HBO's chillingly good series 'True Blood' comes to Louisiana, and the cast and crew taste and feel the real thing

from the Times Picayune [Nola.com]

CLINTON -- It was a characteristically steamy July day, and the grounds surrounding the East Feliciana Parish Courthouse were strewn with trash and clothing as if the town's residents had gone crazy from the heat.

Jeans and blouses in the trees. Lingerie draped on the stone Confederate officer stationed in front of the same courthouse that previously served, appropriately enough, as a location setting for the 1958 film "The Long Hot Summer." "Bacchus Rocks" graffiti scrawled on the base of the 1909 United Daughters of the Confederacy statue.

The lascivious litter was the work of spell-casting party girl Maryann Forrester, a character in the hit HBO vampire drama "True Blood," which came to the Clinton area late in its second season for several days of location shooting.

"Sorry, people of Clinton," said Adam Davidson, director of the episode for which the streets of Clinton had been strategically messed up. "Forgive us."

Not a problem.

Clinton was officially delighted to become the physical manifestation of Bon Temps, the show's fictional small-town Louisiana setting, and not just for the midsummer entertainment the production provided townsfolk, several dozen of whom toted lawn chairs to watch the action from off-camera.

Baton Rouge was the production base for the long-weekend shoot, so much of the food-, beverage- and hotel-room budget for the cast and crew of about 110 wasn't spent in Clinton. But the town did well, and may do very well in the future, by "True Blood."

During filming, traffic had to be routed around Clinton's downtown, creating a minor nuisance for cross-parish travelers, but more than 50 Louisiana residents were employed by the show, including Audrey Faciane, executive director of the parish's Chamber of Commerce and a parish tourism commissioner, who got a small part as one of the Bon Temps residents turned crazy by Maryann's mood magic

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