The stars coming out for the Big Easy: New Orleans gets its groove back

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The stars coming out for the Big Easy: New Orleans gets its groove back
September 21, 2010
by Paul Oswell
Mail Online

As opening gambits go, 'Hey, you really look like Liv Tyler' is a bold one. As my optimistic friend approached the attractive girl at the bar in One Eyed Jacks - a hip music bar in New Orleans's historic French Quarter - the wind was swiftly whipped from his sails. I'm guessing the fact that she actually was Liv Tyler probably didn't help his cause.

Oh well. You don't generally expect to see Hollywood starlets mixing with the masses, but the population of New Orleans has a distinctly A-list feel to it these days. Five years after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, the city has picked itself up, reinvented and evolved, making it one of the most exciting cities in America once again.

The New Orleans Saints American football team are Superbowl champions for the first time in their history (a seismic event in the city), a new mayor has bought renewed optimism and a wave of chic restaurants and bars are repainting the social landscape.
exterior shot of Kermit Ruffins playing the trumpet

Kermit Ruffins & the Barbeque Swingers perform during the 40th annual New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival

The city is even being immortalised in a major TV series, Treme, from the creators of hit show The Wire. These are high times in the Big Easy. As such, New Orleans is awash with celebrities. If they're not openly rejecting your advances in bars, they're standing in front of you drinking cocktails, or ordering gumbo from nearby tables in restaurants. The city's tax breaks have made it a plum destination for film crews, and it doesn't hurt that they have the country's most distinctive urban scenery as a backdrop.

Two major blockbusters were in progress in the week that I visited. One was starring Bruce Willis, who had set himself up at the fashionable International House Hotel, a chic property with trendy minimalist rooms and a shadowy bar, perfect for stars looking to keep a low profile.

Maybe it's the near-Caribbean climate, or the romance of the historic architecture in the French Quarter, or the music and art that seep from every pore in the city, but New Orleans has apparently worked a seduction number on the jet-set crowd, including Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, who have owned an 18th-Century mansion on the edge of the French Quarter since 2007. Pitt was in town filming The Curious-Case Of Benjamin Button, and was impressed enough to spend £2.3 million on a property.

He has been actively involved in the city's recovery, with his Make It Right Foundation sparking the resurrection of the devastated Lower Ninth Ward by building eco-friendly houses for residents to return to.
exterior shot of Bourbon Street with the business district in the background

The French Quarter: Bourbon Street with the business district visible behind

Nicolas Cage is a long-time face about town, John Goodman (from Roseanne, and now star of Treme) is virtually an ambassador for the city, Harry Shearer (star of This Is Spinal Tap and the voice of The Simpsons' Mr Burns, led a Mardi Gras parade this year, and Sandra Bullock has said she will raise her adopted son in the city.

It's not just American stars who appreciate the place, either. Helen Mirren is at least a part-time resident, along with her film-maker husband Taylor Hackford. Their son Rio, coincidentally, owns One Eyed Jacks, so Liv Tyler's presence is perhaps less surprising than it seems.


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Mirren says: 'We will never abandon the most beautiful city in America. It's one of the few places that's not precious to the nth degree; it doesn't look as though its history has been cleaned up by Disney. When I'm working in London, it's New Orleans I'm homesick for.'

But where are you most likely to run into the great and the good? One place is a new uptown cocktail bar called Cure. The drinks are as well presented as the clientele, and it's where to be seen for the city's hip crowd. As well as any number of New Orleans Saints players, one regular is actor Bryan Batt, a Louisiana local famous for his portrayal of Salvatore Romano in the TV show Mad Men.

'I love Cure,' he told me. 'They make the best drinks in town and I take all my out-of-town visitors there.'
exterior shot of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie at film premiere

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie own a home in New Orleans

He also likes La Crepe Nanou, a French restaurant in the upscale Garden District. 'It's impossible not to have a great meal in New Orleans,' he said. 'The city has its own culinary style and locals are obsessive about food.'

Batt also owns Hazelnut, an interior design store on Magazine Street. This uptown neighbourhood that is full of antique shops and galleries.

In terms of dining, it's the big name chefs that draw the in crowds. Local culinary success story John Besh - a TV star through his cookery shows - has a couple of venues that fit the bill. August is his fine-dining establishment, located in the Business District and serving such classics as rabbit cassoulet or Louisana crawfish.

The Pitt-Jolies are fans, as is Sean Penn, another honorary local. Besh's new Italian restaurant, Domenica (in the refurbished Roosevelt Hotel), is also proving a hit with the glitterati.

The new M Bistro, which is run by Matt Murphy at the Ritz Carlton Hotel, is also attracting famous faces. Many of them turn out to hear local music star Jeremy Davenport, who is a protege of Harry Connick Jr.

Trumpeter Davenport plays his way through the American songbook in a lounge-style show each weekend, and is one of the city's most recognisable musicians.

'New Orleans is part small town, part big city,' he says. 'I believe celebrities find the small town aspect charming and the big city part exciting.'

You're also likely to spot famous faces nodding their heads to the likes of jazz trumpeter Kermit Ruffins at Vaughn's in the Bywater neighbourhood, or at Irvin Mayfield's Jazz Playhouse at the Royal Sonesta Hotel.

In the main, though, you're as likely to bump into a famous face anywhere, such is the democratic nature of the city. It doesn't matter whether you're ordering fried oysters at the locals' favourite lunch joint Mothers, sipping a pint of Guinness in Flanagan's pub in the Quarter or treating yourself to a blow out gourmet extravaganza at Galatoire's.

As I sipped on a mint julep at Cure, I asked Auora Shannon, a local actress, what she thought the appeal of New Orleans was. 'We're a welcoming city, hospitable to everyone and we're low-key, and that's why celebrities feel comfortable here. It's an "old soul" kind of place, that's why so many creative types like it.'

It may be 'old soul', but there's a distinct new feeling to New Orleans, and it's great.