Sightseeing for History (With a Few Selfies Along the Way)
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Version 0 of 1. NEW ORLEANS — The director Lileana Blain-Cruz had never been here until she took a recent four-day trip to do research for her production of “The House That Will Not Stand,” Marcus Gardley’s 2014 play that begins performances July 11 at New York Theater Workshop. The drama, a loose adaptation of Federico García Lorca’s “The House of Bernarda Alba,” is set in 1813, a time in the city’s history when whites, blacks and “free people of color” mingled. It follows Beartrice Albans, a woman of privilege thanks to her long-term relationship with a white man, and her three unmarried daughters, as the racial rules were being rewritten. The director, whose other credits include “Pipeline” and, also at the Workshop, “Red Speedo,” said she didn’t often get to travel to research a project, but it seemed important for this production: “I wanted to connect to the city at the heart of the play, so that I could bring that energy and life to the stage,” she explained. The Times asked her to chronicle the visit on her iPhone. Here are edited descriptions of some of what she saw, and why it stayed with her, with references to stage directions and dialogue from the play. Even the food, she reported, felt relevant. This house in the Treme [a New Orleans neighborhood], a Creole maison de maître, or “master’s house,” was the inspiration for the house of Beartrice in the play — and is currently the New Orleans African American Museum. It’s amazing to see the scale of a home owned by a free woman of color in the 1800s and also sad to know that, post-Katrina, getting the museum back on its feet has been challenging. Makeda, a slave in the house, is more connected to her African roots than any member of the household. Voodoo has negative connotations in Western culture — but was primarily used for healing, good luck, and love as described throughout the tiny voodoo museum where these trinkets were sold. Marie Laveau was a free Creole woman, nicknamed the “Voodoo Queen.” She had followers all over the city who watched her rituals on Lake Pontchartrain. Pictured here is her daughter, also named Marie, who also worked as a conjurer when her mother passed. She bore such a strong resemblance that people thought they were seeing her mother’s ghost in the streets. This is where the character Marie Josephine met her lover. Sacred ground of the Houma tribe, it became a gathering place for enslaved Africans on Sundays, where they could drum, dance, and trade. It’s a symbol in the play of the preservation of an African ancestry. The Backstreet Cultural Museum preserves the costumes of the Mardi Gras Indians — which for me spoke to the collision of cultures in New Orleans, part of what makes it feel so special. St. Augustine Church in the Treme was another inspiration for the play. It was the first Catholic church started by free people of color, and because they bought a majority of the pews created a uniquely integrated worship space that also included slaves and white patrons. This is the Tomb of the Unknown Slave outside St. Augustine’s — a devastating shrine dedicated to the “memory of the nameless, faceless, turfless Africans who met an untimely death,” whose bodies never received a proper burial, but whose presence in the earth makes it holy ground. This play does that for me, too. Dance is all over this script — from the Viennese waltz to the dance of the bamboulas. Partying feels like part of the heart of New Orleans; I went to clubs to hear music, from jazz to bounce, to try to find a way to incorporate it into the rhythms of the play. This was on Frenchmen Street. Beignets are delicious. Soft powdery doughy pillows of warm sweetness brought here from France — as in the play — and commonly served at breakfast. I had these at Morning Call in City Park. |