Jennifer Coolidge on Her Love Affair With New Orleans

“I fell in really like with New Year’s Eve a ten years ago, when a handful of girlfriends and I spontaneously went to a place called the Commander’s Palace in New Orleans. I have in no way been a significant New Year’s person—I constantly locate that it is kind of strike-or-miss out on. This celebration was on the lookout the identical, particularly given that all the places to eat close to were entire. But then I got a random phone get in touch with that someone experienced canceled their reservation and to appear by suitable absent. 

We experienced exciting consuming wine and making the most of Creole-influenced hors d’oeuvres, but what I will under no circumstances fail to remember is what transpired proper immediately after we remaining. Some person was handing out these significant bunches of silver balloons, big enough that it nearly felt like they could elevate us. We tied them to the handlebars of our bicycles and located ourselves, at two in the morning, riding down a avenue in the Garden District—past grand historic mansions with ornate iron railings and amazing gardens—with these large bunches of balloons bobbing in the wind. It was a entirely unplanned working experience that felt like a scene in a movie: a second of bliss that I wish everybody could have. 

And that is what New Orleans is all about, which is why I ended up acquiring a household there—you can not have a plan and stop up doing some thing truly interesting and exciting. I’ve had nights in which a marriage ceremony celebration took more than the bar I was at through a rainstorm and we all ended up dancing, soaking soaked and among the strangers, into the night collectively. Or exactly where a random man began taking part in the piano at a lounge and another lady started off singing and it wound up currently being some of the very best new music I’ve ever read. I mean, look—I don’t know a large amount of towns exactly where I would alternatively be out on my bike on New Year’s Eve than at a incredible social gathering.” —As told to Scott Bay

Jennifer Coolidge stars in year 2 of The White Lotus, airing Oct 30 on HBO. 

This write-up appeared in the November 2022 concern of Condé Nast Traveler. Subscribe to the magazine in this article.