How is it that the career of a one-time American beach bum who later produced some of the most-watched live events in television history is reaching its pinnacle with an only-for-Canada production at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver? The answer will become clear when Louis J. Horvitz begins his customary countdown from five to one on Friday night.
Horvitz, 63, is the Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium's director in charge of televising the opening and closing ceremonies for the Vancouver Games, events which could draw hundreds of millions of viewers around the world (perhaps even a billion).
What's different about Horvitz's role, however, is that the handiwork of the long-time director of the Oscars and Emmys broadcasts - this year he boosted the Grammy Awards ratings by 35 per cent - won't be seen around the world. Instead, he was hand-picked by CTVglobemedia president and CEO Ivan Fecan to produce the feed from Friday night's spectacle at BC Place that will be seen only in Canada. And that's more than fine by Horvitz.
"I think this could possibly [rank as]the highest project I've been involved with, ever, just because of what it means to me personally. It's a chance to make my dad proud," Horvitz said yesterday in a telephone interview from the International Broadcast Centre in Vancouver.
Horvitz's sentimental link to the Games comes from his father Louie, who was born and raised in Hamilton, Ont. He moved his family to downtown Los Angeles in the 1930s, where they ran a haberdashery business that supplied caps to the U.S. military during the Great Depression. Horvitz's childhood was dotted with trips to Toronto and Hamilton.
Horvitz long ago made his father proud. A street-racing enthusiastic in his youth, he began his 40-year TV career as an intern cameraman at NBC and went on to direct high-profile projects such as the Rolling Stones' 1989 Steel Wheels Tour, Paul Simon's 1991 Concert in the Park, and U2's halftime show at the 2002 Super Bowl. But for the dad, seeing his son come north for the Olympics is clearly a milestone in a category all its own.
"He goes, 'Finally, you're going home to do your show,'" Horvitz said.
After five months of poring over preview renderings and storyboards outlining plans for the opening ceremonies, Horvitz finally got into the arena this week for a pair of dress rehearsals. But such is the national security-type secrecy surrounding the event that even he has been left guessing what chunks of it will look like.
"The lighting of the cauldron is still under big wraps, so I haven't seen that yet," he said. "I don't know when we will see it. We might be seeing it on the air."
It's a vastly different task from the award shows he's famous for, which tend to involve shooting mostly head on at a proscenium stage. Perhaps his best preparation was his only other Olympic job: Ahead of the opening ceremonies of the 1988 Summer Olympics in South Korea, Horvitz produced a live entertainment show headlined by Bob Hope for hoards of athletes and dignitaries in the packed 100,000-seat stadium.
In Vancouver he's grappling with how to put viewers at the centre of the action of a 360-degree show that will transform the 60,000-seat stadium "into a winter wonderland."
Horvitz has his usual small, hand-picked team as well as a sizable CTV staff to produce the show. He will have 25 cameras of his own, plus access to another 10 or so from the NBC and world feeds. His cameras on the ground will be set in the end zones (BC Place is predominantly a football stadium), as well as at mid-field and on both sidelines at the 20- and 30-yard-lines. Every angle must have a reverse shot to mirror it.
"Then you just kind of chase the performers around," he said, balancing wide shots showing the grand scale of the event with "tighter shots so you feel like you're on the field of play."
It's the unpredictability of that chase that keeps bringing Horvitz back to live performances. His love of the immediate comes from his days growing up as an amateur performer, when "we all played guitar and we all had our bands." But the live television director's task also bears notable similarities to an Olympic athlete's.
"It's working and working and prepping and prepping, getting it all together in your head, and then 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, putting it on the air," he said.
"I raced cars as a kid, and I like to go fast," he added. "Television is about as close as it comes. As much as you prepare, you never know what's going to unfold in a live event. That's just God's choice."