For some weeks, I lamented the lack of tangible story in HBO's Treme. Though the music was kick ass, the stories didn't seem to be going anywhere. There was, however, a character of interest, LaDonna Baptiste-Williams, portrayed on the show by actress Khandi Alexander.
I mentioned a few weeks ago that Alexander was excellent in the role. But that's not the half of it. In Sunday's episode, "Smoke Me a Peace Pipe," Alexander delivers a gut-punch of a performance. And most times she's not saying a word.
Weeks after Katrina and LaDonna's brother, Daymo, has not been found. In this episode, she finds him dead and stored in the back of a truck, a stand-in for a county morgue that had been destroyed by Katrina. The scenes that follow are the best that HBO has delivered in years. In them, Alexander gives Treme a reason for being.
Despite its authentic portrayal of a post-Katrina New Orleans, the inside baseball of local bureaucracy, the obvious references to local New Orleans celebrities and the presence of an Oscar-nominated actress (Melissa Leo as attorney Antoinette Bernette), Treme has thus far lacked anything resembling a full soul. It was too clinical. A bit cold despite its setting. And the central characters were never on screen long enough for us to know them beyond general details of their circumstances.
"Smoke Me a Peace Pipe" is a bit of a turning point. Alexander -- "so real, so regular, so extraordinary" says the Washington Post -- softens us a bit to the other narratives coming together around her. If she could reside in this world, perhaps there's something to this show.
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