WWE announced on Monday that they will take residency at Amway Center in Orlando starting this Friday.
The company is touting the venue change and production additions as the “WWE ThunderDome” as they’ll be able to virtually bring fans into the arena via live video on massive LED boards, in conjunction with The Famous Group. The ThunderDome will feature a state-of-the-art set, video boards, pyrotechnics, lasers, cutting-edge graphics, and drone cameras.
WWE executive vice president of television production Kevin Dunn talked more about the concept in an interview with Sports Illustrated.
He started off by talking about how when people think of WWE they see it as a spectacle but admitted that it was just impossible to put on a spectacle in the Performance Center.
“Moving to Amway, and unveiling the ThunderDome, the opportunities are limitless. We can now do things production-wise that we could never otherwise do. We’re flying drones in the arena, we are putting a roof inside the Amway Center, and we’ll be able to project content onto the roof. So when a big star like Drew McIntyre comes down to the ring, the whole arena will turn into his content with lasers, pyro, smoke, projections on the top of the building and on the floor. It will be a big, beautiful entrance, better than WrestleMania.”
Regarding the virtual fans, he stated that it’s like what the NBA is doing, but they’re also creating an arena-type atmosphere. He said that they will have rows of fans instead of a flat board. It will recreate the arena experience you’re used to seeing with WWE.
“The atmosphere will be night and day from the Performance Center. This is going to let us have a WrestleMania-level production value, and that’s what our audience expects from us. We are also going to put arena audio into the broadcast, similar to baseball, but our audio will be mixed with the virtual fans. So when fans start chants, we’ll hear them.”
He said that it will be a learning experience and they only have two days of testing before they hit the air.
“We may have fans for certain entrances, standing up and cheering for the typical babyfaces. But someone like Bray Wyatt, who is so character-driven, the entire Amway Arena will be one big Fiend-dom. That’s our opportunity to be different from sports, where we can present these larger-than-life characters uniquely. This will be great for people watching at home across the globe, as well as the ones participating.”
