Ron Howard and company managed to suck every ounce of fun out of the Da Vinci Code series with their two film adaptations, most recently Angels and Demons. Now, Variety reports Columbia Pictures is moving ahead with The Lost Symbol. Can they break the streak? Hopefully the newly hired scribe Steven Knight can mix things up a bit. Knight wrote drafts of Shutter Island and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. He also scripted Pawn Sacrifice, “which centers on American chess icon Bobby Fischer leading up to his historic world championship match against Boris Spassky, is being produced by Tobey Maguire.”
Back to the Symbol. The latest novel, which sold more than a million copies in its first day of print, puts Robert Langdon in Washington, D.C. Tom Hanks himself has not yet signed on to return, but Brian Grazer and John Calley are ready to produce. With Angels and Demons making almost $300 million less than the first, it was still quite a financial success.
What do you think of another Dan Brown film adaptation? Could they get out of the rut with the 3rd?