Six reasons you have to see Cleopatra: The Immersive Experience

Well over two thousand years after her death, Cleopatra remains an undisputed icon, star of films and Shakespeare’s great play Antony and Cleopatra and immortalised in London by the obelisk known as Cleopatra’s Needle that was given as a gift to Britain in 1819. She’s one of a bare handful of rulers from the ancient world whose name is still known by virtually everyone. But most of us don’t know her whole story. Cleopatra: The Immersive Experience tells it, in stunning style.

First and foremost, Cleopatra: The Immersive Experience is an experience: a full on spectacle that uses lavish digital film, multiple VR sections (seated and a free-roaming metaverse), a hologram room and massive scale 360-degree immersive film – plus some very cool IRL sets – to throw you headlong into the exotic world of Ancient Egypt and its iconic final queen. A dry history lesson this is not. Instead, you’ll walk with gods, answer sphinxes' riddles, step on a platform over the inky void, survive an earthquake: there’s never a dull moment. It all looks great too, thanks to a team of 80 artists and animators.

Although Cleopatra: The Immersive Experience contains many fantastical animated details rooted in Egyptian myth, it’s got a rock solid factual core. The London edition is endorsed by British Egyptologist Dr Chris Naunton (and also does, in fact, contain original artefacts). Aside from pointing out that a lot of stuff we believe about Cleopatra today – the donkey milk baths and death by asp – was gossip made up by overexcited Roman historians, we also get a solid crash course on the Ptolemaic Dynasty and Cleopatra herself, a woman who believed she was the living incarnation of a goddess and who held on to power by skilfully attaching herself to the great Roman statesman Julius Caesar.

Cleopatra may not immediately seem like every little one’s number-one obsession. But Cleopatra: The Immersive Experience is a magical journey into an ancient world that goes far beyond one woman’s biography. Better still, for May half-term (from 10am-4pm, May 25-29), a raft of fun activities have just been confirmed for the kids, including everything from making your own crown – yas, queen! – to facepainting and writing your name in Hieroglyphs.

Not everyone enjoys a dry, artefact-based, museum-style exhibition. Some people do enjoy a dry, artefact-based, museum style exhibition but also think a VR-based immersive blockbuster sounds like fun too, especially as the digital film fills in the blanks around Cleopatra’s life that a conventional show might struggle to make up. Plenty of us enjoy documentaries and superhero movies, and something similar goes here. Just so long as you’re okay with Cleopatra: The Immersive Experience never being boring, you will be in safe hands.

Immersive historical experiences have become a massive deal in London over the last couple of years, in large part thanks to the opening of the huge Immerse LDN space in the Docklands. It’s a venue that finally lets our city receive the sort of gigantic, tech-enhanced shows that have been touring Europe for a few years now but previously lacked an appropriate London space. You can tell Cleopatra: The Immersive Experience is going to be good because it’s produced by MAD (Madrid Artes Digitales), the company who made the excellent Tutankhamun and The Last Days of Pompeii exhibitions.

Cleopatra: The Immersive Experience is at Immerse LDN, Excel London Waterfront until July 12.