How Backstreet Boys built an epic experience at Sphere

“After the opener, the guys came up to me and were high-fiving,” Halpin says, “and I was saying, ‘Trust the process, trust the process.’”

That trust is crucial to the unbridled success of “Into The Millennium” at Sphere. The Backstreet Boys’ masterpiece will have sold out 21 shows after Sunday night’s performance, playing to 350,000 fans (the vast majority dressed in show’s “Millennium White” theme).

Kevin Richardson, Nick Carter, Howie Dorough, AJ McLean and Brian Littrell have blasted into orbit, like the rocket ship opening the show.

In the show’s signature “Siberia” number, the guys’ faces seem frozen in time. But “Into The Millennium” is not. BSB is closing what was originally its final run of the sellout production this weekend. The production will return to the bulbous wonder Dec. 16-Jan. 3, and again Feb. 5-15. Two sets of seven, 14 total, into next year.

The team that runs Sphere is always testing the boundaries, finding the venue’s limits. They haven’t found them yet.

“We keep learning, every time we do things in this venue. You cannot possibly underestimate it, and you can’t sort of take it for granted,” Head of Sphere Studios Carolyn Blackwood says. “I think the Backstreet Boys probably was the biggest leap forward in any of those boundaries.”

Blackwood recently joined Halpin, founder of Silent House entertainment company and a partner in the production; and Sphere Senior Vice President, Head of Capture (one of the more creative titles titles ever) Andrew Shulkind to chat of this epic project.

Don’t be nervous, Boys

Halpin is familiar for his company’s design work worldwide, and distinctively in Las Vegas. He has worked on Taylor Swift’s “Eras Tour,” has helped conceive the UFC and Eagles productions at Sphere, Usher’s halftime show at Super Bowl 58 at Allegiant stadium, and is co-producer of “Awakening” at Encore Theater at the Wynn. This ongoing adventure is still being tweaked as a rare resort-owned production.

The “Millennium” show is an example of such an evolution, but as an area-scaled spectacle. Early in the process he shared the process with the group at Sphere’s Big Dome prototype in Burbank. This was two months before the show was to be developed.

“I explained that, ‘Guys, when you see things, they won’t be fully realized, it will be in various stages of production,’” Halpin says. “So you can’t get scared because you’re looking at a black-and-white model of 30 seconds of a song, and you think, ‘Oh, my god, is this the right thing? Is this the wrong way?’ You have to have faith in the plan for the show, and they were incredibly good at that.”

Pop music

But the recording superstars were on edge at the start. “Millennium” is the first pop show ever at Sphere. The pressure to make this show a hit, or at least make it make sense, was enormous.

“I’ve been around artists my entire life, I could tell that they had that feeling of, ‘Is this gonna work? How far along is this?’ I’m not sure if this is right,’” Halpin says. “It’s hard, like we can all sit and look at something in the state that it’s in and extrapolate that to where that’s going to be in two months. But for someone who has never seen it before, artists who are putting so much on the line, the fear is very real.”

The confidence in the show has been gradual, and established through such high-tech innovations as patience, passion and hard work. The band rehearsed for months, spending some six hours until 4 a.m. inside Sphere in the days leading to opening night.

Such a cool scene

Shulkind said the afore-referenced “Siberia” was a unique challenge. This is not a surprise. The crowd soars over a snow-capped, Siberian mountain range. The guys’ faces emerge, first totally still, and then singing in sync with the live performance. Icicles form on the eyebrows of these giant images.

Sphere’s Big Sky motion-control camera system was used to capture (hence Shulkind’s title) the group’s live-action movement.

“What what was unique about ‘Siberia’ was that it was a combination of live-action and digital assets, boards and other elements to create what feels like one piece,” Shulkind says. “It’s one comprehensive environment and it involves physical makeup and production-design builds. It was pretty involved.”

Smokin’ dance scenes

Blackwood is dazzled by the audio-video wizardry. But like the hundreds of thousands of fans who have file into Sphere, she is also captivated by human talent.

The Backstreet Boys say they can still pull off about 90-percent of their choreography from a quarter century ago. The choreography team Rich + Tone (directors Rich and Tone Talauega) have designed the dance in the show.

Set amid stage smoke the dance segments soar in Sphere, where the guys take advantage of open “negative space” for a positive response.

“With some of these shows, the kitchen sink gets thrown at everything, and that’s great,” Blackwood says. “But for people who are going to sit there during a show, sometimes it’s nice to have something that’s simple. You can have something that is beautiful and immersive, entertaining and visually gorgeous.”

Taken together, Blackwood says Sphere stands alone, just two years after U2 opened the venue. As she says, “The Sphere point of view is, if it can be done somewhere else, it’s probably not for us.”

John Katsilometes’ column runs daily in the A section. Contact him at jkatsilometes@reviewjournal.com. Follow @johnnykats on X, @JohnnyKats1 on Instagram.