In a Rare Show at Radio City, Two Prize Fighters Will Take the Stage

Earl Wilson/The New York Times For only the second time in its storied history, Radio City Music Hall will host a boxing match. The installation of the ring for Saturday’s fight started on Thursday.

Earl Wilson/The New York Times Pieces of the boxing ring arriving outside Radio City.

Frank Sinatra performed there; so did Rodney Dangerfield and Kermit the Frog.

On Saturday night, the next performance at Radio City Music Hall will not come from a crooner or a comedian or even a Muppet. Instead, a pair of prizefighters, Nonito Donaire and Guillermo Rigondeaux, will meet inside a boxing ring assembled on the storied stage by a small army of carpenters, electricians, riggers and other stagehands.

The two-day transformation began Thursday afternoon as the ring â€" four feet high and 22 feet by 22 feet outside the ropes â€" arrived by truck from a company in Paterson, N.J., that rents boxing rings.

“This is an extremely rare event and a very large undertaking,” said Rich Claffey, senior vice president and general manager of theater and Rockette operations at Radio City. He watched as pieces of the ring, including blue and red ring posts and steel beams needed to fortify its underbelly, were brought through a side entrance of the building and placed on a large ramp usually reserved for musical equipment, wardrobes and theater props. Large groups of tourists stopped intermittently to gawk at the proceedings.

“Our guys here are not accustomed to putting in a boxing ring, but they are a talented and efficient crew and they are excited about this project,” Mr. Claffey said. “A job of this magnitude requires more cable, more lighting, more sound, more money â€" more everything.”

Before long, more than 100 hired hands, some perched high on ladders and sporting coal-miner-like visors with bright lights attached, were scampering around the stage. They began laying pieces of the ring out like a jigsaw puzzle and positioning and testing robotic cameras, pulleys, lighting trusses, drapes and large screen televisions â€" the stage’s hydraulic lifts were not needed â€" in preparation for Saturday’s super bantamweight unification bout in which Mr. Donaire will defend his W.B.O. title against Mr. Rigondeaux, the W.B.A. super bantamweight champion.

Their fight, which will be televised on HBO, will be just the second boxing match held at Radio City since it opened in 1932. Roy Jones Jr. fought there in January 2000, defeating David Telesco in a light-heavyweight championship bout.

“Fighting on the Radio City stage was electric,” recalled Mr. Jones, who will be one of the HBO broadcasters on Saturday night. “It was totally virgin territory for a boxer, and I loved every minute of it â€" the ecstatic crowd, the unusual venue. It really got my adrenaline pumping.”

Like Mr. Jones and Mr. Telesco before them, Mr. Donaire and Mr. Rigondeaux will use dressing rooms in place of locker rooms. Those dressing rooms, complete with large makeup counters and vanity mirrors littered with light bulbs, were used throughout the years by an array of performers, including the Rockettes, who kicked off their act in 1933; Sinatra; the Rolling Stones; Lady Gaga; and thousands of others who have appeared on the Radio City stage, which is a city-block long.

In the minutes leading to the opening bell, both fighters will leave their dressing rooms and take an elevator down to the top of the choral staircase on the stage-right side of the music hall â€" the 51st Street side of the building â€" from which they will descend and enter the ring in theatrical style.

As was the case with Mr. Jones’s fight 13 years ago, three sides of the ring will be surrounded by 250 seats filled by fight officials, members of the press and paying fans, which will leave the front of the ring unobstructed so that the audience, an anticipated sellout of 5,500, can enjoy the rare show.

“This is an amazing place to stage a fight, and I’ll probably sing some Sinatra songs when I’m warming up in the dressing room,” Mr. Donaire said on Thursday as he made his way into Radio City Music Hall for a photo session.

“I’ve never seen a show here,” he said with a sly smile, “But when I get out there on that big stage, I plan on putting on the kind of show that people are going to remember for a very long time.”

Earl Wilson/The New York Times Workers assembling the ring.