[Shaun]

Starts Wednesday on C4 at 8pm:

The show is scheduled to begin at 8.30pm, which means those with a ticket should aim to be at the Olympic Park around 5.30pm. Those watching at home can follow coverage that begins on Channel 4, More4 and Ch4 Paralympics 1 at 8.00pm.

The opening spectacle has been curated by two Artistic Directors, Bradley Hemmings and Jenny Sealey. Their focus has not been on outdoing Danny Boyle’s mesmerizing celebration of all things British, but instead upon perceptions of what a human being can achieve. Fittingly titled ‘Enlightenment’, the show will feature over 3,000 volunteers and a fly past from British charity ‘Aerobility’, followed by a combination of speeches, anthems, parades, flags and flames.

The opening ceremony will also include a fly-past – not from the Red Arrows, but a team assembled by Aerobility, a charity that helps put those with impairments who fly. The Mercury Prize-winning singer PJ Harvey will perform alongside disabled artists who will premiere their music at the ceremony. Professor Stephen Hawking is also tipped to appear.

Coldplay are performing at the closing ceremony, but idk about any others.

[Mrluvaluva]

Parade of Athletes
After the Host Nation's flag has been raised and the national anthem played, the spectacular Parade of Athletes will begin. Teams enter in alphabetical order, according to the language of the Host Country, apart from the team of the Host Nation (in this case ParalympicsGB), who march in last.

Speeches
Once all the nations have arrived into the Stadium, LOCOG Chair Seb Coe and President of the IPC Sir Philip Craven will address the audience. The Games will then be declared open.

Paralympic Anthem and Flag
Once the Games have been declared open, the Paralympic Flag is carried into the Stadium and hoisted into the air as the Anthem is played. The Paralympic Flag features three 'agitos' (Latin for 'I move') in red, blue and green – the colours most represented in national flags around the world.

Oaths
A participating athlete and judge from the Host Nation stand on the rostrum and, holding a corner of the IPC flag in their left hand and raising their right, take the Oath, vowing to compete and judge according to the rules of their respective sport.

The Torch and Cauldron
The big finale is the entrance of the Paralympic Flame into the Stadium. It is passed to the final Torchbearer, who will ceremoniously light the Cauldron, indicating the beginning of the Games. The Flame will continue to burn for the whole of the Games.

Creative team
A host of world-class British directors and producers are leading the artistic team to stage the Opening Ceremony of the London 2012 Paralympic Games.

Co-Artistic Directors Bradley Hemmings and Jenny Sealey share a long history of staging exciting live events, including work with deaf and disabled artists.


1. The theme is "Elightenment":

The opening ceremony, overseen by artistic directors Jenny Sealey and Bradley Hemmings, is entitled "Enlightenment" and will celebrate Britain’s history of science and discovery.

"We want our ceremony to be both spectacular and deeply human,” Sealey and Hemmings have said in a statement.

Sebastian Coe, head of the London Olympics and Paralympics organizing committee, has called the show "more thoughtful" than the action-packed opening ceremony, dubbed "Isles of Wonder," that Danny Boyle put together for the Summer Games. But organizers in online promotions still promise such things as "acrobatic performances on a 35 meter-high rig above the stadium floor."

"It focuses on that extraordinary period in European history and the great intellectual revolution that took place between 1550 and 1720," the Guardian quoted Coe as saying about the Paralympics opening. "Everything from Newton making sense of gravity and motion to Napier with logarithms and Harvey with blood circulation."

Organizers have said that the event will not only pay tribute to the likes of Netwon, but also Stephen Hawking.

Added Coe: "It's really about ceilings, about human understanding, about limitations and the importance of knowledge. Within that period some quite profound things were being said about the rights of man. You can probably gather what it's trying to say."

2. Shakespeare's "The Tempest" is one key inspiration:
Just like the opening ceremony of the Summer Games, the Paralympics event will quote William Shakespeare’s The Tempest.

A young actress will play Miranda, the main character from the famous writer's play, and lead the audience through the ceremony.

According to the Daily Mirror, the proceedings will kick off following a fly-over by Aerobility, a charity that trains disabled people to become pilots, with the famous lines: “O wonder! How many goodly creatures there are here!"

3. Music:
Most talk in the U.K. has focused on the Paralympics closing ceremony, which is scheduled to feature a performance by Coldplay, while the opening ceremony score has drawn less attention.

Organizers have said little beyond the fact that the opening event will be a mix of classical and dance music. Most observers have highlighted that whatever music is used, the ceremony will not be the broad display of British music royalty that the Summer Games opener was.

In addition to music entertainment, the ceremony will feature the typical opening remarks from Coe and Philip Craven, the president of the International Paralympics Committee, the lighting of the flame and the Paralympics anthem.

4. Thousands of volunteers and athletes will make it happen:
The Paralympics opening celebration will feature more than 3,000 volunteers and 100-plus professional artists, as well as more than 4,000 athletes.

Among the performers are 50 disabled people, including non-competing Paralympians and rehabilitating soldiers, who learned skills from scratch for a circus act.

The athletes will come in earlier than during the Olympics opening ceremony. They will then sit on the track to form part of the audience.

5. The Summer Olympics cauldron will return:
The cauldron that was used to display the Olympic flame during the Summer Olympics will be back in use for the Paralympics.

While the cauldron has 205 petals - one for every nation participating in the Summer Games, it will this time only have 166 inscribed as fewer countries compete in the Paralympics.

Like the Summer Games, the torch relay for the Paralympics has involved some celebrities, including singer Charlotte Church.

[reece(:]

How many viewers in proportion to the Olympics do you think this'll get?

[Saph]

Isn't Steven Hawkins suppose to be in it?

[Mrluvaluva]

Originally Posted by SaphLiike

Isn't Steven Hawkins suppose to be in it?

It just reads that they will pay tribute to him.

I think it will get a fair number of viewers, but not as many as the summer olympics, although it promises to be the biggest paralympics ever.

[Black Dagger]

Sam & The Womp are supposed to be at the opening.

I'm excited... I was on an Olympics downer when it finished.

[Mrluvaluva]

Originally Posted by Black Dagger

Sam & The Womp are supposed to be at the opening.

The whole nation will be tuning in, I am sure.

[Shaun]

Professor Stephen Hawking will help narrate a scientific "journey of discovery" at the Paralympic opening ceremony, it has been revealed.

The world-renowned physicist, who has motor neurone disease, will appear live at Wednesday's event at the Olympic Stadium.

Called Enlightenment, the show will start at 20:30 BST and will showcase the talents of disabled performers.

Oscar-nominated director Stephen Daldry has been involved in its production.

A capacity crowd of 80,000 people will watch the ceremony in east London, which will be opened by the Queen and watched by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Organisers say the ceremony's central themes will be empowerment and the challenging of perceptions of human possibility, and it will welcome home a Games which started in 1948 in Stoke Mandeville.

A 24-hour long Paralympic torch relay began in the Buckinghamshire town on Tuesday night and will culminate at the opening ceremony later on Wednesday.

The flame will be carried by 580 torchbearers in total, and after being carried past some of London's most famous landmarks, will be used to light a scaled-down version of the Olympic cauldron.

The organisers have revealed that Prof Hawking will act as a guide to Miranda, a character from William Shakespeare's play The Tempest, through the show.

The pair will be joined by Prospero, another character from the play, which will be played by British actor Sir Ian McKellen.

Bradley Hemmings, one of the Paralympic opening ceremony's artistic directors, said the team approached Prof Hawking towards the end of 2011.

"We worked very closely with Professor Hawking to develop a series of messages which are very much integrated into the storytelling of the ceremony.

"We have spent time with him [Prof Hawking] in Cambridge and have been so incredibly gratified with him giving his time".

Prof Hawking - a British theoretical physicist and former Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge University - is famous for his work around the Big Bang theory and his book A Brief History of Time.

In 1963, the professor was diagnosed with motor neurone disease and given just years to live. But Prof Hawking, now aged 70, went on to defy the odds with a glittering career in the scientific arena.

Mr Hemmings praised the professor's "humanity and humour", saying "he is a fun guy".

The start of the show will also feature a fly-past by Aerobility, a British charity that trains disabled people to become pilots.

Fifty specialist performers in the ceremony have taken part in an eight-week circus skills training programme in Hackney, east London.

Hemmings's fellow artistic director Jenny Sealey said: "You will be taken on the most exquisite journey of discovery inspired by the wonder of science.

"Both Hawking and McKellen in their narrative talk about what we all need to remember: don't just look down at your feet, look at the stars, be curious."

Sealey would not revealed the cost of the event, but said it had been put together on a "prudent budget".

About £27m was spent on Oscar-winning director Danny Boyle's spectacular Olympic opener, with the remaining £53m divided between the Paralympic opening event and the closing ceremonies for both Games.

Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg is expected to tell Paralympians at an official pre-ceremony reception that the return of the Games to Britain will be a "showstopping homecoming".

Mr Clegg is expected to say that the UK is "on the brink of making history".

"What began in Britain 64 years ago, with 16 World War II veterans competing in the Stoke Mandeville Games, returns tonight as the biggest Paralympics of all time.

"We want to go further, faster in London 2012. If 1948 was the birth of the Paralympic movement, let 2012 be a milestone in its journey," he will add.

Paralympic opening: Facts and stats

A cast of more than 3,000 adult volunteers will include injured soldiers and past Paralympic athletes
About 100 children and 100 professional performers are also involved
The crowd will be urged to take part in the world's largest "apple crunch", as each spectator is given an apple to bite simultaneously
The opening ceremony will signal the start of 11 days of competition by more than 4,000 athletes from 166 countries

[Jayson]

Forgot that C4 had the Paralympics... not looking forward to the adverts

[Maia]

8 minutes

Looking forward to this, hasn't been the same since the Olympics finished

[Jayson]

Really hope they put a lot of effort into this, like they did for the Olympics

[Marc]

I don't feel excited? Like the Olympics

[Shaun]

IIRC the Beijing paralympics started immediately after the Olympic games... this 2-3 week gap has kind-of killed the buzz

[Marc]

It was 2 weeks aswell at Beijing

[Shaun]

Oh right

I guess people just get bored of sport at this stage of summer

[Redway]

Eurgh at David Cameron appearing.

[Jayson]

I just really wish it was on BBC

This is the first ad break and it's already pissing me off

[Marc]

We're just much more aware of the timings because it's in our country.

Will Stephen Hawkin be jumping out of a helicopter as well?

[MTVN]

Think it'd actually be better to have had the Paralympics before the Olympics to get people excited and give them a chance to test everything and see it in practice

[Marc]

Test it on the disabled aye?

[Shaun]

Originally Posted by MTVN

Think it'd actually be better to have had the Paralympics before the Olympics to get people excited and give them a chance to test everything and see it in practice

Same.

I hope there's some stars appearing tonight, could boost the numbers.

[MTVN]

Originally Posted by Marc

Test it on the disabled aye?

Yes use them as guinea pigs

[Jayson]

I wonder if NBC have decided to show this pre-recorded as well

[Marc]

Throw them off the diving board, see how it does with them

[Jayson]

I see Boris is preparing for his events