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Wrestlemania 37 will take place this weekend in front of 25,000 fans at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, FL, and it will be the second year in a row that the spectacle will be spread out over two nights.
The WWE first executed a two-night show last year when the COVID-19 pandemic forced their hand to moving the biggest event of the year to the WWE Performance Center in Orlando. All of the matches were taped days beforehand due to cautions over the new virus, with two matches having cinematic elements. This year’s show however will done live in the mold of a traditional super card taking place over a two-day period.
While the WWE hasn’t explicitly released an official reason for doing two nights this go-around, a multitude of reasons are factors.
For starters, the company was fully committed to giving the city of Tampa a do-over after everything was blown up at the last minute one year ago. With 37 being their first show in front of a live crowd since last March, they want to maximize the experience as much as possible with two shows instead of one.
Another reasoning is Peacock, the new streaming platform where the WWE will now house all of the content in their library along with live events like WrestleMania. A two-night event offers more exposure for the streaming service and an extra opportunity to bring new subscribers on board.
A final reason is that two-night WrestleMania’s may be the new wave of the future. For years it has been murmured that the company wanted to turn WrestleMania into a multi-day festival-like experience similar to Coachella, with different “acts” or matches headlining the different days. On top of that, the company has drawn criticism in recent years for excruciatingly long shows like WrestleMania 34 in New Orleans that had over seven hours of ring time when including the two-hour pre-show. A two-day event breaks up the action, while ensuring that most of the performers get a spot on the card.
As of now, the next two WrestleMania’s are scheduled for AT&T Stadium in Arlington, TX, and SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, CA are scheduled to be one-day events. But don’t be surprised if plans change in the future for those two shows to also be two-day events.