Zidane suspended from helicopter: the wild Paris 2024 Olympics project revealed

Zinédine Zidane had agreed to fly over Paris suspended from a helicopter ladder for the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games on July 26, 2024, before the project was abandoned for safety reasons. It is Thomas Jolly, artistic director of the event, who lifts the veil on this aborted scenario in issue 241 of So Foot, published in November 2026.

The idea was as spectacular as it was audacious: the former number 10 of the French national team, holding the Olympic flame, suspended from a ladder attached to a helicopter flying over the capital, before joining the Tuileries gardens for a memorable arrival. Behind this staging lay an explicit tribute to French cinema: Thomas Jolly wanted to recreate a cult scene from Georges Lautner’s film Le Guignolo (1980), in which Jean-Paul Belmondo performs a similar aerial stunt, with Zidane in the lead role.

According to the artistic director’s revelations, the 1998 World Cup champion had agreed to participate in the sequence. But the regulations governing low-altitude flights over Paris put an end to the project before it even truly took shape.

Forced to revise his plans, Thomas Jolly ultimately assigned Zidane a different role in the show. The former playmaker appeared in the opening ceremony’s introductory film, then took to the Trocadéro stage in pouring rain to pass the Olympic flame to Rafael Nadal.