Las Vegas’s Sphere Is Just as Bonkers as Everyone Says
U2 may have helped the Sphere make headlines during its opening week, but don’t let that trick you into thinking Las Vegas’s latest must-see attraction is just a concert venue.
Last week, I had the chance to check out Madison Square Garden’s latest venture while in town for work. The constant stream of posts to social media over the last six months had piqued my interest, but even that couldn’t prepare me for the actual experience.
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If you haven’t heard of the Sphere, it’s a 366-foot-tall round auditorium that MSG has spent four years and more than $2 billion building just off the Strip in Las Vegas. It’s shaped like a giant ball that’s embedded itself into the desert floor after falling from space. That alone would make it unique, but its surface is also covered in 580,000 square feet of LED panels that have been used to display everything from the dimpled surface of a basketball to a blinking eyeball—or, in the lead-up to the Las Vegas Grand Prix, a week’s worth of delirious Formula 1 content—making it the world’s coolest billboard.
Of course, there is an interior of the Sphere, which includes a 160,000-square-foot wraparound 16k LED display and 160,000 speakers that also allow it to play host to a wide variety of live and pre-recorded entertainment options. In its opening months, the highest profile of these has been U2’s 36-show UV Achtung Baby residency (which was originally supposed to end in December but has been extended to February). The band has been accompanied by a dazzling array of visuals—which people like Diplo have called “completely insane”—while playing some of their biggest hits, something that has built up more buzz around the band than it’s had since Pop was released in 1997.
A new film from Academy Awarded-winning director Darren Aronofsky called Postcard From Earth premiered during the venue’s second week of operation that’s just as much of a reason to visit the venue as U2. Tickets for the filmmaker’s first “multi-sensory” film—which is a unique science fiction and nature documentary mashup—start at $69 and can go as high as $249. That may seem steep for a movie with a 50-minute runtime, which might explain why there’s an hour of interactive programming in the venue’s atrium beforehand where you can talk to robots and check out interactive art displays. The robots are fun, but won’t surprise anyone who’s been to Disneyland in the last couple of decades.
You’ll stop thinking about the cost of your ticket five minutes into Postcard From Earth. The movie starts out at the same size as a standard IMAX screen before opening to its full height and width after an introductory segment about a pair of humans who’ve returned to Earth after their ancestors fled to space following a climate apocalypse. When this happens, the camera is soaring over snow-covered mountain tops. The reveal is breathtaking, but only a taste of what’s to come. For the rest of the film, you’re hit with a stunning series of images of all the earth has to offer, from the peaceful serenity of a seaside cave to the clamoring bustle of the modern metropolis. In one particularly striking section, a group of giraffes can be grazing when one meanders off camera only to reappear looking down on you from above. It’s not just the gigantic scale of the image that makes it so immersive, but the fact that the crystal-clear footage—which was shot using special 18K cameras—is accompanied by blasts of air, seat-shaking sound and even scents that match the action on screen.
The film is short and powerful and might be the best display yet of the Sphere’s capabilities. You can see U2 in play in front of a screen of crazy visuals elsewhere, but you literally cannot watch Postcard From Earth anywhere else. It was made specifically to show at the Sphere and it may never be available to view outside of the venue. Some of its beauty might come through in a smaller format, but there’s little doubt it would lose much of its power if you couldn’t watch it on its giant wraparound screen.
To be sure, there’s nothing quite like the Sphere right now—in Vegas or the rest of the U.S. Which makes what comes next so exciting. U2’s residency has earned raves, but they’re only playing until February 18. Can MSG find an artist of the same profile to fill its spot, and will they maybe do a better job of maximizing the space’s potential? Postcard From Earth is a great viewing experience, but it’s also just a start. Will other filmmakers be able to push the technology even further, and maybe tell a satisfying story outside its narrative bookends? I can’t wait to find out.
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