Auditions for “The Cake,” “How I Learned to Drive,” and “Emma”

Celia Couture is an award-winning director with an MFA from Emerson College. Her professional credits include directing for the Gloucester Stage Company. Celia has received multiple accolades throughout her career, including Best Director and Best Production honors from the Eastern Massachusetts Association of Community Theatres (EMACT) and the prestigious Moss Hart and IRNE Awards. In 2023, Celia received both the Best Director and Best Show Award for the New England premiere of Handbagged. She is thrilled to be directing for the Venice Theatre. Celia’s regional directing credits include Proof for the Vokes Players, Sunday in the Park with George and Les Misérables for the Concord Players. Proof was a finalist in the EMACT Festival, while Sunday in the Park with George earned a Best Director nomination.

In the 2004 season, Celia directed EMACT’s award-winning production of The Laramie Project, winning both Best Director and Best Show of the year. Her 2005–2006 production of Wit for Arlington Friends of the Drama was the New England winner of the Moss Hart Award. She later directed M. Butterfly for the same company, which was honored with both Moss Hart and IRNE Awards. Celia’s production of How I Learned to Drive advanced to the National Festival in Tacoma, Washington, and her staging of Graceland and Steel Magnolias for the Wellesley Players represented New England at the AACT Regional Festival in Charlotte, North Carolina, where Graceland earned a Best Actress Award. In 2013, her production of Radium Girls with the Burlington Players won Best Production at the National Festival in Indiana.

In 2017, Extremities earned her another round of Best Director and Best Production Awards from EMACT. Most recently, her 2019 production of Lauren Gunderson’s Silent Sky was nominated for Best Production by EMACT. Celia is passionate about bringing both new and classic works to the stage, always with a focus on storytelling that resonates with audiences. Last season, she was invited to direct Fiddler on the Roof for the Cookeville Theatre Company, a production that celebrated community and cultural connection.

Geddie holds a BFA in Musical Theatre, an MA in Arts Administration, and has performed on stages around the world. He has directed productions such as Once On This Island, Lady Day At Emerson’s Bar and Grill, Fences, Ain’t Misbehavin’, and Dreamgirls. Prior to his arrival in Venice, FL, he cruised the world as a Company Manager and Principal Singer for Jean Ann Ryan Productions on Norwegian Cruise Line. His theatre performance credits include Ragtime, Twelfth Night, Race, Intimate Apparel, Falsettos, the premiere of the one-man show Bert Williams, Broadway Star; Angels in America, Dreamgirls and the role of “Judas” in Jesus Christ Superstar.

In addition to Geddie’s duties at Venice Theatre, he serves on the Ambassador Circle for Embracing our Differences; the Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, Access+ committee for Southeastern Theatre Conference, is the treasurer of the Florida Theatre Conference, the Florida State community theatre representative, and is a Board Member of the Friends of the Venice Public Library, Suncoast Black Arts Collaborative, Squeaky Wheel Theatre Group, and President of the American Association of Community Theatre.

A fifth-generation Floridian, Woodland is an actor/director who holds degrees in acting and directing from Florida State University. She has directed at the Island Players, for Random Acts Guerilla Theatre and at State College of Florida, as well as Venice Theatre. A frequent VT director, credits include Race; Silence! The Musical; The Grapes of Wrath; Flaming Guns of the Purple Sage; Venus in Fur; The Beauty Queen of Leenane; Road to Nirvana; Superior Donuts; Frankenstein; Almost, Maine; Spring Awakening; The Diary of Anne Frank, and The Great American Trailer Park Musical.