Cleveland Cavaliers' arena gets a makeover for Donald Trump
CLEVELAND -- Goodbye, LeBron. Hello, Donald.
The set design of the Republican National Convention was unveiled here on Tuesday, just a little over a week after the Cleveland Cavaliers handed their arena's keys over to the team planning the quadrennial affair.
"We've never done this in less than five weeks and we're doing this in just four weeks," Jeff Larson, the CEO of the Committee on Arrangements, told reporters of their condensed construction timeline. Twenty-five percent of the construction has now been completed with three weeks to go until the masses descend on Cleveland.
Also revealed in the under-construction arena was a model of the stage that Trump and various speakers will assume, one that Phil Alongi, the executive producer of the convention, touted as the "best one we've ever had." Dominating the stage is a 1,711 square foot, 10 million-pixel screen.
Despite the presumptive Republican nominee's musings of a dramatic four-day spectacle drenched in razzle dazzle, it was clearly stated that the convention was being built as a "news event."
"The reason they hired me to produce this is because I have a news background and this is the part that won't get lost," Alongi told reporters. "This will remain a news event."
Larson and Alongi would not say if Trump personally had a hand in the design and they dismissed reporters' questions of behind the scenes tension, emphasizing a successful team effort that's gone into putting together the massive event.
"It's been a great collaboration," Larson told reporters. "Working with [Trump campaign chief] Paul Manafort and Chairman Priebus and others, we've made some enhancements to the set which I think made things better and so I think the enhancements, along with the Trump campaign, have made a set design and stage that will be the best one we've ever had."
The price tag on the event? Larson said it was yet to be determined.