South Mississippi man debuting first self-written play, “What She Left Behind”

GULFPORT, Miss. (WXXV) — Theaters all across the Mississippi Coast put on countless shows each year, but there’s something extra special about a show that’s written and directed by a South Mississippi native.

Trae Spears has been a show director at Downstage Theatre Productions in Gulfport for years. Now, he can add writer to his resume.

“It took about a weekend for me to throw it together the first time, the first draft,” Spears explained, referring to his new show. “Then, we did a table read with our cast members. I had invited people that I wanted to be these characters, because I actually wrote the characters for them specifically. And then we did a table read, worked through it, we found some different spots we didn’t like so we cut those out and rewrote them. Then we started rehearsing. We rehearsed for about a month starting in April and then realized we didn’t really care for the second act, how it was working through, so I rewrote the entire second act, and yeah, we’ve been rehearsing since then.”

The play is called What She Left Behind, and it combines drama and comedy to tell a heartwarming story.

“It is about Opal Mae, which is the mother of the main characters in the show,” Spears said. “The four daughters — Jolene, Magnolia, Merit and Wrenley — all come together with her granddaughter, Delilah, to go through Opal Mae’s house and the boxes that she has in the house to really figure out what to do next.”

There are lots of writers across South Mississippi as a whole, but for Gulfport, this marks one of the first times in many years that an original production has hit the stage. It’s given Spears a new perspective on what goes into putting together a play that delights audiences of all ages.

“I know what I expected when I wrote the show, and having to portray that to the actors on stage and say, ‘This is exactly what I meant by that line and how that dialogue is supposed to go,’ has been a whole different ballgame altogether,” Spears said.

The show runs on July 25th and 26th at 7 p.m., then again on July 27th at 2 p.m. It hits the stage again for the first weekend in August, with performances at 7 p.m. on August 1st and 2nd, and at 2 p.m. on August 3rd.