Paris dazzles with a rainy Olympics opening ceremony on the Seine River

A Canadian athlete reacts while participating in the opening ceremony of the 2024 Summer Olympics, Friday, July 26, 2024, in Paris, France. (Andy Wong / AP Photo)

PARIS — A hot-air balloon brought an Olympic ring of fire into a rainy sky and singer Celine Dion belted from the Eiffel Tower as Paris kicked off its first Summer Olympics in a century Friday, with a four-hour-long, rule-breaking opening ceremony that unfurled along the Seine River.

On-and-off showers did not seem to hamper the enthusiasm of the athletes. Some held umbrellas as they rode boats down the river in a showcase of the city's resilience as authorities investigated suspected acts of sabotage targeting France's high-speed rail network.

With the ambitious ceremony, the stakes for France were immense. Dozens of heads of state and government were in town, and the world was watching as Paris turned itself into a giant open-air theater. Along the Seine, iconic monuments became stages for dancers, singers and other artists.

That included the Louvre museum, near where French judo champ Teddy Riner and three-time Olympic champion runner Marie-Jose Perec lit the Olympic cauldron, which was attached to a giant balloon that floated into the night -- an homage to early French pioneers of manned flight.

"We survived the rain, but it didn't spoil any of our fun," USA beach volleyball player Kelly Cheng said. "This was one of the most magical nights of our lives."

Despite the weather, crowds crammed the Seine's banks and bridges and watched from balconies, "oohing" and "aahing" as Olympic teams paraded in boats down the waterway that got increasingly choppy as the weather worsened.

Many of the hundreds of thousands of spectators huddled under umbrellas, plastic ponchos or jackets as the rain intensified, others danced and sang, and some dashed from their seats for shelter.

"The rain can't stop us," said U.S. basketball star LeBron James, sporting a plastic poncho along with the other American flag bearer, tennis player Coco Gauff.

The weather made for some bizarre scenes at the show combining prerecorded and live performances: a stiff upper-lipped pianist played on even as small puddles formed on his grand piano. A breakdancer flipped her moves on the sheen of a rain-drenched platform. Some athletes in Bermuda-style colorful shirts looked dressed for the beach, not a deluge.

As global audiences tuned in, Paris put its best foot forward -- quite literally, with a spectacular Olympic launch that lifted spirits and joyous French cancan dancers early on. A humorous short film featured soccer icon Zinedine Zidane. Plumes of French blue, white and red smoke followed.

Lady Gaga sang in French in a prerecorded bit, with dancers shaking pink plumed pompoms, injecting a cabaret feel. On the Eiffel Tower, Dion closed the show with her first live performance since the French-Canadian singer was diagnosed stiff person syndrome, a rare neurological disorder, at the end of 2022.

More than three hours into the show, French President Emmanuel Macron declared the Games open. In a gaffe before that, the five-ring Olympic flag was raised upside down at the Trocadero across from the Eiffel Tower.

In some memorable moments, French-Malian pop star Aya Nakamura, the most listened-to French-speaking artist in the world, emerged from a pyrotechnic display in an all-gold out to sing her hit "Djadja" accompanied by a Republican guard band of the French army.

The ceremony celebrated women, including 10 golden statues of female pioneers that rose from giant pedestals along the river. Among them was Olympe de Gouges, who drafted the Declaration of the Rights of Women and the Female Citizen in 1791 during the French Revolution. She campaigned for the abolition of slavery and was guillotined in 1793.

The Paris Games aim to be the first with equal numbers of men and women competing.

The sprawling event gave organizers bigger crowds to transport, organize and safeguard than previous Olympic ceremonies in stadiums.

Thousands of athletes on 85 boats started the six-kilometre (nearly four-mile) parade on the Seine by breaking through curtains of water cascading down from Austerlitz Bridge. The jetting waters were a wink at the fountains of Versailles Palace, the venue for Olympic equestrian competitions.

Per Olympic protocol, the first boat carried athletes from Greece, birthplace of the ancient Games. It was followed by the Olympic team of refugee athletes and then, the other nations in French alphabetical order.

Some spectators who followed organizers' advice to arrive well ahead of time along the ceremony route fumed over long waits to get to their seats.

"Paris has been great, anything to do with the Olympics and dissemination of information has been horrible," said Tony Gawne, a 54-year-old Texan who turned up six hours in advance with his wife.

"When you spend US$6,000 on two tickets, well, that's a little frustrating," he said.

But Paris had plenty of aces up its sleeve. The Eiffel Tower, its head visible below the clouds, Notre Dame Cathedral -- restored from the ashes of its 2019 fire -- the Louvre Museum and other iconic monuments starred in the opening ceremony. Award-winning theater director Thomas Jolly, the show's creative mind, was using the signature Paris cityscape of zinc-gray rooftops as the playground for his imagination.

His task: Tell the story of France, its people, their history and essence in a way that leaves an indelible imprint on Olympic audiences. Refresh the image and self-confidence of the French capital that was repeatedly struck by deadly extremist attacks in 2015. Capture how Paris is also aiming to reboot the Olympics, with Summer Games it has worked to make more appealing and sustainable.

It was a big ask. So Paris went big, very big. That goes for the security, too. Large fenced-off stretches of central Paris were locked down to those without passes and the skies during the ceremony were a no-fly zone for 150 kilometres (93 miles) around.

During the athletes' waterborne adventure, they passed historic landmarks that have been temporarily transformed into arenas for Olympic sports.

Concorde Plaza, where French revolutionaries guillotined King Louis XVI and other royals, now hosting skateboarding and other sports. The golden-domed resting place of Napoleon Bonaparte, the backdrop for Olympic archery, and the Eiffel Tower, which donated chunks of iron that have been inlaid in the gold, silver and bronze Olympic medals. They'll be won in the 32 sports' 329 medal events.

Paris' aim, said Estanguet, is "to show to the whole world and to all of the French that in this country, we're capable of exceptional things."

AP journalists Jerome Pugmire, Hanna Arhirova, Tales Azzoni, Jocelyn Noveck, Debora Rey and Kristie Rieken and contributed from Paris.