International actor Jay Laga'aia didn't have too much in his schedule thanks to COVID-19, so was happy to help out his friend Peter Copeland and family who run So Popera Productions.

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"I love working with amateur theatre and rarely do you get the opportunity," the former Play School host told the Mercury.

"It's always great when people who work in the industry get to work with people who are passionate about the industry, and passionate just about telling stories."

He'll be starring as the Teen Angel who has the unforgettable song "Beauty school drop-out" (originally played by Frankie Avalon in the movie starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John).

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Peter's sister Amy said Laga'aia was one of the most "generous human-beings" to help the company get back on track after the show had been postponed from May.

"This is just a love job, we all have our own lives as well," Miss Copeland said, whose main employment is with the Starlight Foundation.

Peter is a music producer at Schools Spectacular, father Mal works in the mines and mum Donna works in admin.

The family has always been heavily involved in musical theatre which saw the kids "away for weekends on end" so creating their own company was one way to hang out together.

"[The pandemic] was honestly the scariest thing ever because we love doing what we do and we love going overboard," Miss Copeland said.

"But it was one of those gut-wrenching things of 'are we going to survive this?."

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She said it's the generosity of their volunteers which was their "saving grace" - especially that of her old school teacher Anthony Keen who setup a crowd-funding campaign through the Australian Cultural Fund platform and raised more than $10,000.

Mr Keen is currently the stage manager on Grease and has been a part of every show since their first major production, Avenue Q, in 2012.

"The cheque came in so it's like right, pay the rent and keep going," Mr Keen said.

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The money was used to pay the bills of the company's set-building workshop and storage unit as the family were not able to keep funding it themselves.

"People always ask me, 'why do you do it?'" said Mrs Copeland.

"It's like sport. People play their sport, this is what we do for fun."

Upcoming productions lined up next for So Popera include Jersey Boys, Priscilla: Queen of the Desert and Mary Poppins.

Grease will run at the IPAC from January 15 to 23, with tickets through www.merrigong.com.au