David Simon's Treme Pilot

Wow. Very excited. Probably more excited for this than I was for the Bad Lieutenant remake here:

HBO sets drama series in Treme with focus on city's musicians

Posted by Dave Walker, Television writer, The Times-Picayune July 10, 2008 2:00AM

HOLLYWOOD -- In a move that could boost the city's psyche and pump millions into its economy, cable giant HBO is developing a new TV drama to be set in the New Orleans music community.

"Treme," named after the iconic New Orleans neighborhood where many musicians live, will marry one of television's most prestigious networks with creator David Simon, one of television's hottest series masterminds.

Simon created HBO's the "The Wire," which just completed a five-year run. While not a huge ratings success for the network, "The Wire" was one of the most critically acclaimed shows in television history.

Simon confirmed that HBO will film the first episode of "Treme," possibly sometime later this year. If HBO gives the green light for more episodes, production would resume in 2009.

Simon, a frequent visitor to the city and a longtime New Orleans music fan, said this week that the stories told in "Treme" would reach beyond the music scene to explore political corruption, the public housing controversy, the crippled criminal-justice system, clashes between police and Mardi Gras Indians, and the struggle to regain the tourism industry after the storm.

"It's basically a post-Katrina history of the city. It will be rooted in events that everybody knows," Simon said. "What it's not going to be is a happy stroll through David Simon's record collection. It should not be a tourism slide show. If we do it right, it (will be) about why New Orleans matters."

Simon is also co-writer and co-executive producer of "Generation Kill," an HBO miniseries adapted from an account by a magazine reporter embedded with Marines during the invasion of Iraq, due to debut Sunday at 8 p.m. The seven-part miniseries is generating positive critical buzz.

Approval of the pilot episode of "Treme" does not guarantee that it will launch as a series. But HBO doesn't create pilots of as many scripts as broadcast networks traditionally do. That, combined with Simon's pedigree, makes the chances of "Treme" going to full series status comparatively high. The show, like the pilot, would be filmed in New Orleans.

Simon also filmed "The Wire" on location in his hometown of Baltimore. "The Wire" was an unflinching fictional portrayal of crime, urban decay and civic dysfunction, informed in part by Simon's former life as a newspaper crime reporter for The Baltimore Sun.

The "Treme" pilot is expected to be announced publicly today in Hollywood during the Television Critics Association summer TV tour, where Simon today also will promote Sunday's "Generation Kill" premiere.

Hosting a TV series is considered a bonanza for the local film-and-TV production community. Though a critical and ratings dud, "K-Ville," the Fox cop drama that shot 11 episodes in the city in 2007, pumped an estimated $1 million per episode in cast and crew salaries and production expenditures into the local economy.

Local production recently wrapped on the first season of the upcoming Disney Channel series "Imagination Movers," said Jennifer Day, director of the city's office of film and video, so news of a possible new series to be filmed locally would further boost the area's film-and-TV production scene.

Day has read the "Treme" pilot script and said it's less "sensationalized" than "K-Ville."

"It's a lot more realistic," she said, adding that New Orleanians "will see themselves more in the characters than they did in 'K-Ville.'

"I loved it. It's a very emotional, character-driven storyline."

"Treme" is not the first time HBO has backed a post-storm project in New Orleans. The network backed filmmaker Spike Lee in the development of Lee's award-winning Katrina documentary, "When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts."

Dave Walker can be reached at dwalker@timesicayune.com or 504.826.3429.