From the outhouse to the White House to Mt. Olympus

JEREMY OLSHAN and GEOFF EARLE, "TEMPLE OF DEM ON MT. O-LYMPUS: GOP MOCKS GRAND STAGE AS GREEK HUBRIS" (New York Post, August 28, 2008):

DENVER - Democrats will kneel before the "Temple of Obama" tonight.

As if a Rocky Mountain coronation were not lofty enough, Barack Obama will aim for Mount Olympus when he accepts his party's nomination atop an enormous, Greek-columned stage - built by the same cheesy set team that put together Britney Spears' last tour.

. . . Some Republicans have dubbed it the "Barackopolis," while others suggested the delegates should wear togas to fit in among the same Doric columns the ancient Greeks believed would stroke the egos of Zeus and Athena.


"It's only appropriate that Barack Obama would descend down from the heavens and spend a little time with us mere mortals when accepting the Democratic nomination," said Republican National Committee spokesman Danny Diaz.


. . . We would have expected to read something like this in The Onion. Fortunately for us, it's true. Unfortunately for Obama, it's true," a McCain adviser told The Post.


But the set is designed to evoke the White House and the Lincoln Memorial, not the Acropolis, said staging supervisor Bobby Allen, a Spears set vet.
"We've done Britney's sets and a whole bunch of rock shows, but this was far more elaborate and complicated and we had to do it in far less time," said Allen, of RDA Entertainment.