Blanche DuBois was just visiting: the “Big Easy” is anything but in “Treme”
“Are you saying that New Orleans is not a great city? A city that lives in the imagination of the world?”
That is the crux and last word on the subject for me. I’ll never know a New Orleans before Katrina. Three weeks before I was supposed to go, the hurricane hit. And just as the city heaved a sigh of relief over not-too-much damage, the levies gave way. I, and everyone else the world over, spent those next three weeks watching a bogged-down tragedy play out with no end in sight. It’s been five years, an unbroken chain of Mardi Gras’, a first-ever Super Bowl victory, and several nods from the entertainment industry since then. Now “Treme,” from the same people that brought us “The Wire,” offers not just a fine counterpoint to the damsel in distress New Orleans has been made out to be (or perhaps just a nice bookend to Spike Lee’s “When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts”), but a surefooted and streetwise narrative of a city that is always the main character in whatever story it figures in. It’s safe to say that I now have a better opportunity to understand and come to know the city than I would have had from firsthand experience.
It’s no secret that the Steel Closet is “The Wire’s” Valentine in perpetuity (that’s right, just called it, better luck next time), and all of the reasons that led us to dot the “i” in “Stringer” with a heart are poised to make “Treme” just as engrossing. David Simon, the compass of “The Wire,” had wanted to take audiences on an intimate tour of New Orleans before he introduced us to a Baltimore where “the American Dream” hasn’t just failed and died but is propped up as a hubristic carrot on a stick. Now he has his chance, and it’ll be a much more difficult feat to pull off. While “Treme” won’t be the full cultural/social/political strata-traversing look at a society that “The Wire” was for Baltimore, it’s much more difficult to approach an actual tragedy of societal neglect than an existential one. It’s all too easy to give in to what’s right there rather than cast the situation into meaningful relief. However, Simon’s sensitivity to what is sincere and his ability to make something satisfying instead of tidy and overly plotted gives this series the best chance of any Post-Katrina chronicle to be a definitive, endearing, genuine, and potent look at the supportive struts that hold up the mystique and glitter of the Big Easy.
Sadly, one of the main architects of this, and what has been described as “the best TV show EVER,” passed away just last week. David Mills, the head writer of “Treme,” was a perfect complement to Simon’s intentions. It’s unclear where this series goes from here, but this season will introduce us to the neighborhood of Treme (truh-may), the birthplace of jazz. The music that permeates, connects, and defines so many of the things we identify with New Orleans will be our passport along its road to recovery. So I hope you’ve saved that Easter ham bone to make some red beans and rice for this next Sunday, because “Treme” premieres April 11th.
Browse Timeline
Tweet StreetAdd a Comment
