Welcome to BON TEMPS

• By JUDY BERGERON
• Television editor
• Published: Jul 19, 2009

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CLINTON — They trashed downtown. Newspaper and other assorted garbage littered the streets. Clothes were strewn across the courthouse lawn. Graffiti defaced the statue of a Confederate soldier.

This wasn’t Clinton at all, but Bon Temps, the fictional Louisiana town in which the sophomore HBO vampire series “True Blood” is set. Cast and crew descended upon the East Feliciana Parish town this month, turning the courthouse square and surrounding area into the backdrop for its blood-sucking tale of vampires and humans living side by side in the not-so-distant future.

And the aforementioned havoc in the streets. Blame that on Bon Temps’ Maryann Forrester, a mysterious woman with an unfolding agenda for no good.To lend authenticity to the series, based on Charlaine Harris’ Sookie Stackhouse novels, “True Blood” shot scenes in Shreveport last season, and this season has spent time in New Orleans, Baton Rouge, and now Clinton.

“We’ve kind of taken over the whole town,” executive producer Gregg Fienberg said, talking to media as crew prepared for a scene involving stars Anna Paquin, who plays Sookie, and Ryan Kwanten, who portrays her brother, Jason.

Fienberg said that in Louisiana, the actors can get a better sense of the characters themselves, and just hearing the voices, the accents of the locals, is valuable.

“We want this to be Bon Temps for a very long time,” Fienberg said, anticipating more seasons for the network’s third-most-popular draw behind “The Sopranos” and “Sex and the City.” The crew returned to L.A. last week, where it will finish shooting for the season in the studio.

Bon Temps is a backwoods town with a quirky, twisted mix of breathers (non-vampires) and non-breathers (vampires). Mass-produced synthetic blood means that the vampires no longer need humans for their nutrition, but there’s still plenty of blood-sucking going on. Romance, suspense, mystery and humor simmer and sometimes boil over in the gumbo that is “True Blood,” the creation of Alan Ball. Ball also brought viewers the Emmy-winning HBO series “Six Feet Under,” centered around a funeral home owned and operated by the highly dysfunctional Fisher family.

Among the richly layered characters of Bon Temps is Lafayette Reynolds, played by Alabama native Nelsan Ellis.

Standing under the courthouse’s large oaks, Ellis, who had finished shooting for the day, still donned a typical Lafayette ensemble: black bandana tied on his head, denim vest, T-shirt, long shorts and boots.

Although the temperature hovered in the 90s, Ellis said that the Louisiana heat hasn’t affected the filming schedule.

“It adds to it,” Ellis said grinning, his eyeliner still in place despite the humidity.

As for his inspiration for the flamboyant, gay Lafayette, a grill cook at the local watering hole, Merlotte’s, Ellis pointed to family.

“I draw on my mom and my sister. A lot of the swagger comes from the women in my life,” he said.