A Christmas Carol

Alyssa Goudy is thrilled to be joining the Christmas Carol family as a director! Some previous VT stage management credits include Reefer Madness, Hamlet, and Hamlet POV (SETC Stage Management Award). Previous directing credits include Moana JR., Rock of Ages MSE, Much Ado About Nothing, and more. She is the Special Events Production Manager for VT, coordinating the International Festival for 2026, scheduling and calendaring for all productions.

Murray Chase served as Venice Theatre’s Executive Director since 1995. As of June 2023, he is now focused on overseeing the restoration of the theatre after it sustained severe damage from Hurricane Ian.

He has been an active participant — and former board member — of Florida Theatre Conference and Southeastern Theatre Conference. He has served as President of the American Association of Community Theatre, and currently works with the organization as a member of the national Festival Commission. He has been a frequent grant review panelist for both the Florida Arts Council and the Mississippi Arts Commission. Recently he represented the United States as a delegation member to the World Congress of the International Amateur Theatre Association. Under his leadership, Venice Theatre has hosted the international theatre festival, actWORLDFEST, four consecutive times. Chase is also a former chair of the CEC for Sarasota County Arts Council and a former president of Venice MainStreet.

Actor/Director Credits: Besides the daily aspects of his job here, directing credits include A Midsummer Night’s Dream, I Never Saw Another Butterfly, Mary Poppins, Our Town and the award-winning productions of The Pillowman, The School For Wives, The Good Woman of Setzuan, Tartuffe and Fool For Love. He has also played a few roles on the VT stage, including Johnny in Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, Stuart in the Award-winning Boom Town, and George in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? all with wife Lori

Michelle Kasanofsky has been playing piano for almost 56 years and is a professional musician as well as a music educator. Michelle received a scholarship to Berklee College of Music in Boston and studied jazz piano there as well as classical at Boston University. She has a B.A. cum laude from Dowling College, a Master of Science in Music Education from C. W. Post Long Island University and an Education Leadership Specialist degree from Nova Southeastern University.

Michelle is originally from New York and spent most of her life on Long Island. While in New York she music directed many off-Broadway productions which included Always, Patsy Cline and has performed all over the world in Europe, Japan and Korea. Since moving down to Florida in 1998, Michelle has taught chorus, drama and dual enrollment music classes. In 2014, she was selected as Charlotte County’s Teacher of the Year. Since 2000 Michelle has performed and music directed at Venice Theatre. Her productions have included Hair, Mamma Mia, Cabaret, Toxic Avenger and Dreamgirls to name a few. She has also Music Directed at Sarasota Players, Manatee Players, Charlotte Players and the Dingbat Theatre Project.

Michelle has played for national touring companies at venues such as Barbara B Mann and Ruth Eckerd Hall for shows including A Chorus Line, Legally Blonde and West Side Story as well as accompanying artists such as Bernadette Peters and The Irish Tenors. In 2021 Michelle became the resident music director at Venice Theatre.

Natalia Mock is thrilled to be back at Venice Theatre for this season as Choreographer for A Christmas Carol and Director for Calendar Girls. She is an honored recipient of the STRAZ Broadway Stars of the future “Best Director Of A Musical” Award as well as a local theatrical teaching artist and choreographer. Past Venice Theatre credits include The Revolutionists, The Vagina Monologues, The Rocky Horror Show, Urinetown, Don’t Dress for Dinner, and more.