Downtown Shreveport has a lot of big buildings, but there are relatively few people on the streets at night. The truth is that it feels like a kind of ghost town. It’s almost a little spooky. The only industries that are bringing in any money, according to a senior member of the Straw Dogs team, are the casinos and film production. I was briefly driven around town last night and saw some closed-down stores, a couple of gutted buildings, vacant lots and almost no people anywhere except for low-income guys sitting on bus-stop benches.

Okay, I stuck my head into a very hot and happening bar on Texas Street, but the Cajun food restaurant I visited nearby clearly wasn’t getting much business. I didn’t get around all that much last night so maybe I’m missing something. I didn’t even go down to the commercial district adjacent to the Red River. But the Straw Dogs guy was adamant — “this town is dead.” It certainly seemed this way to me by the street-life standards of Seattle, Prague, San Francisco, Alberquerque, New Orleans, Paris, etc.