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00:00François Picquart has also been, he'll also be hosting a show as one of our several evening slots.
00:06And François earlier caught up with Craig Capazes from the Daily Beast.
00:10He gave us his opinion about this scale of the show.
00:16Hey James, so here we are, a safe distance from where it's all happening.
00:21You can see in the distance over here is the Eiffel Tower, the Eiffel Tower which
00:26the skeptics would argue has been privatized for the next fortnight.
00:31Now you can see I don't have the golden ticket, but we're with someone who does.
00:37Enter Craig Capazes. Your first Olympics were in?
00:42Barcelona, 92.
00:44My first Olympics were in Barcelona.
00:45Yeah, you were just a puppy then.
00:47Yeah, and this is the golden ticket.
00:49This is the golden ticket, and you're not going to get anywhere closer
00:53without this ticket and this little blue gizmo right here.
00:56Right, and you need on top of that...
00:58You need to have your passport, you need to have a digital ticket,
01:03and they also want you to have a French Foreign Ministry press card or a police press card.
01:08They want you to go with that as well.
01:09Now, Parisians tend to insist too much on the fact that they think they're all of France.
01:16But for the rest of France, it'll be great.
01:18They can see the games on television.
01:20And Craig, this opening ceremony is not in a stadium.
01:25It is a made-for-television event.
01:27Yeah, it's costing the French government $150 million just to stage the opening ceremony.
01:34And the closing ceremony, they've also kicked in $4.75 billion
01:40to put on this show on the river, the whole Olympics.
01:44And the little teaser promo on French state television is,
01:49you ain't seen nothing yet, showing reels from past opening ceremonies.
01:54Of course, Mother Nature may rain on the parade.
01:59Well, a lot of people think this is a boneheaded idea to do it on the river,
02:03to have this floatable feast down the Seine.
02:05All these games before have had opening ceremonies in stadiums,
02:09where it's very simple, easier to control the crowds and security.
02:13This is a nightmare because Paris, whether you like it or not,
02:17is locked down tight, tighter than even Beijing during the games there.
02:23And it's going to stay that way for the next two weeks.
02:25Now, if you think that's worthwhile price tag to promote Paris, great.
02:31A lot of people think it isn't.
02:32OK, this is where I argue the point.
02:35Craig, this is a fortnight in which you showcase sports, the world coming to Paris.
02:42And it is a made for television event.
02:44So the lockdown, the Parisians are gone anyway during the summer.
02:48So why not for just this fortnight?
02:52Well, according to the Confederation of French Commerce in that area down there,
02:58sales are 70 percent down.
03:00But they'll make it back in spades.
03:02Everybody's going to watch TV and want to come to Paris.
03:06Paris is perhaps the one city in the world which doesn't need another wet kiss
03:10on television to get people to come here.
03:13It is the most visited city in the world.
03:15In fact, Air France has estimated conservative 180 million euros
03:21in ticket sales lost between now and the end of August.
03:24Why?
03:25Because of the Olympics, because people don't want to come here again.
03:30Is it worth the price tag to give Paris this two week advertisement?
03:36We'll see.
03:37All right.
03:37So organization, security risks.
03:40These are the things that are owning the news cycle right now.
03:43But we've already seen because some of the events
03:46can't be sandwiched into a fortnight have already begun.
03:50I personally went to the Rugby Sevens on Thursday.
03:55Great atmosphere.
03:56And once the games have begun,
03:57this is where I get back to what we were talking about earlier.
04:00All this stuff is forgotten about.
04:02Everyone does forget about the background noise once the games begin.
04:07But this is the first games where the city will be locked down completely
04:12during the entire event.
04:14That wasn't the case in Barcelona.
04:16It wasn't the case in Atlanta.
04:17I've seen Parisians who are understanding of it and who get it.
04:23There are many, but I've also seen many Parisians,
04:26elderly ones who don't know how to get the security code on their phone
04:29to show the police in order to get to their apartment.
04:32I've seen people crying on the streets over this.
04:34Hey, there's always problems at the Olympics.
04:37We all know that.
04:38We just have to hope for the best.
04:40This is an argument that's going to run throughout the two weeks.
04:42We'll revisit this conversation.
04:43One final question.
04:46What are you looking forward to most during these games?
04:49Beach volleyball.
04:50Beach volleyball.
04:52Crickapetus there.
04:53Back to the studio.