LAS VEGAS – Dana White plans on engaging fans in attendance at Sphere.
UFC 306 (pay-per-view, ESPNews, ESPN+), headlined by a bantamweight title fight between champion Sean O’Malley (18-1 MMA, 10-1 UFC) and Merab Dvalishvili (17-4 MMA, 10-2 UFC), takes place Saturday in Las Vegas.
The event will feature 10 bouts, with a movie running in between each fight of the main card. One fan will also have the opportunity to win big prize money.
“There’s a movie, there’s chapters,” White told MMA Junkie and other reporters Tuesday at a post-fight news conference. “Each chapter starts before the next fight, so there will be a show open, then the first movie will run, and it will end at the end of the fight. Then we call them ‘worlds,’ and the fight will live inside this world, and the world will evolve while the fights are going on, but it will be very subtle.
“Clouds will move, fires will burn, birds will fly, or whatever the hell is going on in that world at that time, and it will slowly evolve during the fight. There are also going to be Easter eggs in each one of these films. We’re working it out with legal right now, but what I want to do, if somebody can find all the Easter eggs, I’ll give you $25,000. This is during the main card, so the show will progress throughout the night.”
When asked what was the biggest challenge to deal with throughout the whole process of preparing for an event at Sphere, the UFC CEO highlighted a major difference from past events.
“Lighting,” White said. “Yeah, there’s no lighting rig. This will be the first event ever in the history of the company and probably in the history of combat sports where there isn’t a lighting rig hanging over the octagon. So you have lights, cameras, microphones, different audio all up in that trusting up there, and that’s all gone. So that was the big first challenge.”
White plans on making UFC 306 so iconic that it’s globally recognized.
“So my goal in this thing is to be nominated for an Oscar, an Emmy, and a Grammy,” White said. “So, yes, there will be a documentary.”
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 306.
