Reconstructing History
IT’S 3:45 P.M. ON SUNDAY, JAN. 5, NOT EVEN ONE week into this chaotic new decade, and I’m walking into Gallier House, the elegantly restored 19th-century residence-turned-museum at 1132 Royal Street in New Orleans’s French Quarter. I’m here to watch a rehearsal of The Unin vited, the latest work by the award-winning performance ensemble Goat in the Road Productions, led by 38-year-old co-artistic director Chris Kaminstein.
Kaminstein, a tall, lanky fellow with a full brown beard and an amiable smile, is nowhere to be seen, but several cast and crew members are passing through the gift shop that serves as the house’s entrance gallery, speaking mostly in whispers. A radio newscaster, though, is clearly audible: Things are neck and neck, he announces breathlessly, Saints 20, Vikings 20, and the game is going into overtime. Actor Ian Hoch is leaning stone-still against a cabinet wall, his head buried in his arms.
I’ve arrived at a tense moment, it’s clear—the NFC championship game, precursor to the Super Bowl, is in its climactic moments a mile or so away in the Superdome, giving this rehearsal a vivid subtext. Moments later, the standoff is over. There are some anguished shouts from the adjacent courtyard. Hoch finally moves, sliding