FIFTEEN MINUTES FROM the Las Vegas Strip, into a tranquil gated community, up a redbrick driveway, past the palm trees that touch the Mojave Desert sky, through the veil that separates the astral plane, and here he is: the man they say gained and lost a $150 million fortune; who owned castles in Europe and the most haunted house in America and the Shah of Iran's Lamborghini and two albino king cobras and a rare two-headed snake; who had to return his prized dinosaur skull upon learning it was stolen from Mongolia; who went on an epic quest for the actual Holy Grail; and whowhen his singular, fantastical life eventually comes to an endwill be laid to eternal rest in a colossal white pyramid tomb in New Orleans.
Nicolas Cage greets me at his door, wearing a kung fu suit.
“This is my wing chun kung fu suit,” he explains, waving me in and handing me a mug of coffee. “I studied with my sifu, Jim Lau, when I was 12 years old, because I was a big Bruce Lee fan. And so it's like my uniform to relax in."
His voice is a low, contemplative drawl that imbues every word with a sense of philosophical magnitude. To hear Nicolas Cage state an opinion about his preferred loungewear is to hear anyone else reflect on the cosmos.
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