LDS choir likely to get call in '02

SYDNEY— Yes, it looks like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir will be invited to perform at the opening ceremonies of the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City. But, no, the show is not going to turn into a historical pageant.

That's according to Don Mischer, the veteran ceremony producer hired by the Salt Lake Organizing Committee to put together the 2002 show.

"We want to use them for sure. There's no question," Mischer said of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' famed choir. "They're an institution." Several months ago, a top NBC official said the network, which paid a record $544 million for the right to broadcast the 2002 Games in the United States, wanted the choir to perform for the same reason.

Indeed, added Salt Lake Organizing Committee president Mitt Romney, also in Sydney, "We would be honored to have this world-renowned choir participate in our opening ceremonies." He noted, however, that "SLOC has not made a formal invitation to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, nor have we finalized our plans for ceremonies."

Even if the choir does participate, Mischer said, it's important to avoid turning the ceremonies at the University of Utah's Rice-Eccles Stadium into a history lesson for billions of television viewers around the world.

For instance, there likely won't be a segment on the LDS Church, he said. What role, if any, the church's influence on Utah will play in the opening ceremonies is still being discussed with SLOC.

"These things cannot be historical pageants. Last night was about as far as you could go," Mischer told Utah reporters here Saturday local time.

He was referring to the four-hour spectacle in front of 110,000 people that marked the beginning of the 2000 Summer Games here Friday night local time.

Sydney organizers used everything from sacred Aboriginal ceremonies to fire-breathing stilt-walkers to suburbanites with lawn mowers to tell Australia's story.

The show relied on a heavy dose of larrikinism, an Australian term for irreverence, wit and mistrust of authority that emerged as British convicts settled the rugged continent.

There were also some spectacular effects, including the use of cables strung across the open-air field to lift performers and props high into the air.

Add an estimated 12,600 performers and a 4,600-member production crew to the mix, and it's clear it would be hard for Salt Lake City to top Sydney's effort.

Both Mischer and Romney said that's not their intent. Instead, Salt Lake organizers hope to present more of a "winter wonderland," warmed by local hospitality.

That hospitality could include, for the first time, scripted interaction between Olympic athletes and spectators in the stands. Traditionally, the athletes simply march into the stadium.

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