Carla Stickler

Carla Stickler is an American musical theatre actress and software engineer, best known for her work in the Broadway and touring productions of Wicked. Born in Chicago, she grew up in a musically active family: her mother performed in a chamber ensemble, her grandmother was an opera singer, her father was a former member of a band called Stuck in the Fifties, and her cousin played drums. Stickler began singing at a young age with the Oak Park River Forest Children's Choir. During high school she attended Interlochen Arts Camp for four summers, studying musical theatre, choir, and fine arts, before transferring for her senior year to Interlochen Arts Academy, where she focused on vocal music and ceramics. She went on to earn a theatre degree from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts and later completed graduate study at NYU's Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, graduating in 2016 as a member of Kappa Delta Pi. In 2019 she studied computer software engineering at Flatiron School and subsequently joined G2 in Chicago as a software engineer.

Stickler's professional stage career began with the Asian tour of The Sound of Music, in which she played Liesl. She then joined the second national tour of Mamma Mia!, which launched in 2002, serving as understudy for the role of Sophie. Additional regional and New York credits include the role of Narrator in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at New London Barn Playhouse, Antonia in Man of La Mancha with the Staten Island Philharmonic, Woman 1 in Songs for a New World at HERE Arts Center, and a performance at the New York Fringe Festival in Save the Goondocks.

Her most sustained association has been with Wicked. In 2010 she joined the first national tour of the Tony Award-winning musical as standby for Elphaba, a position she held through 2012. She then moved to the Broadway production, where she served as understudy for Elphaba and performed as a member of the ensemble from 2012 until her departure on June 19, 2015. On June 1, 2015, she gave her first solo concert, titled Option Up, at The Metropolitan Room, with guest appearances by Bree Lowdermilk, Drew Overcash, and Zoe Sarnak. Following her exit from the company, Stickler continued to return to the Broadway production of Wicked on a fill-in basis, covering the roles of both Elphaba and Nessarose while also appearing in the ensemble. In 2022 she returned to the Broadway production as emergency standby for Elphaba during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Beyond her stage work, Stickler has participated in several concerts and recordings. She sang Giving Up Later at the Oh Glaucoma! Benefit Concert in 2012, which was released as a live recording, and contributed In the Bleak Midwinter to Broadway's Carols for a Cure: Vol. 16 in 2014. She has also performed at the Nebraska Thespian Festival, appeared at 54 Below for Broadway Back to School in 2015, and taken part in numerous benefit concerts alongside the Wicked cast. Her film credits include the short Brand New Day, directed by Mark Roso for Columbia Student Films, and a lead role in Pressure for 40th Floor Productions. In addition to her engineering career, Stickler teaches private voice lessons.