A Christmas Carol is Coming!

Tickets for A Christmas Carol, starring Mike Ryan as Scrooge, will go on sale on October 1. Performances will take place at the Veterans Memorial Hall at 846 Front St. in Downtown Santa Cruz from November 26 through December 24.

Following a sold out run in 2024, A Christmas Carol returns as a holiday tradition for the whole family! Audiences can expect a theatrical and music-filled adaptation of this classic play in the heart of Santa Cruz.

Directed by Charles Pasternak and Alicia Gibson, A Christmas Carol stars Mike Ryan as Ebeneezer Scrooge, with returning favorites Julie James, Charlotte Munson and Andrea Sweeney Blanco. Luke Shepherd provides music direction for the production.

Ticket are available at www.santacruzshakespeare.org or through the seasonal Box Office, 831-460-6399, open Tuesday through Friday from 12:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. The show is 90 minutes with no intermission.

Preparing for 2026

Our 2026 festival season is expanding! We will present 5 mainstage productions, plus more Monday Night Revels (one-night only music, comedians, and more), the Fringe Series (staged readings by our professional actors, and performances by our amazing apprentices), and our annual Christmas production. Performances will begin on July 12 in the Audrey Stanley Grove (The Grove) in Santa Cruz’s DeLaveaga Park, with the holiday production of A Christmas Carol taking place in November and December at the Veterans Hall in downtown Santa Cruz.

The productions of the 2026 season include:

Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare
Macbeth by William Shakespeare
Fences by August Wilson
Private Lives by Noel Coward
The Last Five Years by Jason Robert Brown
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

The 2026 Fringe Series and the Monday Night Revels line-up with will be announced at a later date. Stay tuned!

Thank You for an Amazing 2025 Season: No One is Alone

Celebrating our 12th year as an independent producing non-profit and the 44th year of Shakespeare in Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz Shakespeare presented the following productions from July through September 2025:

Main Stage Productions

'Master Harold'...and the boys by Athol Fugard, directed by Rebecca Haley Clark
A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare, directed by Paul Mullins
Into the Woods, music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim,
book by James Lapine; licensed by Music Theatre International, directed by Jerry Lee with musical direction by Luke Shepherd
Pericles by William Shakespeare and George Wilkins, directed by Charles Pasternak

Monday Night Revels

While Mondays are traditionally "dark" at our theatre, this season we tried something new: bringing entertainment to our stage 7 nights a week!

July 1 - Rockapella, global phenomenon for nearly 40 years, setting the standard for all a cappella vocal groups
July 28 - Brian Kiley, Emmy Award-winning comedian
August 4 - Pink Ladies of the Sonnets, drag show extraordinaire
September 22 - The Surf City Allstars play The Beach Boys