After a week hiatus over Memorial Day, The tail end of Treme’s inaugural season kicked off with the Holy Grail of all celebrations: Mardi Gras.
To the outside observer, Mardi Gras is seen largely as a crazed, no holds barred rager, an epic street party with booze and beads where everything goes. To New Orleanians it’s much the same, but as we saw in this week’s episode it’s more than just an excuse to party. It’s about community, tradition and celebrating who they are as a people. It’s the one time of year where everyone takes to the streets to let the world know what New Orleans is all about.
But Treme has made wonderful television thus far out of upending our preconceived notions of what New Orleans is and what life there is like. Sure it’s New Orleans, but it’s New Orleans post Katrina. The flavor and celebratory nature is still in the air, but its been tempered by a sense of devastating loss and tragedy. So when Fat Tuesday rolled through the Big Easy, there was a sense of uncertainty that grounded the festivities. Watching Creighton, the city’s greatest ally and staunch defender, call it quits just hours into the day long celebration brought that feeling around full circle. Just months removed from a natural disaster, is it OK to celebrate or is it too soon? Is it inappropriate and misguided to take cave into the festivities when there is still so much work to be done to get the city and its people back on their feet?
These questions grounded episode eight, which hit an excellent balance between celebrating the city’s festive culture and history and the exploring the weighty reality that, Mardi Gras or no, New Orleans is a city in crisis. Throughout the episode there are those who fall in line and celebrate with the best of them (Janette, Antoine, Davis, Annie and Sonny) and those who, try as they might to embrace it, can’t shake the grim state of the city. Creighton’s devastating Youtube confession that remembering the way Mardi Gras used to be is like “waking up to a dream” might be a heartbreaking sentiment, but no less true.
With two episodes left, it’ll be interesting to see where things go from here.
RB
