The event, a tribute to favorite son Tennessee Williams, was staged to help keep the arts alive while a new home for the theater is refurbished. carmen k. sisson

Show goes on: Cheryl Grace, president of the Bay St. Louis Little Theater, performs during a recent 'Stella-calling' competition. carmen k. sisson

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One town uses the arts to revive after hurricane Katrina

Bay St. Louis, Miss., taps painters and the cultural community nationwide to become a rare post-Katrina success story. Why are residents yelling 'Stellaaaaaaa?'

from the May 14, 2008 edition

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Correspondent Carmen Sisson tries to remember what used to be along part of the Gulf coast of Mississippi before Hurricane Katrina.

Reporter Patrik Jonsson visited an art gallery that features artwork with Hurricane Katrina debris in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.

Beyond holding Bay St. Louis together, culture also bonds its people. Restaurant owner Steve d'Angelo says he quickly saw the role art could play in boosting spirits and rebirth. Though his business, Bay City Grille, was heavily damaged, he knew people needed laughter even more than nourishment. So he invited actors from the Bay St. Louis Little Theater to perform "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown" to local patrons.

"We were just starting to serve food again, and emotions were high on all sides," Mr. d'Angelo recalls. "Everybody was still lining up for water. That show was the first sign of life, and people needed that – a familiar place with a familiar scent – to begin healing."

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Rosemary Migliore slaps a maroon cap on her head as she approaches the balcony. "Stellaaaa!" Ms. Migliore calls, weeping as she throws herself to the ground in front of the century-old ivy-choked building that is the theater's new home. Katrina ripped the roof from the building the theater had been using, flooding the interior and leaving it uninhabitable.

Now, thanks to state grants and the efforts of cast members, a new home is rising from the ruins. Inside, the two-story structure doesn't look like much yet. The floors are plywood, the walls exposed studs. Cast members spent three whirlwind weeks removing debris from the building, which had stood vacant 40 years.

Theater president Cheryl Grace says it will take two years and close to $1 million to complete repairs. Meanwhile, they're holding outdoor shows and dragging folding chairs inside to keep the stage alive. "When the theater was destroyed, I knew in essence it wasn't, because we had all our memories," says Ms. Migliore. "We had such great fun there. But it was only a building. The spirit was still alive."

In 1946, Tennessee Williams settled in Bay St. Louis and wrote, appropriately, a one-act play, "This Property Is Condemned." Twenty years later, Robert Redford and Natalie Wood came to do a movie version of the work. After Katrina unleashed her fury, no one could have guessed where Bay St. Louis would end up. But these days, no one's dwelling on the past. There are canvases to be filled, clay to be shaped, plays to be performed. An entire city is restless. The show must go on.

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