St. Mary people gather to watch 'Ghosts of Morgan City'

FRANKLIN -- A 90-year-old Morgan City murder case made it to national TV Friday night. And so did "Ghosts of Morgan City."

A near-capacity crowd came to Franklin's Teche Theatre for the Performing Arts to watch the premiere of the eight-episode Travel Channel series "Ghosts of Morgan City" on a big screen.

The were joined by some of the people who made the show possible.

Producers of the series, a follow-up to the cable channel's "Ghosts of Shepherdstown" series about paranormal goings-on in West Virginia, promise to explore supernatural happenings in Berwick, Patterson and Franklin as well as Morgan City.

The central idea, as laid out in a press release, is that Morgan City police were confronted with reports of a shape-shifting mist. In the show, the mist is related somehow to Ada LeBoeuf. In 1929, LeBoeuf became the first white woman to be hanged in Louisiana after she was convicted of conspiring with her lover, a Morgan City physician, to have her husband killed.

Then-Lt. Gov. Paul N. St. Cyr opposed LeBoeuf's execution, touching off a long political feud with Gov. Huey Long. The Kingfish called the killing of LeBoeuf's husband a "conscienceless" crime.

To investigate the more recent mist reports, according to the Travel Channel, a team of paranormal investigators came to St. Mary. They included Jereme Leonard; former FBI agent Ben Hansen and psychic medium, Sarah Lemos.

Diane Wiltz, active in local media and in productions of the Teche Theatre, said producers enlisted her help on local history. She also put the production team in touch with local people.

Along the way, Wiltz was tested to see how she'd look on the air.

"They said, 'Yeah, they want you,'" Wiltz said.

She said Shepherdstown, West Virginia, experienced a surge in tourism because of the "Ghosts" show there, and she's hoping the Morgan City show will enhance local efforts to promote tourism.

"If the TV program can help us do what we're trying to do on our own, sign me up," Wiltz said.

"They said half the people believe and half the people don't," said Morgan City Mayor Frank "Boo" Grizzaffi just before the show began. "W're going after the half that does."

Wiltz offered one word of caution: The show isn't a documentary. It's billing itself as a docudrama, which hints at a certain amount of dramatic license.

The license may have started in the original press release. It says that Morgan City police got in touch with colleagues in Shepherdstown because of similar experiences there.

The alternate explanation is that former Morgan City Police Chief Steele Viccellio had moved to Virginia, where he's the neighbor of a TV executive. Viccellio, hearing that the search was on for a Louisiana follow-up to the West Virginia shows, suggested Morgan City.

You can follow the show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at @TravelChannel and #GhostsOfMC

This story has been corrected to reflect the proper spelling of Steele Viccellio's name.