Laura Blanchette, director of the theater camp for Porkchop Productions, sits on the edge of the stage as she asks, "Who wants to be Mother Nature?"

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Anxious hands were in the air to volunteer for various parts in the play as the camp began Monday morning.

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Ah! The serious young actress emerges.

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Young members of a theater camp sponsored by the Cheraw Arts Commission receive their scripts for Friday's production at the Theatre on the Green.

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The older students participating in the Porkchop Production rehearse their moves in the lobby of the theater.

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If you happen to know any of the children enrolled in theater camp this week, and you’ve heard them rehearsing or singing their jingles, you may think you’re in a time warp. Participants in the camp, sponsored by Porkchop Productions and the Cheraw Arts Commission, will present their version of “Gilligan’s Island,” complete with commercials from the 1970s, at the Theatre on the Green Friday, Aug. 10, at 6 p.m. Admission is $2.

Most anyone, of a certain age, knows the tune of the television commercial written for the words: “If you think it’s butter, but it’s not; it’s Chiffon.” Tunes like this, and many others from that era, will be sung by the younger children between the acts of the main story line.

In essence, the older camp participants will present “Gilligan’s Island,” while the younger group presents a series of commercials. This unique composition allows director Laura Blanchette to maximize her time with each of the two groups, “as they can rehearse separately,” she said.

Blanchette has been working with students in Cheraw through theater camps each summer, for 17 years. “Some of the children have literally grown up participating in the theater camp,” said Lindsey Bennett, executive director for the Cheraw Arts Commission.

For more information, contact the Cheraw Arts Commission at 843-537-8420, ext. 12. The Cheraw Arts Commission is sponsored in part by the South Carolina Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts.