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There's no business like war business. Everything about it is appealing, says the Army Times (via Romanesko):

CAMP AS SAYLIYAH, Qatar — In a warehouse that until a few weeks ago housed American tanks and armored vehicles, which are now in Kuwait preparing for a war against Iraq, a Hollywood set designer is overseeing feverish efforts to complete a $200,000 stage in time for military briefers to deliver news of that war to gathered reporters and a worldwide television audience.

The glitzy, high-tech set, half as wide as a basketball court, features a soft focus blue and white map of the world as its backdrop. Hanging from industrial gray steel stanchions and girders will be five 50-inch and two 70-inch plasma video screens. The TV screens will display all manner of video, computer images, maps and just about anything else officers from America’s Central Command might want to show.

This set will have more audio-visual bells and whistles than anything in the White House or the Pentagon.

In fact, said a technician flown here from the White House to install the electronic gear, "this totally sets a whole new standard to present information."

[...]

The designer of this high-tech, high-impact set is George Allison, 43, whose last major credit was art director for the Mike and Kirk Douglas movie "It Runs in the Family." He also designed the $89 million set for ABC’s "Good Morning America." More important, he has designed stage settings for appearances by President George W. Bush.

"It’s about bringing the level of technology up from the flip chart to the modern age," Allison said as he sat, paint spattered on his arms and hands, watching the final touches on his set. "It’s trying to send a very clear message about technology and the use of it."

Air Force Col. Ray Shepherd, director of public affairs for Central Command, said, "We use the latest technology in our military operations. It’s only fitting we use it here."

Besides, he said, most Americans get their news from television and are used to a certain level of visual sophistication. "We want to come as close as we can to the standards they're used to seeing on television," he said.

As a symbol of the American military’s growing media sophistication, you couldn't do better than the briefing room/TV set. The set is part of a 17,000-square-foot media center that will host journalists not just from America but from every European country, China, Japan and even the Arab TV network al-Jazeera, which some in the military refer to as the enemy station. Not only do these journalists speak a babel of foreign languages, they use a babel of television systems. Not to worry. The military technicians in the media center will be able to convert any form of video into any other of the world’s formats. On the spot.

[...]

"I can’t tell you how much high-level support we’re getting for this," Shepherd said. One reflection of that high-level interest: Central Command's "strategic communicator" is Jim Wilkinson, who came over from his job as deputy communications director at the Bush White House.

It was Wilkinson who dreamed up the stretched canvas backdrops that appeared behind Bush with key phrases printed on them: Strengthen Medicare, A Home of Your Own, Corporate Responsibility. And it was Allison who designed them.

Allison's set in the Qatar briefing room has had its share of glitches. He was told the ceiling would be 15 feet high and he designed the set accordingly. When he arrived he found the ceiling was only 11.5 feet high. The stage was lowered.

One more measure of how important the military thinks the appearance of this stage is. Most of the set was built in Chicago and then sent by Federal Express to Qatar. At a cost, Allison said, of $47,000.

But the final measure of how little may have changed in military-media relations is this: Unnamed Defense Department officials ordered the Central Command public affairs officers to bar photographs of the set while it was under construction. No explanation was offered.

Places! Lights... camera... cue Ethel Merman Colin Powell....

There's no people like show people,
They smile when they are low
Even with a turkey that you know will fold,
You may be stranded out in the cold
Still you wouldn't change it for a sack of gold,
Let's go on with the show!

"Sing out, Colin!" yells stage manager Karl Rove, with his clipboard, smiling from the wings with a wave of approval. Next, he turns on the STANDING OVATION sign (#7).

{ 2:21 PM }

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