Wizard of Oz at Sphere Smashes Records: $260 Million in Ticket Sales

As mogul James Dolan plots an expansion for the Sphere concept to the nation’s capital, his unique Las Vegas-based entertainment venue has disclosed a new milestone for its blockbuster Wizard of Oz experience. The reimagining of the 1939 classic has now sold 2 million tickets since it bowed on Aug. 28 of last year, totaling more than $260 million in ticket sales, the company said on Tuesday. While its apples-and-oranges as far as the box office goes — an Oz at the Sphere ticket could be $200 while a movie ticket at a normal theater showing may be more like $15 — $260 million in ticket sales would rank at No. 9 domestically in theaters last year, basically tied with Universal’s live-action How to Train Your Dragon ($262 million stateside). Oz at the Sphere had passed the 1 million ticket sale milestone and $130 million in sales as of mid-October at its sole 18,600-seat Las Vegas venue. The project, which took two years to develop and carried with it a $100 million price tag, now looks to be a template for how Hollywood can adapt classic IP for new experiences (think: Jurassic Park, Avengers, Harry Potter or Star Wars at the Sphere etc.) The reimagining of the classic MGM/Warner Bros. movie marked a major bet that audiences would be interested in seeing feature-like experiences at the venue, which had bowed with concert experiences from the likes of U2, the Eagles and Dead & Company. (Phish, No Doubt, Kenney Chesney and more are on-deck for 2026.) During a November earnings call, the Sphere CEO (and AMC Networks mogul and Knicks owner) said that the company is planning an Oz 2.0 experience to bow on the first anniversary of the show this upcoming summer. “This is likely going to include some new features to the film such as we might just take you for a ride on a witch’s broom during the show,” the exec said. Creatives who worked on the Oz project included producer Jane Rosenthal, VFX expert Ben Grossmann and Oppenheimer editor Jennifer Lame. And, like other long-running Vegas staples including Cirque Du Soleil, Dolan has said that he sees a long lifespan for Oz showings. “What’s the lifespan of Wizard of Oz? It wouldn’t surprise me if we were we were showing Wizard of Oz ten years from now,” Dolan said to Wall Street analysts on that earnings call. The success of the show’s opening also breathed new life into plans to expand the Sphere concept to other major cities. On Jan. 19, the company said it inked a deal to develop a smaller-scale Sphere in the Washington, D.C. metro area with the state of Maryland at a National Harbor location. The state’s governor, Wes Moore, described the deal as “one of the largest economic development projects in Prince George’s County history.”