Nicholas Cage's Pyramid Tomb
New Orleans, Louisiana
In 2010 Nicholas Cage purchased the last two plots in New Orleans' thickly populated St. Louis Cemetery No. 1. He had built on it a nine-foot-tall cement pyramid mausoleum, apparently for his future self.
Some say that Cage's love of Voodoo motivated him to locate his tomb in the same ancient cemetery as Marie Laveau, the Voodoo Queen. The pyramid stands, stark and white and out-of-place among the surrounding graves, which are stained with centuries of New Orleans' grime and mold. Its only embellishment is a line of creepy lip prints, apparently left by adoring fans.
New Orleans purists hate Cage's pyramid. His defenders argue that pyramids have a long history in funerary art, but Cage's creation is not some classical neo-Egyptian tomb; it's more like the "pyramid power" storage boxes that were once sold at Sharper Image stores to indefinitely preserve bananas and razor blades. Maybe Cage is planning to keep his corpse fresh until Voodoo can revive it for some future National Treasure film?
The only inscription on the pyramid is the latin Omnia ab Uno, a motto popularized by the Rosicrucians. It expresses a belief in universal unity -- although we overheard one unsympathetic tour guide translate it as, "I am a jackass."