Inside Noche UFC's $20M plan for The Sphere: A wild cinematic journey led by Oscar-nominated director 

UFC CEO Dana White's vision of a grand-scale tribute to the spirit of Mexican Independence Day and his reverence for the fighters from the nation will come to life at Noche UFC 306. Early reports previewing the event suggest that the upcoming pay-per-view will live up to White's promise of a memorable sporting spectacle for years to come.

According to a report by ufc-las-vegas-sphere-plans-dana-white-1235990615/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-is-sponsored="false">The Hollywood Reporter, the pay-per-view broadcast will transport the audience by blending live fights with immersive visual storytelling. The Sphere in Las Vegas, featuring 160,000-square-foot LED screens, will showcase a film in chapters celebrating Mexico’s role in combat sports between bouts. Director Glenn Weiss, known for live TV events like the Oscars, and Academy Award-nominated producer Carlos Lopez Estrada are involved in the production.

UFC chief content officer Craig Borsari recognizes that the organization's vision for the event was "truly insane." That being said, he was completely on board with the idea and asserts that each fight on the card will take place in a different “world” projected on the 16K resolution wrap-around display. According to Borsari:

"At the highest level, we were trying to think about, how do we put on a live MMA fight... 10 fights throughout the night and not take away from the fight action. Not take too much time in between fights where we slow things down, but also tell this other story about the Mexican people and their heritage and their culture, because it’s rich and it’s deep."

He added:

"Those would be our main drivers for storytelling, everything that Dana wanted to get across … Those films then transition into what we’re calling these worlds, which is like these environments that take up the entire LED screen, that then the fights sit within. So there’s what we call a film and a world and an act. So there’s these acts that take you through the entire night, and we tell the story within those acts.”

---

Behind Dana White's vision to outshine U2 with Noche UFC 306

The UFC's groundbreaking event at the $2.3 billion Las Vegas Sphere, Noche UFC 306, will go down on Sept. 14, featuring a bantamweight showdown between Sean O'Malley and Merab Dvalishvili in the main event.

Dana White drew inspiration from U2's performance at the Sphere, where he felt the venue’s cutting-edge technology was the real standout. Captivated by the immersive capabilities of the space, White envisioned using it to create a groundbreaking sports experience, stating:

“I guess I looked at this thing and said, ‘Eventually, somebody is going to come in here and pull off a sporting event. I want to do it, I want to be first.’ If you take what U2 did and multiply it by a million, that’s where we are. It’s a whole other universe, not even another level. It’s a whole ‘nother universe what we’re pulling off on September 14.”