One of President Trump’s first-term appointees to the board of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is floating big ideas to revamp the D.C. cultural mainstay, including a Jacqueline Kennedy-centered fashion show, a new space for “yachts” and potentially even franchising the institution.
“It’s shocking how many people have no idea about the Kennedy Center or how to even get there. Everybody in Milan knows about La Scala. Some people don’t even know where the Kennedy Center is,” businessman Paolo Zampolli, who has been friends with Trump for decades, told The New York Times in an interview published Monday.
In early February, Trump declared he would be ending the terms of multiple Kennedy Center board members, making himself the chair of a new board.
His actions were met with sharp disapproval from celebrities and performers, with some canceling scheduled shows at the center.
Zampolli says he wants to help make the Kennedy Center a “bankable business.”
“The goal of the center is to bring more money and people in. But the Kennedy Center is not really a destination. When people say, ‘Hey, where are we going to tonight?’ you don’t think about the Kennedy Center,” he said. “All the ideas that I came up with are about making it a destination point.”
Asked about the nature of those ideas, Zampolli pitched a fashion show with Valentino in honor of the former first lady, including a gala that would sell $200 tickets.
“We can franchise the Kennedy Center’s name in Europe and Asia and the Middle East, like the Louvre does in Abu Dhabi. That would be lucrative,” he said.
“You can build a marina. I’m convinced it would be terrific,” Zampolli continued of the space, which is on the Potomac River, near the famous Watergate Complex. “The Kennedy Center is very difficult to access. You put in a little marina, and on the weekend you go there — the yachts [park] there. You go to a beautiful restaurant. It will be a beautiful experience.”
He also suggested having a living artist create a piece of work that could travel around space on the International Space Station.
Zampolli said he hasn’t spoken with Trump about the idea that the president may impose his own cultural tastes on the center, despite Trump saying he wants to make the center “hot.”
He defended Trump’s decision to make himself chair and purge the board of Biden-era appointees, noting the center falls under federal authority and “the vision of some previous board members did not align with the president’s.”
“He felt the people around him would go completely against his views. He had the total right to fire them,” Zampolli said, later adding that “in the old system, we couldn’t get improvements. Now, if the president is involved, the center has unlimited potential.”
Trump announced last week that he would be appointing Fox News hosts Laura Ingraham and Maria Bartiromo to the board, joining other Trump-friendly names including White House chief of staff Susie Wiles and second lady Usha Vance.
