they’ll all be women — the gold, silver and bronze winners from the women’s marathon earlier Aug. 11.
The race — won by Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands — took the spot of the men’s race that traditionally closed out previous Games. In Paris, the men were bumped to the final Aug. 10, with Ethiopia’s Tamirat Tola taking gold.
The switch was part of efforts in Paris to make the Olympic spotlight shine more brightly on the sporting feats of women. Paris was also where women first made their Olympic debut, at the Games of 1900.
The U.S. team again topped the medal table, with 126 in all and 40 of them gold. Three were courtesy of gymnast Simone Biles, who made a resounding return to the top of the Olympic podium after prioritizing her mental health instead of competition in Tokyo in 2021.
Following controversy that enveloped the opening ceremony — assailed by former U.S. President Donald Trump, French bishops and others over segments they felt poked fun at Christianity — the closing ceremony was being closely watched to see whether artistic director Thomas Jolly had any more surprises in store.
Jolly and other members of his creative team filed police complaints over death threats and online vitriol targeting them and some of opening show’s performers.
Critics jumped to the conclusion that a segment featuring drag queens and a DJ who is also an LGBTQ+ icon had parodied “The Last Supper,” Leonardo Da Vinci’s painting showing Jesus Christ.
Jolly and his team repeatedly insisted that was never their intention and got backing from Macron, who described himself as “outraged and sad” by the backlash against them.
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