Olympic Schedule, Opening Ceremony and Local Ties

NBC is estimating that one billion people will watch Friday’s Olympic Games Opening Ceremony.

The ceremony titled “Isle of Wonder” and created by “Slumdog Millionaire” director Danny Boyle, will air at 7:30 p.m. on NBC and will feature the character James Bond (played by Daniel Craig) and Queen Elizabeth II, Paul McCartney and David Beckham, according to NBC.

For the complete Olympic Games schedule, click here. 

For the NBC Olympic programming schedule click here.

According to NBC:

The stadium will be transformed into a British countryside scene featuring fields, meadows and live animals including sheep, horses, cows, chickens and goats…there’ll be a cricket pitch and synthetic clouds will reportedly hang above the bucolic pastures. Four giant Maypoles will represent England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland.

The green will give way to an industrial landscape featuring the Houses of Parliament and Royal Albert Hall. Performers will then recreate the Jarrow march of 1936 when 200 walked to London to protest poverty and unemployment in the northeast. There will be a tribute to the suffragette movement and the British National Health Service will honored by real nurses pushing hospital beds around the arena.

Several local athletes will compete in London, including Seal Beach water polo players Adam Wright and Tim Hutten, and the entire women’s U.S. Water Polo Team, which trains in Los Alamitos.

There are several athletes with local ties including Canadian Cyclist Tara Whitten, a medal contender who lives and trains in Seal Beach along with fellow Olympic teammates Gillian Carleton and Jasmine Glaesser. The team’s coach, three-time Olympian Tanya Dubnicoff is also a Seal Beach resident.

Additionally, Tori Pena, a Huntington Beach pole-vaulter, who will be competing for her grandmother’s native Ireland also has a large Seal Beach fan base.