Tokyo 2020 Presentation at Rio Olympics Closing Ceremony Interview with the Production Team
We talked with the creative team behind the Rio Olympics Tokyo 2020 presentation which had Japanese Prime Minister as Super Mario.
TOKYO2020/Shugo Takemi
Olympics Flag Handover Ceremony
01 Japanese national anthem arranged by composer Jun Miyake. 20 performers show up on a red field. Red color turns into the Japanese flag.
02 Words of “OBRIGADO” and “ARIGATO”. Foreign words meaning “Thank you” made of children from Tokyo and Tohoku region hit by the Tsunami.
03 Video part. Young athletes behind sightseeing spots in Tokyo, such as Shibuya, Asakusa, Ginza, Tokyo station and Odaiba. Tokyo to Rio ball relay by Olympic athletes and Japanese famous characters, such as Captain Tsubasa, Packman, Doraemon, Hello Kitty and Super Mario. The ball finally lands on Abe Prime Minister.
04 Prime Minister dressed as Mario pops up from a pipe in Rio stadium.
05 Athletes of 33 sports planned to play in 2020 Tokyo Olympics descend from the air. After AR direction, 50 dancers perform.
06 Time lapse of night view of Tokyo is shown on the field.
07 Three teams called “Omotenashi no mai”, “Oen no mai”, “Arigato no mai” clap and dance. They switch costumes like in a Kabuki performance. Light frames move to center and make the Tokyo Olympics mark.
08 View of Tokyo shows up with Fuji Mountain in background. Dancers line in a row. With Super Mario’s “Stage Clear” SE, fireworks set off.
01-08 Tokyo 2020/Shugo TAKEMI, Tokyo2020, quoted from "NHK Rio Olympics"
Interview:
Challenge was “How to express Tokyo”
The core members of the creative team behind the closing ceremony were 4 people. First was creative director Hiroshi Sasaki, who had worked for major Japanese beverage and car companies for over 30 years. Second was musician Ringo Sheena, third was Kaoru Sugano who had also worked for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic bid presentation, and forth was choreographer MIKIKO who had worked with Japanese pop groups such as Perfume and BABYMETAL.
Production Team ： From left, Akihiro Hamabe, Megumi Ohta, Yuichi Kodama, Sakiko Yasue, Hiroshi Sasaki, Kaoru Sugano, Mikiko, Kohei Ai, Daito Manabe
Sasaki recalls when he got commissioned. “I never heard anyone in the advertising industry being asked to do the Olympics ceremony. I was very surprised at first. But the organizing committee said it was a trailer for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, and then I thought maybe I could do something”.
The challenge was how to express Tokyo. “I didn’t know if we were supposed to express Tokyo or Japan. And there are so many aspects of Tokyo. Tokyo means differently for someone who was born in Tokyo and someone from outside Tokyo. It changes from generation too, and is quite different for people from abroad. Then I realized the broadness of Tokyo is what Tokyo is, but at the same time struggled to narrow the image,” says MIKIKO.
Then they got a hint from Edo-Tokyo Museum Honorary Director Makoto Takeuchi. “Nowadays Tokyo has a cutting edge image, but before the high-tech robots there were the Edo period wind-up dolls. Before the Anime and Manga there were the ukiyo-e prints. The history behind makes what Tokyo is now. I realized I should express that,” said Sasaki.
Japanese Prime Minister showing up as Mario!
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe appeared as Mario in the ceremony. How did this idea come up? It was Sugano who said at the planning “what if we show Mario as one of the Japanese famous people?” Most of the creative team were in their 30’s, who used to play Mario games when they were children. So everyone loved the idea.
But the response from the International Olympic Committee was a negative. The reason was because it could be taken as a promotion for a particular character. So they decided to use other characters as well. They chose characters that were famous around the world, and gave a role for each.
When they pitched the idea to the organizing committee, their response was “why not make the pipe go through Rio?” There were many opinions for whom to do Mario. It was the organizing committee leader Yoshiro Mori who suggested the Prime Minister. When “Abe Mario” appeared in the stadium, he was greeted with a massive applaud.
They overcame the restrictions with new ideas
The idea of using light frames came from the restriction of having to fill in the space with only a few people. They were told at first “At least 200 dancers are required based on the size of the stadium.” But then it turned out they could only take 50 dancers because of the budget. So MIKIKO decided to use light frames to synchronize the dancers and light and projection on the floor to show the movements bigger.
Another restriction was not being able to do rehearsals. Daito Manabe from Rhizomatiks Research developed a special simulation soft to solve this. It was in front of the audience when they could actually perform with all the direction elements. So they used the simulation soft to figure out the camera work and lights.
Same team worked for the Paralympics closing ceremony
The same members worked for the Paralympics closing ceremony that was held a month later the Olympics. The concept was more valued than the direction for the Paralympics. “Changing disabilities to a charm”, “Positive switch to achieve a world of helping each other” were the concepts. Prosthetic foot models and dancers, visually disabled people did the performance.
Paralympics Flag Handover Ceremony
01 Video part. Prosthetic foot model GIMICO walking in Tokyo. The foot shows images of Tokyo. Last it becomes Tokyo Sky Tree.
02 One of the performers is amputee model called GIMICO. Together with dance unit AyaBambi.
03 Second is dancer Koichi Omae. His unique dance with prosthetic foot developed by Rhizomatiks.
04 Third is visually disabled Akira Hiyama. He touches special musical device. View of Tokyo shows in background.
05 Wheel chair performer and accompanist dance together. Performance by dancer with down syndrome.
06 Parade by all performers.
LED lights embedded in the prosthetic foot device and the three dimensional Tokyo diorama were created by Manabe from Rhizomatiks Research. “I was always curious about people who can’t hear or see and thought they had special powers. That’s why I would work with them and made things together,” says Manabe.
A great applaud followed the performance by19 dancers. Sasaki says, “The reaction was very different from the Olympics. I think we achieved our goals trying to express Tokyo in a cooler way.”
The flag handover ceremony was a commercial of Japan
Sasaki says, “I always wanted to make a commercial not just for companies but for Japan. The eight minutes was exactly that. It was Japan’s all-out war, just as Sheena said.”
With the logo and stadium problems, Tokyo Olympics had a rather negative image. But this flag handover ceremony changed the mood altogether, and became the positive switch for Japan.