Celia Rose Gooding

Celia Rose Gooding is an American actor and singer born on February 22, 2000. They use she/her and they/them pronouns and identify as bisexual, gray asexual, and non-binary. Gooding was born to actress, singer, and dancer LaChanze and Calvin Gooding, who died in the September 11 attacks. They have one sister, Zaya. Their mother's 2006 Tony Award win for Best Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical for The Color Purple, which Gooding watched on television, inspired them to pursue acting, though they did not begin participating in musical theatre productions until ninth grade.

Gooding attended the Hackley School in Tarrytown, New York, graduating with honors in performing arts. During their junior year, they took leaves of absence to participate in readings and workshops for Jagged Little Pill, completing three hours of tutoring each morning before rehearsals in place of regular schooling. Their senior project centered on the show's out-of-town tryout. Additional training included dance study at the Alvin Ailey Institute and acting and film study with a concentration in Shakespeare at the Berridge Conservatory in Normandy. In 2018, Gooding enrolled at Pace University, initially double majoring in musical theatre and child psychology before dropping the latter during their second and final semester.

At age 17 in 2017, Gooding was cast in the first 29-hour reading of Jagged Little Pill, an original musical written by Diablo Cody based on the music of Alanis Morissette, which included performers such as Idina Menzel. Gooding originated the role of Mary Frances "Frankie" Healy, a 17-year-old Black, bisexual activist adopted into an affluent white family in a Connecticut suburb. Earlier theatrical experience included playing Carmen in the Rosetta LeNoire Musical Theatre Academy's production of Fame. Gooding participated in the 2018 lab for Jagged Little Pill and the show's world premiere at the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in May 2018.

Gooding reprised the role of Frankie when Jagged Little Pill transferred to Broadway in November 2019 at the Broadhurst Theatre. That same year, Gooding and their mother performed on Broadway simultaneously, with LaChanze starring in A Christmas Carol — a circumstance previously achieved by Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher. For their Broadway debut, Gooding received Broadway World's Debut of the Month recognition, a Clive Barnes Award nomination, and Broadway.com's Debut of the Year honor, and was named among BET's Future 40. Gooding also appeared on Late Night with Seth Meyers, Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve with Ryan Seacrest, and Good Morning America in connection with the production.

The performance earned Gooding a 2020 Tony Award nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical, making them one of the youngest nominees in the category at age 20. Gooding also received the award for Best Actor in a Featured Role in a Musical at the inaugural Antonyo Awards. The cast recording of Jagged Little Pill earned Gooding a 2021 Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album. The show closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and on September 24, 2021, Gooding announced they would not be returning to the production, citing alleged transphobic and abusive treatment of the show's non-binary cast members.

Beyond Broadway, Gooding was cast as Nyota Uhura in the Paramount+ original series Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, which premiered in 2022. Gooding has also been publicly active on issues of racial justice in theatre, participating in the New York Times' "Offstage" program in June 2020, an ABC panel on the realities of being Black on Broadway for Black History Month, and a Black Theatre Matters benefit panel hosted by Samantha Williams. Gooding additionally participated in the summer 2020 series Transformation 2020: Popular Democracy Defined, which included a panel on normalizing consent and advocacy for sexual assault victims, alongside co-star Kathryn Gallagher, and took part in the 2020 Playbill Pride Spectacular with co-star Lauren Patten.