Donald and Melania Trump wanted ‘carbon copy’ of Star Jones’ splashy wedding for their nuptials, new book reports
For reasons that may not be all that surprising, flamboyant former real estate mogul Donald J. Trump was reportedly impressed by the over-the-top 2004 wedding of Star Jones, then a co-host of “The View.”
In fact, the future president liked “the design” of the million-dollar wedding so much that he sought to copy it for his January 2005 wedding to Melania Trump at Mar-a-Lago, claims Jones’ wedding planner David Tutera.
In an interview for the new book, “Ladies Who Punch: The Explosive Inside Story of ‘The View,'” Tutera said Trump reached out to him to discuss plans for his wedding to former model Melania, saying he wanted a “carbon copy” of Jones’ nuptials, TooFab.com reported.
Jones’ November 2004 wedding involved a ceremony at St. Bartholomew’s Church in New York City and a reception at the Waldorf Astoria hotel.
Jones was one of the original co-hosts of “The View” when she hired Tutera to plan her wedding to her now-ex-husband Al Reynolds. Donald and Melania Trump were guests, along with Samuel L. Jackson, Chris Rock, Kim Cattrall, Kelly Ripa and then-U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton.
But Jones’ wedding was as controversial as it was extravagant, boasting a ceremony with 15 bridesmaids as well as corporate sponsorships that Jones hawked on air.
Jones’ promotion of her wedding freebies, which included invitations, tuxedos and bridesmaids’ gowns, was one of the reasons ABC later cited for cutting her from “The View,” according to the Daily News. Meanwhile, Reynolds attracted plenty of tabloid speculation over his sexuality; the couple filed for divorce in 2008, the Daily News added. In 2017, Reynolds came out as bisexual.
In “Ladies Who Punch,” by journalist Ramin Setoodeh, Turtera didn’t specify exactly what aspects of his design for Jones’ wedding that Trump liked. Tutera said he and Trump met to talk about working together but failed to agree on a price, so Trump hired another designer.
However, Tutera alleges that the new designer used his ideas.
“Melania and Donald copied my design and hired someone else,” Tutera told Setoodeh, according to TooFab.com. “That’s the God’s honest truth. Look at the photos of their wedding versus Star’s. It’s the exact same thing! The way the flowers were set up, the layout, the whole thing.”
Donald Trump’s third wedding to former model Melania may have been more star-studded than Jones.’ According to the Hollywood Reporter and the Palm Beach Post, major media outlets covered the arrival of guests, who included Bill and Hillary Clinton, Matt Lauer, Katie Couric, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Russell Simmons, Billy Joel, Heidi Klum, Kelly Ripa and Jones’ “The View” colleague Barbara Walters.
The ceremony took place at the Bethesda-by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in Palm Beach, Florida, with a small plane flying overhead and toting a banner that read, “Melania, You’re Hired,” the Hollywood reporter recounted.
The reception, held in the ballroom at Mar-a-Lago, featured an “elegant but not over-the-top” aesthetic, said Preston Bailey, the designer the Trumps apparently hired instead of Tutera to do the decor.
Bailey added to the Hollywood Reporter that the new Mrs. Trump, who wore a hand-beaded strapless Dior wedding gown, wanted a “very creamy and white color palette.”
From photos of Jones’ wedding, it appears that she, too, went for a creamy and white color palette — though this seems to be a pretty popular color scheme for weddings.