Nobel 2014 9: Wow - This is Really Happening, Isn't It?

Day 3: The Nobel Awards Ceremony – Wednesday December 10, 2014

After the now traditional morning buffet – at which time Sharon introduced us to John O’Keefe, one of the winners for Medicine – we took a look outside at the cold and now rainy weather and decided that our day was going to be busy enough with the afternoon Awards Ceremony and evening Awards Banquet, so we ended up staying in all morning and early afternoon.   That wasn’t too much time to kill as we had to start getting ready around 1:30 in the afternoon.

The Awards and Banquet are strictly white-tie and black tailcoats for the men, and as we started prepping we heard Robert calling out from next door that his shirt seemed pretty tight.  “Suck it up” we called, assuming he was just being a difficult teenager.  When he put on the jacket and threatened to bust the seams we realized with horror that the suits delivered the day previously to our room for the boys were NOT the suits that had been fitted for them.  What we had received were the suits for the two (younger) sons of one of the Physics winners.  Unfortunately, we were so close to our departure time that we had no opportunity to try to rectify things and see if we could swap clothing.  Fortunately, although things were tight they weren’t impossible – had our guys been bigger or the Nakamura kids smaller things could have gotten VERY stressful VERY quickly.  We kicked ourselves for not having the boys do a trial run the day before when we first got the suits delivered from the tailor.  NEXT time we go to the Nobel Awards we’ll be more careful.

Full disclosure: the collars are starched.  By the end of the evening I had severe chafing from mine.
The Awards took us back to the nicely lit up Concert Hall again.  Unlike the previous night’s concert, the weather today had been cold and rainy throughout.  We happened to be on the first bus to leave, and when we arrived the doors to the concert hall hadn’t yet opened.  So we all ran up the stairs and huddled under the meager overhang in what was thankfully just barely a mist at this point.  Had it been even a mild drizzle we all would have been soaked in just the few minutes we stood outside, waiting for the doors to open.  Our 200-250 bus-ferried passengers were among the earliest arrivals.  The general public apparently started arriving a bit after we did.

The Golden Ticket.  You would not believe how many Wonka Bars I had to eat to get this.

Once again our invitations – which also doubled as our Banquet invitations – had our seating assignment on them.  This time, the choice family seats were on the main floor.  We were in row 5 on extreme house right, which provided us with perfect viewing of the Laureates who would be sitting onstage diagonally across from us on stage right.

The overall layout onstage was of rows of chairs set in a shallow V-formation, with the apex of the V upstage center.  There were three rows on stage right: the most downstage row of 11 chairs for the Laureates were at stage level and then two rows on shallow risers behind them were for previous Laureates.  On stage left there were three rows on risers for members of the Nobel Academy, and in front of them at stage level (and consequently immediately in front of us) were 4 gilt chairs arranged in two rows for the King and Queen (front row) and Crown Princess Victoria and her husband.  Finally, at extreme downstage left was a table upon which the Nobel Diplomas and medals were stacked, waiting to be handed over.

About 50 minutes before the start.  The general public hasn't yet arrived, so we have an opportunity to take pictures in front of the stage.  That's my sister (and Weo's wife) on the right.  The chairs for the Royals are just over her shoulder.

Prior to the ceremony’s start at 430P we did have time to take some pictures standing in front of the stage in our finery.  Things were timed such that we arrived by 330P and the concert hall was fundamentally filled by 400P.  Broadcast cameras were everywhere (as they had been for the concert).  The royal box from last night was now given over completely to a large crane-mounted camera, which was just one of the 7 cameras I could see – and I’m sure there were others I couldn’t find.  From Weo’s group, we were joined in Row 5 by family only including (moving from house center to house right) Sharon, Daniel, Stef, the four of us, Randy (female, Weo’s cousin) and Jeff and Lise.  Everyone else was somewhere else, up in one of the balcony levels.

The members of the Academy and former Laureates wandered onto stage.  Literally – they didn’t have any “official” entrance time, so straggled into place between 4P and 430P until those seats were filled.  The members of the Stockholm Royal Symphony Orchestra were behind and above the stage, up in the organ loft – but in full view.  Again, there was a drum tattoo, some standing, and the 4 royals came onto stage looking like a G&S quartet.  The orchestra launched into music and the crowd sang their “Yea, King!” song (which the King himself modestly does NOT sing).  Everyone then sat down.
Everybody's here, so let's get going!  We're in the 5th row, from just right of center and extending to the right.  You can't see us, but I know we're there.  (Truthfully, I can just pick out my sister in her burgundy dress.)

Opening remarks by the President of the Nobel Academy.  A musical interlude.  Then the awards started.  The basic outline was the same.  The head of the Committee for each award made remarks in his or her native language.  All remarks began with the boilerplate intro of “Your Royal Majesty, Your Royal Highnesses, Nobel Laureates, ladies and gentlemen…”  We could follow along with English translations in a booklet everyone was given at entry.  The remarks talk about the work done by the winners and why it is significant.  The remarks always concluded with something along the lines of “Name of winner(s) [at which point the winners for that particular discipline stood up], it is my honor and privilege to award you the Nobel Prize for <your discipline>.  When your name is called, please come forward and accept your award from the hand of the King”.
Now came the highly choreographed presentation of the prize and Royal Handshake.  I believe the recipients were told to support the King so that he didn’t topple off to his left due to the weight of all the crap hanging off of him.  Maybe.  Not sure.  Also note the grimace of pain on Weo’s face due to the effects of the Royal Joy Buzzer hidden in the King’s right hand during this otherwise solemn moment.

Wow.  He did it!

OK.  So maybe that’s not quite true.  But it IS true that there is tremendously meticulous preparation behind the presentation of the award.

The King first stands up (meaning that everyone else does, too) and moves to center stage, where he is met by the winner.  Now some tricky stage management happens.  The guy manning the awards table follows the king and passes him the diploma and medal.  The recipient accepts the diploma with both hands and holds it flat, parallel to the ground.  The king then places the box with the medal on top of the diploma, which the recipient hopefully secures with his left thumb, while simultaneously releasing the diploma from his right hand.  They then shake hands as a trumpet fanfare sounds from up left, and then from somewhere diagonally opposite at the back of the concert hall (a very nice effect)!  The king backs away a few steps and nods his head, at which point the winner bows to the king.  The king turns away and walks back to his seat while the winner turns slightly upstage to bow to the Academy, then the winner turns around to face the audience, takes a couple of steps to center stage (placing himself in the middle of the ornate gold “N” in the carpet) and bows to the audience’s applause.  The winner then retreats to stand back by his chair while this process is repeated for any additional winners in the discipline.  Once all awards in the category are handed out the King sits (so we sit) and there’s some kind of musical interlude, and we move to the next award.

The award/handshake/bow sequence is so important that there had been a rehearsal the day before for all the recipients to practice.  One thing that was made clear is that deviation from the process is NOT welcome.  Apparently, one year a recipient, upon taking center stage for his bow to the audience, thrust his arms up in Victory Formation in his excitement.  This is Bad Form.  How bad?  When the ceremony was replayed on TV later that night this incredible breach of etiquette was edited out.

After the last award and musical interlude, everyone stood and the orchestra played the national anthem.  The Royals exited the stage (and for the first time I noticed that there were also Royals in the first row of the audience – they, too, were leaving).  The orchestra played exit music while the audience left…but the families remained and we all went up onstage for hugs and ad hoc pictures.

After the ceremonies families are invited onstage to take more photos.

After about 15-20 minutes Weo’s attendant came over and took the diploma and medal into safekeeping and told S&W that they needed to move on, so the rest of us headed outside in order to be bused over to the Banquet.

Last night the buses only had to contend with the 200-250 guests staying at the hotel.  Tonight we have to get 1300 people from the Concert Hall to City Hall – so instead of our 6 luxury buses we were directed to an endless stream of city buses (“bendy buses”) that have “NOBEL” on their signboards.  These buses were definitely SRO – so we were standing up wedged together in our ties and tails or ballgowns.  However, once aboard we were deposited at City Hall in about 5-10 minutes.

What happens next?  Tune into the next episode by selecting another page from the "2014 Nobel" menu, above.  These instructions cheerfully supplied as a public service for those who haven't won a Nobel Prize.

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