Envisioning a world where regular folk, just like you, can thrill to the majesty, the mystery, and the wonder of Tom Hanks’ haircuts getting slightly less regrettable over time, author Dan Brown has announced that he’s creating a live-action immersive Da Vinci Code experience. Working with digital artist Massimiliano Siccardi—one of several artists who’s spent the last few years in the weirdly lucrative and prolific “walk through giant projections of the works of Vincent Van Gogh” space—Brown is set to create an immersive experience focused on the works of noted dinner party chronicler Leonardo Da Vinci.
This is per Deadline, which makes it sound like the experience that Brown and Siccardi are cooking up will go a lot heavier on the “Da Vinci” than the “Code,” focusing on the artwork and ideas of Da Vinci—noted, in modern times, for providing inspiration to creatives ranging from artists, to engineers, to the scriptwriting and production design team for the 1991 Bruce Willis/Danny Aiello vehicle Hudson Hawk. Siccardi (who once famously suggested that his immersive Van Gogh experience allowed visitors to walk through the Dutch artist’s dying thoughts, which were apparently pretty fixated on how nice some of his paintings would look screen-printed onto a T-shirt) has said that the Da Vinci version will be “a journey through the mind of Leonardo—his inventions, his obsessions, his brilliance—and the unveiling of Da Vinci works the world has never seen.”
And, look: We’re not saying we’re not interested in really getting up in the guts of a Vitruvian Man, or seeing someone try to recreate Da Vinci’s famous aerial screw. But Da Vinci Code, as a name, lends itself a lot more to an escape room than an art exhibit; if we’re not spending at least some of our time at this thing translating simple anagrams while being pursued by a villain who is, himself, being pursued by angry representatives of the National Organization for Albinism and Hypopigmentation, then what’s the Code part even doing in the title?
