PANTEGO — A group of seniors from a local community center are gearing up to present a Christmas play, written and directed by a Beaufort County native.

Sponsored by Growing a Fit Community, a program that brings health and environmental-related educational activities to seniors and the disabled in the community, the play follows a dysfunctional family that comes together for Christmas dinner, said Sharon Greig, the executive director of Growing a Fit Community, who will narrate the play.

The play will be held Saturday at 3 p.m. at the Beaufort County High School Alumni Association building, located at 150 Swamp Rd. in Pantego. Admission is $10 per person, and tickets can be purchased at the door. The proceeds raised from the play will go toward funding programs for the group, Greig said. Every person associated with the program will perform in the play, and it will feature a “special strut” by the cast, some of which are in their late nineties, Greig said.

“It’s basically about a Christmas dinner, and we’re talking about dysfunctional people,” Greig said. “And all the family members will come together and plan a Christmas play. It’s hilarious the characters each different person plays. We’re going to feature them doing their ‘strut,’ and it should be hilarious. It is a funny, funny play so come with your laughing shoes.”

Greig said the play was written by a local, Annie Williams, who will also direct the play. Williams was born and raised in Pantego and is a graduate of Beaufort County High School, according to Greig.

“I must tell you, Annie, who is a perfectionist, put a lot of work into it (the play),” Greig said. “The actors don’t have any experience — it was encouraging to her. This is the first time they’ve done a play so you have to bear with them. So she prayed about it, and it came out beautiful.”

Greig said the cast has been rehearsing after daily activities, which consist of exercise and nutritional classes, among other activities teaching participants about health-related topics.

“It’s more or less a senior center because we don’t have any place to go down here,” Greig said. “The seniors have no transportation and they sit in their houses and have nothing to do. We recently moved back down here from New York, and we got together and said, ‘Let’s do this, and we brought this together and it’s turned out to be a success.”

In addition to this play, the group is willing to perform for other organizations or people in the area, Greig said. Williams recently received a call from someone in New York who has asked her if she would be willing to take the play on the road.

“She said, ‘Let us do the play down here, first, then we will see how it goes and then we may (go on the road).’ We said, ‘We got another Tyler Perry right down here in Pantego.”