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Speaker 3: Maybe if I give them every single thing in my
Speaker 3: body this time, they'll see how much I care and
Speaker 3: how talented I am, and how worthy I am of
Speaker 3: her role. And it's just this constant like seeking validation
Speaker 3: from somebody else instead of like finding validation within yourself.
Speaker 1: Welcome to she Pivots, the podcast where we talk with
Speaker 1: women who dared to pivot out of one career and
Speaker 1: into something new, and explore how their personal lives impacted
Speaker 1: these decisions. I'm your host, Emily Tish Sussman. I'm thrilled
Speaker 1: today to be sitting down with Carla Stickler. And you
Speaker 1: might know who she is if you're a Broadway fan
Speaker 1: like me. She played the role of Alphaba in the
Speaker 1: famous musical Wicked, and after years of being in the ensemble,
Speaker 1: touring and playing the lead role, Carla decided to leave
Speaker 1: it all behind and transition into tech. And like me,
Speaker 1: Carla's pivots have been full of waivers. She returned back
Speaker 1: to Broadway when they needed her the most, at the
Speaker 1: height of COVID. Throughout this episode, we'll explore how Carla
Speaker 1: weaves in and out a feeling like she was in
Speaker 1: control of her power. Carla talks about the ups and
Speaker 1: downs of working in an industry where you're always striving
Speaker 1: for validation, and her ongoing struggle to fully pivot away
Speaker 1: from the thing that she loved for so many years,
Speaker 1: and the thing I identify with most that even if
Speaker 1: you love what you do, it can still burn you out.
Speaker 3: My name is Carla Stickler. I am a software engineer,
Speaker 3: but I was also an actor for a very long time.
Speaker 1: Did you always think that you were going to be
Speaker 1: an actor? Yes.
Speaker 3: Mostly. My family is really really in the arts. My
Speaker 3: mother is a pianist, and my grandmother was an opera singer.
Speaker 3: My grandpa was like a violinist and a graphic designer
Speaker 3: and related to Gene group of somewhere down there anyway.
Speaker 3: So music and all that was always in my family,
Speaker 3: and so I kind of always knew I was going
Speaker 3: to be in that world. I sang a lot. I
Speaker 3: wanted to act just because it went along with singing.
Speaker 3: I felt like if I was going to be the
Speaker 3: best singer that there was, I had to also be
Speaker 3: a really good actor. But I really wanted to be
Speaker 3: an opera singer. That was kind of my first passion.
Speaker 3: I wanted to be like my grandmother was like, she's awesome.
Speaker 3: My grandmother had like this giant thing of red hair,
Speaker 3: and she was such a diva, and she wore like
Speaker 3: these glamorous clothes, and she had this beautiful voice studio
Speaker 3: downtown Chicago. And I was like, I want to be
Speaker 3: just like her. She's amazing. And then I ended up
Speaker 3: having vocal surgery on my vocal cords. I was at
Speaker 3: Cincinnati Conservatory of Music and I was studying opera and
Speaker 3: I was like, I'm gonna be an opera singer. This
Speaker 3: is my dream. And I was having some trouble singing
Speaker 3: and my teacher was like, go to New York. Go
Speaker 3: see this guy. He's incredible. He will look at your
Speaker 3: vocal courts and I'll tell you what's wrong. And immediately
Speaker 3: he's like, you have a cyst.
Speaker 1: I can remember.
Speaker 3: So I had surgery and then I just like a
Speaker 3: good nineteen year old, panicked and didn't know what I
Speaker 3: was doing. And I was like, maybe I shouldn't be
Speaker 3: an opera singer. The doctor was like, you may not
Speaker 3: be able to sustain really high long notes for a
Speaker 3: long time. Because that was it. I was like a Sobrano.
Speaker 3: I was like a coloratura. I wanted to be like
Speaker 3: Natalie to say, for those who don't know Natalie, to say,
Speaker 3: go look her up. She's incredible, sings in like five
Speaker 3: in chiels on her back, high notes, incredible opera singer.
Speaker 3: But I was like, oh my gosh, if I can't
Speaker 3: do that, well, then I can't. I'm not going to
Speaker 3: do this. So I was like, well, then who am
Speaker 3: I if I can't be an opera singer. Who am I?
Speaker 3: And I dropped out of school and I worked in
Speaker 3: a deli in Chicago for a semester. I was like, okay, well,
Speaker 3: my boyfriend goes to NYU and I like NYU and
Speaker 3: I want to be an actor. I could just be
Speaker 3: an actor. That's the next thing, right, because acting singing
Speaker 3: same thing. They're just performing. So I transferred n YU.
Speaker 3: I guess if we're going to get into pivots. That
Speaker 3: was my first pivot.
Speaker 1: So she studied theater, leaving her singing aspirations behind until
Speaker 1: one day a professor suggested that she should explore musical theater,
Speaker 1: the perfect combination of her love for theater and her
Speaker 1: singing background, and so.
Speaker 3: I was like, great, I will learn. I learned a
Speaker 3: belt and that was kind of it. Like I that
Speaker 3: was like going into my senior year of college where
Speaker 3: I kind of figured out, oh, I'm really good at that.
Speaker 1: Do you remember if there was like a song that
Speaker 1: you just connected with and you're like, wow, my voice
Speaker 1: can do that. Jason R.
Speaker 3: Brown, I'm not afraid of anything. I was singing it
Speaker 3: and it was the first time I'd like hit these
Speaker 3: like notes of like, oh gosh, it's so hard to explain.
Speaker 3: It's like the first time singing felt like nothing like
Speaker 3: it felt like the sound just kind of poured out
Speaker 3: of me and it was like this very it was
Speaker 3: like a release almost, And after having so much kind
Speaker 3: of trauma around singing for so long, I remember just like,
Speaker 3: you know, the song is like I'm not afraid of anything.
Speaker 3: I can do anything. It's a little more complicated than that,
Speaker 3: but there was something about like holding back and letting
Speaker 3: go and allowing myself to like feel that for the
Speaker 3: first time. I was like, Oh, I love this, I
Speaker 3: can do this.
Speaker 1: Do you think it had something to do with the
Speaker 1: content of the song, like what you were singing that
Speaker 1: let you like release into it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's a lot of emotion in it right in
Speaker 3: that song, and it's a lot of connecting with who
Speaker 3: we are on the outside versus how we feel on
Speaker 3: the inside. I was like at late teens, early twenties,
Speaker 3: trying to figure out who I wanted to be for
Speaker 3: the rest of my life and feeling all this pressure
Speaker 3: that I had to be a performer.
Speaker 1: Do you think that your family put pressure on you,
Speaker 1: even if they didn't know it, to achieve a level
Speaker 1: in the arts that maybe they had not been able
Speaker 1: to achieve themselves.
Speaker 3: I don't know if they did it on purpose, but
Speaker 3: I think I just I was good at singing, right,
Speaker 3: Like people told me I was good at singing. So
Speaker 3: I think there's this common thing when we're young that
Speaker 3: if we are good at like an artistic thing, or
Speaker 3: if we're good at anything, right, adults like to label
Speaker 3: us and be like, that's what you're going to do. Oh,
Speaker 3: you're really good at ice skating, You're going to be
Speaker 3: a figure skater. Oh you're really good at basketball, you'red
Speaker 3: a basketball player. Like I was really good at singing,
Speaker 3: and so I was going to be a singer. I
Speaker 3: think there's a part of me that felt that I
Speaker 3: never understood as a young person why my mother stopped performing.
Speaker 3: She's like, but I decided to stay home and have
Speaker 3: kids since sart my family, and as a kid, I
Speaker 3: couldn't understand that. I was like, you quit on your dream.
Speaker 3: How could you do that? And I couldn't. I just
Speaker 3: couldn't wrap my brain around that. So I was like, well,
Speaker 3: I'm going to do that because you didn't get to
Speaker 3: do that. You gave all that up for me, So
Speaker 3: I'm going to go and do that for you, for me,
Speaker 3: for everybody. Because I have this You've all told me
Speaker 3: I'm fantastic. You've all like blown up my ego and
Speaker 3: like told me I'm incredible. So obviously I can do
Speaker 3: this thing and make that happen.
Speaker 1: But that ambition, inspired by the life her mother left behind,
Speaker 1: came with costs. She was living not only her dream,
Speaker 1: but her mother's dream, and like any job, it felt
Speaker 1: like something was off.
Speaker 3: We don't see the private stuff. We only see what's
Speaker 3: on the on the surface, and people have trouble wrapping
Speaker 3: their brain around that you would ever possibly want to
Speaker 3: give something up that they see is something that everyone wants.
Speaker 3: They're like, wow, how could you? Like when I left Broadway,
Speaker 3: I had a lot of people that were like, why,
Speaker 3: You're like living my dream. You're like living the dream
Speaker 3: And I'm like, yeah, but the dream is really exhaust
Speaker 3: like I'm burnt out, and it's like hard to show
Speaker 3: what that look. People don't see that. All they see
Speaker 3: is that you are living the dream.
Speaker 1: So you graduated, Where did we go from there?
Speaker 3: I lucked out. I got an agent right out of college.
Speaker 3: I booked the Asia tour of the Sound of Music,
Speaker 3: and I played Leazel and I went to China. I
Speaker 3: was just an idiot on that tour. I had so
Speaker 3: much fun, but like just I did a lot of
Speaker 3: partying because I was like, I'm not going and this
Speaker 3: is so cool and I'm twenty one. Like I was
Speaker 3: like invincible, I could do anything. It was very fun.
Speaker 1: Despite feeling invincible, she still struggled with feeling enough.
Speaker 3: I've always been really insecure. I don't know. I feel
Speaker 3: like if you pull every every single perform in the world,
Speaker 3: they'll all tell you that they're just the worst performer ever.
Speaker 3: There are things I know I'm good at, but I
Speaker 3: think at that age, I just didn't know. I wasn't
Speaker 3: super confident about it. I knew I had a lot
Speaker 3: of feelings around it. I knew that like things were
Speaker 3: working out really well because I had booked the show
Speaker 3: right away, but I couldn't quite figure out how I
Speaker 3: fit right. Like I still wasn't I wasn't sure if
Speaker 3: I really loved a musical theater yet because I was
Speaker 3: still kind of mourning the loss of my opera self.
Speaker 3: I still just wasn't sure. I think I didn't know
Speaker 3: what I wanted, so like when I got back and
Speaker 3: I was here and I didn't have my union card yet,
Speaker 3: and I was like, oh, what am I going to do?
Speaker 3: And my agents were like, so we're going to need
Speaker 3: you to like go to open calls. And I was
Speaker 3: like what, but I have an agent. They're like yeah,
Speaker 3: we just need you know, go to as much as
Speaker 3: you can. And I was about to quit the business
Speaker 3: again because a year had gone by and I couldn't
Speaker 3: get anything, and I had been in for like Mama Mia,
Speaker 3: and then I was out in California for like a
Speaker 3: couple weeks with this X of mine and I was like,
Speaker 3: I think I'm going to quit the business. This is awful,
Speaker 3: Like I hate everything. I'm not getting any I'm not
Speaker 3: getting work. Maybe I made a bad decision. Maybe I
Speaker 3: shouldn't be doing musical theater this year is awful. And
Speaker 3: then Mamaia called me all as California and they're like,
Speaker 3: can you come back and do another audition? And I
Speaker 3: I got a really back cold for the audition and
Speaker 3: I was feeling terrible. And I get there and I'm
Speaker 3: in this dance call and it's like dancers. I'm not
Speaker 3: a dancer and these girls are like kicking their face
Speaker 3: and this combination is really hard, and I like froze,
Speaker 3: and the choreographer comes up to me. She goes, Carla,
Speaker 3: I don't know if anybody told you, but you're not
Speaker 3: here for the dancer track. We're auditioning a couple of
Speaker 3: things right now. This combination is for the dancers. You're
Speaker 3: here for the Sophie understudy track, who doesn't do this
Speaker 3: much dancing, so don't worry. And I was like, oh
Speaker 3: my god, thank you for telling me that, because I
Speaker 3: was literally about to burst into tears. I was like,
Speaker 3: what am I doing here? Why did I leave California
Speaker 3: to come and embarrass me home in.
Speaker 1: This dance call?
Speaker 3: And then like I sang. And then like a week later,
Speaker 3: they were like, great, you want to go on tour
Speaker 3: in a week and I was like yes, and I
Speaker 3: booked my first equity gig and I went on tour
Speaker 3: for like a year and a half and then I
Speaker 3: was like, Okay, this feels good. This is like reaffirmed
Speaker 3: I should be doing this.
Speaker 1: So she set out on her first US Broadway tour,
Speaker 1: hopping from city to city every single week.
Speaker 3: This tour we were doing one week stops. Every like Sunday,
Speaker 3: we'd load out of the theater, travel Monday, open Tuesday
Speaker 3: in a new city.
Speaker 1: So what was the relationship. I mean to traveling with
Speaker 1: the same people for a year and a half and
Speaker 1: then for three years.
Speaker 3: I learned a lot about how to be independent, how
Speaker 3: to like try to separate work in life. It's really
Speaker 3: hard when you like live with work. I would find
Speaker 3: like a Whole Foods or a health food store, a
Speaker 3: grocery shop. I would make sure that I had a kitchen.
Speaker 3: I would find the yoga studios I could go to,
Speaker 3: and I would try to kind of build a little
Speaker 3: bit of a life during the daytime when I wasn't
Speaker 3: at the theater. That would allow me to feel sort
Speaker 3: of normal, so that I wouldn't get totally swept up
Speaker 3: in like the drama at the theater, so I wasn't
Speaker 3: always hanging out with everybody that I worked with. It's
Speaker 3: really really hard, and on a touring production, everybody on
Speaker 3: a touring production thinks they deserve to be in the
Speaker 3: Broadway Company or there's something better out there, So you
Speaker 3: constantly have people flying to New York for auditions and
Speaker 3: talking about those auditions, and then like talking about, Oh,
Speaker 3: my friend just booked so and so, and now they're
Speaker 3: going to be in blah blah blah, and I'm going
Speaker 3: to go back for that opening. And it's just like
Speaker 3: a lot of everybody's trying to warn up everybody all
Speaker 3: the time, and it's very sometimes exhausting was the word.
Speaker 1: I was going for. That sounds east bad.
Speaker 3: It's really hard to just like settle.
Speaker 1: I want to pause here and explain for our non
Speaker 1: Broadway listeners what Wicked is. The show centers around the
Speaker 1: origin story of the Wicked Witch of the West. Like
Speaker 1: Wizard of Oz, we follow the friendship and journey of Glinda,
Speaker 1: who is Glinda the Good Witch in the movie, and Alphaba,
Speaker 1: the green skinned Wicked Witch of the West. Not to
Speaker 1: spoil a musical and a book that has been out
Speaker 1: for decades, but Alphaba is the protagonist, the misunderstood hero
Speaker 1: of the story, and her trauma as the outcast led
Speaker 1: her to become an advocate for the little guy, fighting
Speaker 1: against a system that villainizes anyone who is different. So
Speaker 1: did you go right from Mama Mia to Wicked? Had
Speaker 1: you seen Wicked by the time you joined the tour?
Speaker 3: I saw it in two thousand and five graduated from college.
Speaker 3: I'm really embarrassed about this, but I didn't like it.
Speaker 3: I'm really sorry. I hate saying that out loud. It's
Speaker 3: not that I didn't like it, but when I watched
Speaker 3: the show as an actor, I have a problem where
Speaker 3: when I watch shows, I can't turn off my actor brain.
Speaker 3: So like I'll watch and I'm like, Okay, what track
Speaker 3: am I? Who am I going to play? What's my
Speaker 3: What do I do? And I was like, am I Glinda?
Speaker 3: Am I? I'm like, I'm obviously not an Alpha BA.
Speaker 3: I was like, am I a Nessa Rose? So like
Speaker 3: I was like, I guess I'm a mess I'm Annessa Rose?
Speaker 1: Why don't you think you were in Alpha BA?
Speaker 3: I'm small. I'm like not quite five four, which is
Speaker 3: not actually short, but they love to cast Alpha basall
Speaker 3: even though a Dina Menzelisfi for Christon Tanna with is like,
Speaker 3: what's right? But not every Glinda's going to be as
Speaker 3: short as Crystontena With. So they like this thing of
Speaker 3: like alpha but being taller than Glinda, and so I
Speaker 3: was like, well, I'm short. I also didn't feel Alpha
Speaker 3: BA at that time in my life. I didn't feel
Speaker 3: that kind of power and not how to channel that
Speaker 3: in myself, so like I couldn't relate to her. So
Speaker 3: I was like nessa Rose Tragic, I could do that.
Speaker 3: Great funny thing is the first time I auditioned for it,
Speaker 3: I actually went in forness Arose after I came back
Speaker 3: from Mama Mia. The message that got relayed to me
Speaker 3: to my agent was they just don't think you're tragically
Speaker 3: beautiful enough. So I was like, great, I guess I'm
Speaker 3: not gonna be a wicked And then like a year later,
Speaker 3: no maybe not a year, but like like a few
Speaker 3: months whatever. I had gotten married in that time and
Speaker 3: I then got very quickly divorced. But it was right
Speaker 3: when I was going through my divorce my agents called again.
Speaker 3: They were like Glinda Alphaba, and I was like, Alphaba,
Speaker 3: this divorce has taught me that I'm a really strong person.
Speaker 3: I can be an alphabet absolutely, and like I was
Speaker 3: able to then channel all of that divorce energy into
Speaker 3: Alphaba and it was incredible, Like I like got it finally.
Speaker 3: When I first had seen the show, I was like,
Speaker 3: I don't have anything that tragic. I don't have anything
Speaker 3: to relate to, and I don't know what that power
Speaker 3: looks like in myself, and so like having gone through
Speaker 3: that process of like finding my strength, I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: I can be Alphaba. That was when I was like, okay,
Speaker 3: let's do it.
Speaker 1: Please welcome Carla Stickler from Wicked. My future is.
Speaker 2: That's true.
Speaker 3: So I was on the first National tour for three years.
Speaker 3: The first year I was the understudy, so I was
Speaker 3: in the ensemble eight times a week, so I was
Speaker 3: like the second cover. So there's Alphaba, there's a stand
Speaker 3: by who's an off stage principal cover, who's the first
Speaker 3: to go on, and then there's standers study who's in
Speaker 3: the ensemble. And halfway through that second year, they were like,
Speaker 3: we're gonna move up to stand by and I was
Speaker 3: like okay, but I had to wait like six months,
Speaker 3: which is like an agonizing six months. I couldn't tell
Speaker 3: anybody that I was moving up to the role because
Speaker 3: I knew, but like I couldn't talk about it because
Speaker 3: I didn't want to upset anybody. Like so I once
Speaker 3: I moved up, I was a stand by for a
Speaker 3: year on tour, which was great.
Speaker 1: It was great for a number of reasons, but surprisingly
Speaker 1: the stand by role is more coveted than the understudy role.
Speaker 1: Why simply because it's easier. The standby doesn't have to
Speaker 1: be part of the ensemble. The stand by is the
Speaker 1: best role. It is a better role than the understudy roll.
Speaker 1: The thing that's hard about the understudy role is that
Speaker 1: you're doing eight shows a week. It's a different level
Speaker 1: of exhaustion, where like when you're in the stand by
Speaker 1: you get to rest a lot.
Speaker 3: On the tour, we get to leave halfway through and
Speaker 3: us act too, and then in Broadway you just leave
Speaker 3: after she enters Act too. You could go home, which
Speaker 3: is the best. It's great because we're like, all right, fine,
Speaker 3: because look at that point, I think the whole thing
Speaker 3: is if she goes down and Act two, they have
Speaker 3: to stop the show. So it's faster to get the understudy,
Speaker 3: who's already wigged and miked, into green, than it is
Speaker 3: to get the stand by into green, because they would
Speaker 3: have to wig her and do a lot more prep work.
Speaker 1: If you've never seen Wicked, Alpha but is fully green,
Speaker 1: And if you're wondering how long it takes to be greenified,
Speaker 1: so was I.
Speaker 3: We started half hour a half hour before the show.
Speaker 3: It's eight o'clock curtain seven thirty. You should be in
Speaker 3: like tights and your body suit in the chair, ready
Speaker 3: to go, and then they start greeting you. Ideally they're
Speaker 3: done greeening you by the time the show starts, so
Speaker 3: you have like ten minutes to warm up and get
Speaker 3: into costume. Sometimes they're faster. They can do it in
Speaker 3: five minutes if they need to, and you.
Speaker 1: Don't do it yourself. Absolutely, and does the stand by green? No,
Speaker 1: only if she's going on.
Speaker 3: Only if she's going on. Yeah, So, like there are
Speaker 3: spots in Act one where they know that they have
Speaker 3: time to get the standby ready. A common spot is
Speaker 3: Alpha bo will sing Wizard and I and she'll be like,
Speaker 3: I'm out and then and she'll continue on because she
Speaker 3: doesn't have to sing anything, or a couple of scenes,
Speaker 3: so she'll continue through the show, and then there's like
Speaker 3: a swap out where she'll walk off stage and the
Speaker 3: new one will walk on.
Speaker 1: And that really happens all the time.
Speaker 3: All the time, and people don't notice unless there's like
Speaker 3: a drastic height difference or like a body shape difference.
Speaker 3: Like people might be like, hmm, something looks different, and
Speaker 3: then they'll make an announcement of intermission.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess if she's green.
Speaker 3: Yeah, nobody knows, nobody cares.
Speaker 1: That's the thing.
Speaker 3: It's like, it really doesn't matter. I think that's the
Speaker 3: beautiful thing about the show, right, I mean, as long
Speaker 3: as the Alphaba is like a solid actress and singer, like,
Speaker 3: nobody cares who's playing the role. It's not about the actress,
Speaker 3: It's about the character.
Speaker 1: Okay, So you moved from the tour to Broadway and
Speaker 1: how did that feel to go on Broadway as Alphabet?
Speaker 1: I mean, you've really stepped into your power.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was great. While I was on tour, I
Speaker 3: really kind of grew into the character. She changed a
Speaker 3: lot for me over, Like I go back to there's
Speaker 3: some random bootlegs from when I was on tour, and
Speaker 3: I watched them and I'm like, oh, that's such a
Speaker 3: different version of what I would do now, especially like recently,
Speaker 3: Like when I went back, I just I'm such a
Speaker 3: different person. So I think that's the beautiful thing about
Speaker 3: Alphaba is you can kind of take where you are
Speaker 3: and channel that inter her and it changes as we
Speaker 3: get older, right, Yeah, And you can you can kind
Speaker 3: of morph with the role and grow deeper and deeper.
Speaker 3: But yeah, I learned a lot. I learned a lot
Speaker 3: about myself through her. She's such a powerful character and
Speaker 3: her journey is it's sad and lonely, but she finds
Speaker 3: her strength. I think when you play that role too,
Speaker 3: there's kind of a loneliness that goes into playing the role,
Speaker 3: and so you kind of like become Alphaba when you're
Speaker 3: playing the role a little bit. You know, you get
Speaker 3: to the theater early, you're kind of by yourself a lot.
Speaker 3: It's you, your dresser and the hair people and wardrobe,
Speaker 3: and then you don't see anybody else on stage. And
Speaker 3: then when you do go on stage, everybody's like kind
Speaker 3: of laughing at you, and then you're by yourself, and
Speaker 3: then you switch places there on stage, you're off stage,
Speaker 3: and then the show ends, and then you go to
Speaker 3: the dressing room, you shower, and by the time you leave,
Speaker 3: everybody's left. So there's this loneliness to Alphaba that kind
Speaker 3: of goes with just playing the role, right, and then
Speaker 3: during the daytime you have to be quiet, you have
Speaker 3: to take care of yourself. That's the thing that ultimately
Speaker 3: led to my burnout was doing the same thing eight
Speaker 3: times a week. It takes its toll on your body.
Speaker 3: I had a bunch of injuries. I had a neck injury,
Speaker 3: I had some foot injuries, and I just your day
Speaker 3: today is all about making sure you can do the
Speaker 3: show at night. So you know, you wake up, like,
Speaker 3: maybe you go to the therapy, maybe you go to
Speaker 3: the physical therapist, maybe you go get a massage, you're
Speaker 3: steaming your voice, You're making sure that you are ready
Speaker 3: to do that show at night, And so your whole
Speaker 3: life becomes about can I do the show tonight. Like
Speaker 3: I would wake up and I would lay in bed
Speaker 3: and I go and I would like war. I would like,
Speaker 3: I'm like, okay, is it there? And I would just
Speaker 3: kind of check my range every morning. I was like,
Speaker 3: and I would know it was going to be a
Speaker 3: good day or a bad day based on what I
Speaker 3: felt like right when I woke up. And it just
Speaker 3: get really exhausting. And you don't really get a break
Speaker 3: when you do a show like that for years and
Speaker 3: years and years, and so your body is just kind
Speaker 3: of like you're in maintenance mode all the time. That's
Speaker 3: the thing when people are like, why would you give
Speaker 3: that up? You're right, the show is really fun, but
Speaker 3: all of that other stuff. Doing a long running show
Speaker 3: for I did it straight for five and a half years, NonStop,
Speaker 3: eight shows a week, with like two weeks off every year.
Speaker 1: That's a lot.
Speaker 3: Really messed my body up. I'm still dealing with like
Speaker 3: my neck and jury and stuff.
Speaker 1: On top of the physical toll, the show began to
Speaker 1: take an emotional toll. Between the demand of doing eight
Speaker 1: shows a week at odd hours, she began to feel
Speaker 1: isolated and unable to find time for her friends.
Speaker 3: It's hard to go out with friends after shows because
Speaker 3: you're like, I gotta go to bed. So it's hard
Speaker 3: to kind of like have relationship with people who are
Speaker 3: not in the business. So either you're like only having
Speaker 3: relationships with people in the business, which can get exhausting
Speaker 3: because of like the competitive nature of the business, or
Speaker 3: you're just not seeing people. And that was hard, Like
Speaker 3: I missed a lot of holidays, I missed a lot
Speaker 3: of family events. Like during the time I was on
Speaker 3: tour with Wicked and in New York, I had a
Speaker 3: boyfriend who was a teacher, and it was really hard
Speaker 3: because our schedules were flapped and we had this point
Speaker 3: where he got clearly frustrated because like, we never saw
Speaker 3: each other and that sucks.
Speaker 1: Carlin knew she needed to make a change, but I
Speaker 1: think it's important to note here that it's hard to
Speaker 1: leave something you've dedicated so much time and emotional energy to.
Speaker 1: So instead of doing the hard thing and leaving, we
Speaker 1: end up searching for a better purpose an excuse. So
Speaker 1: she made her first career pivot, deciding to leave the
Speaker 1: show in twenty fifteen to attend NYU to get a
Speaker 1: master's in theater education.
Speaker 3: And so I was like, I just need to get
Speaker 3: out of the show. I need space to breathe, I
Speaker 3: need space to think. And I needed a reason to
Speaker 3: leave Wicked. And I was like, I'm going to be
Speaker 3: a teacher. I like teaching and grad school, Like being
Speaker 3: a teacher is a noble thing as an actor, to
Speaker 3: go do right, like spread the gospel. I was like,
Speaker 3: I'm going to do this. This feels really good, this
Speaker 3: feels powerful for me, this feels like a purpose great.
Speaker 3: So I did that, and right after I left the show,
Speaker 3: a friend of mine was doing this cruise ship show
Speaker 3: and she'd gotten pregnant. She's like, do you want to
Speaker 3: take over my show? While I'm pregnant. I was like,
Speaker 3: I do and it was perfect because I could do
Speaker 3: it alongside grad school. So I'd like fly on Wednesday
Speaker 3: to the Bahamas and then I would do like two
Speaker 3: forty five minutes sets with me and like a three
Speaker 3: piece band. And I got this like little bit of
Speaker 3: performing that was really joyful, and I could do that
Speaker 3: while I was in grad school, while I was teaching,
Speaker 3: and it was this really beautiful balance of the two things.
Speaker 3: I was like, Oh, I get I get to perform
Speaker 3: this joyful thing where I get to like be myself
Speaker 3: and sing stuff that I love, and then I get
Speaker 3: to teach and inspire and so it was really lovely
Speaker 3: and in that time I found my power again and
Speaker 3: I was like feeling really good.
Speaker 1: Carla ended her relationship with her then boyfriend and shortly
Speaker 1: after met her now husband on the exact cruise ship
Speaker 1: she was working on. The stars seemed to align between
Speaker 1: the two of them, both from New York, both performers,
Speaker 1: both looking for something new, and he.
Speaker 3: Also lived in New York. And then we also found
Speaker 3: out he was from my hometown. We went high school together.
Speaker 3: I had played softball with this sort of sister. Our
Speaker 3: parents knew each other. So I was like, this is
Speaker 3: meant to be. The universe is colliding. And things were
Speaker 3: great because he met me after Wicked, which is such
Speaker 3: a weird thing because he never really knew me when
Speaker 3: I was like full time in a Broadway show, so
Speaker 3: he's always known me when I've been in transition, and
Speaker 3: so there's always been this conversation of, well, Carla, I
Speaker 3: know at some point you're going to stop transitioning, but
Speaker 3: like you keep kind of transitioning and transitioning, and I'm like,
Speaker 3: I'm going to settle. I'm going to find the thing.
Speaker 3: And you know, I taught for a while. My cruise
Speaker 3: ship show got canceled right when he and I moved
Speaker 3: in together, but like he had had a brain tumor
Speaker 3: and so he had to have brain surgery, and so
Speaker 3: like all of these things were kind of colliding at once,
Speaker 3: right around when my show closed and I finished grad school,
Speaker 3: and it was just like this moment of oh, okay,
Speaker 3: this is a lot of things what is important. And
Speaker 3: I was also still kind of auditioning and he was
Speaker 3: trying to audition as well, and we were both just like,
Speaker 3: maybe that's not important. His brain surgery kind of made
Speaker 3: us realize maybe like family and relationships are more important.
Speaker 3: So we kind of stepped back from that. Like with
Speaker 3: my show closing, I was like, Okay, I'm not going
Speaker 3: to audition as much. I'm going to teach more. I
Speaker 3: taught on a couple of faculties here in the city
Speaker 3: and I really leaned into that. And Wicked was still
Speaker 3: kind of calling me in during that time, so I
Speaker 3: was kind of like on and off in the show,
Speaker 3: and he would see me, like go back to the
Speaker 3: show and be really stressed out for two weeks and
Speaker 3: be like Carlot, that was awful. I was like, I know,
Speaker 3: He's like, do you need to do that? When they call?
Speaker 3: And I was like, I can't say no. I can't
Speaker 3: say no to Wicked.
Speaker 1: Why couldn't you say no?
Speaker 3: Wicked is like an abusive boyfriend. I mean that in
Speaker 3: the way that like we loved them and there's so
Speaker 3: much like passion and there's so many interesting things about them.
Speaker 3: And every time we go we're like, it's going to
Speaker 3: be different. It's going to be different this time because
Speaker 3: they've changed. I've changed. I can manage it better. And
Speaker 3: then you go back and it's the same every time.
Speaker 3: Every time it's the same, and you're like, why didn't
Speaker 3: I see it coming? And I would go back and
Speaker 3: I get really excited that I was there, and after
Speaker 3: like a week or two, my body would start hurt again,
Speaker 3: and I would get those feelings of wanting more while
Speaker 3: I was there again, like I had been the under
Speaker 3: study and I had been passed up for the stand
Speaker 3: by role in the Broadway company.
Speaker 1: After already playing the stand by role, she craved that
Speaker 1: role again. It was less intense and harsh on her body,
Speaker 1: meaning she could still experience the magic of Wicked without
Speaker 1: the toll on her physical health, so she kept trying.
Speaker 3: So I was always like, well, maybe I'll go in
Speaker 3: and they'll see me again, and they'll and I saying
Speaker 3: it out loud, I feel so dumb, because it's like,
Speaker 3: maybe they'll love me this time. Maybe if I give
Speaker 3: them every single thing in my body this time, they'll
Speaker 3: see how much I care and how talented I am
Speaker 3: and how worthy I am of a role. And it's
Speaker 3: just like this constant like seeking validation from somebody else
Speaker 3: instead of like finding validation within yourself. And then every
Speaker 3: time I come back, I was like, I can't do
Speaker 3: this anymore. I hate it, and they call again and
Speaker 3: I would go and so finally, in like twenty eighteen,
Speaker 3: I was like, I'm so tired. I can't keep doing this,
Speaker 3: and like teaching was getting really hard because I was
Speaker 3: feeling how crappy that element of the business was. I
Speaker 3: was just like, it's not fair. It's not a fair business.
Speaker 3: They're going to just chew everyone up and spit them out.
Speaker 3: And I was starting to like feel for my students
Speaker 3: because I was like, I don't know how I can
Speaker 3: tell you to go into this business if I don't
Speaker 3: truly believe the structure of this business makes sense.
Speaker 1: I want to hop in here because I think this
Speaker 1: is an important point to emphasize. During my conversation with Carla,
Speaker 1: I really saw this as a breaking point for her,
Speaker 1: the idea that the thing we love and we're so
Speaker 1: passionate was no longer a fit as we changed. For me,
Speaker 1: it was when I realized that I couldn't be there
Speaker 1: for my kid's formative moments while also showing up the
Speaker 1: way I wanted to in my job, realizing that the
Speaker 1: structure or the system I was working within no longer
Speaker 1: fit me. And we hear it time and time again,
Speaker 1: when we talk about people's pivots, when we remove the
Speaker 1: veil from our eyes, is the path really serving us?
Speaker 1: Or is it time to pivot?
Speaker 3: And I was like, how do I inspire people to
Speaker 3: go into this business when I don't feel pasionate about it?
Speaker 3: And that's when I found coding. I'd come back from
Speaker 3: one time at Wicked and I was like, God, I
Speaker 3: hate it. I can't go back.
Speaker 1: What am I doing?
Speaker 3: Why do I want this? What am I doing with
Speaker 3: my life? They're never going to give me what I want?
Speaker 3: What is the point of all this? And why do
Speaker 3: I need it so bad? And my friend came to
Speaker 3: my birthday party, He's like, hey, I'm a software engineer.
Speaker 1: Now I think.
Speaker 3: I was just like so desperate to find something that
Speaker 3: would make me feel smart and powerful again. I felt
Speaker 3: like I had all of my power had been stripped
Speaker 3: away from me.
Speaker 1: I was like, I could do that. I don't know.
Speaker 3: I'm a crazy person. I think that's really what it
Speaker 3: comes down to.
Speaker 1: But I was like, I can do that.
Speaker 3: I don't know what that is, but I bet I
Speaker 3: could do that. I'm smart numbers. I was always very
Speaker 3: good at numbers. And I went home and I started
Speaker 3: teaching myself, and I was like, this is incredible. Look
Speaker 3: at what I did. I made this thing happen. Look
Speaker 3: at this button. When you press this button, these words
Speaker 3: appear on the page. I did that.
Speaker 1: Wait, how did you teach yourself?
Speaker 3: There's a bunch of stuff for free online that you
Speaker 3: can go and do. And I just started googling, like literally,
Speaker 3: I was like, Google, how do I become a software engineer?
Speaker 3: Is software engineering hard? How much money do first year
Speaker 3: software engineers make? How much money do second your sofa
Speaker 3: engineers make?
Speaker 1: And I was like, holy crap.
Speaker 3: I didn't realize there's this is the thing about software engineering.
Speaker 3: And I think why I talk about it so much
Speaker 3: to people who are like unhappy in the arts or
Speaker 3: they're just trying to figure it out. I'm like, software
Speaker 3: engineering is artistic, it's creative, but it's also accessible, right, Like,
Speaker 3: if you have the time and the ability to commit
Speaker 3: it to learning the skill, you can change your life
Speaker 3: in a very short amount of time. Getting into software engineering,
Speaker 3: there's a little bit of a hump that you got
Speaker 3: to get through, but as soon as you learn the
Speaker 3: basics and you get your first job, the pay skill
Speaker 3: just explodes right within a year, you're making six figures.
Speaker 3: Within a few years you're a mid level engineer. And
Speaker 3: Google and Apple and like all these big companies are
Speaker 3: like trying to recruit you. And so I was like, cool,
Speaker 3: if I'm going to try to change careers, let's do
Speaker 3: something that's really hard and interesting and will also give
Speaker 3: me like a four h one K and health insurance
Speaker 3: and like the stability that I never really had.
Speaker 1: At the time, she was working on an off Broadway
Speaker 1: production and her plan was to apply to tech jobs
Speaker 1: after her show closed and the premiere was set for
Speaker 1: you guessed it March of twenty twenty, when the world
Speaker 1: as we knew it shut down.
Speaker 3: So Broadway shutdown I think on Wednesday, and that was Friday,
Speaker 3: so we were in we were not in New York.
Speaker 3: We were doing it out of town in Pennsylvania, and
Speaker 3: Broadway shut down, and we were all in the dressing
Speaker 3: room and stay like, oh God, this isn't looking good.
Speaker 3: And then Friday was supposed to be our first preview,
Speaker 3: and Friday morning they're like, we can't have an audience.
Speaker 3: We're going to do the run tonight. We're going to
Speaker 3: videotape it, and then you're all going to go home tomorrow,
Speaker 3: and I was like, Okay, well I was going to
Speaker 3: start my job search for my engineering job when the
Speaker 3: show ended, so I guess I'm going to start it
Speaker 3: now at the beginning of a pandemic great, which was
Speaker 3: awful because nobody was hiring junior engineers, and so finally
Speaker 3: I was like, I got to pivot. Pivot, Hey, I'm
Speaker 3: going to look for software adjacent jobs. So I found
Speaker 3: this customer success role at this company, and I was like,
Speaker 3: great customer success, that's technical. It's also it worked with people.
Speaker 3: I like working with people, so it was like very
Speaker 3: customer facing tech.
Speaker 1: It was great.
Speaker 3: It taught me like the lingo, it taught me how
Speaker 3: to work remotely, It taught me how to like communicate
Speaker 3: in this kind of very different world. And it allowed
Speaker 3: my husband and I to buy a car, moved to Chicago,
Speaker 3: buy a house. It allowed us to kind of like
Speaker 3: have this life.
Speaker 1: I feel like what you're describing is you totally transformed
Speaker 1: your life into this leave it to Beaver, like going
Speaker 1: from the extreme of Broadway to this idyllic, picturesque life
Speaker 1: and then you went back. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I don't know if I'll ever be able to kind
Speaker 3: of turn off that thing. Like I'm like a fly
Speaker 3: to a light right, like you flip that switch on.
Speaker 3: I'm like hello. Broadway was starting up again, and I
Speaker 3: remember feeling a little itchy about it. I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: I feel like I should find some performing here in Chicago.
Speaker 1: And that's when Wicked came knocking again, this time due
Speaker 1: to the omicron surge. They asked her to come back
Speaker 1: to cover Alphabet for a few weeks, and then I was.
Speaker 3: Like I should say no. He's like, do you want
Speaker 3: to say no? And I was like maybe no. He's like,
Speaker 3: do you want to do it? And I was like, okay,
Speaker 3: I feel like I have this duty I should go.
Speaker 3: At that moment, I was like, this is bigger than me.
Speaker 3: This is kind of like Broadway is struggling, and I
Speaker 3: think we need to show the world that Broadway can
Speaker 3: make it through this, because I think if Broadway can
Speaker 3: make it through this, I don't know if it'll ever
Speaker 3: recover from this. And I think a lot of people
Speaker 3: felt that. And so I was like, I'm going to
Speaker 3: do this. It's going to be crazy, but here we go.
Speaker 3: He's like, here's a deal. I support whatever you want
Speaker 3: to do. It's like, if you want to go, you
Speaker 3: should go. It'll be fine. I will be fine with
Speaker 3: our friends, by myself in this cabin in Michigan. You
Speaker 3: should go if you really feel like you want to go.
Speaker 1: And I was like, I think I have to go.
Speaker 1: And He's like, Okay, one day you're developing software and
Speaker 1: the next day you're starring at a Broadway show. That
Speaker 1: is a spellbinding moment from the life of Carla Stickler.
Speaker 1: And as we've been reporting, COVID has taken its toll
Speaker 1: on Broadway. But over at Wicked, they really do believe
Speaker 1: the show must go on. And that resulted in a
Speaker 1: triumphant return for someone who thought her performing days were over.
Speaker 1: But between the shows and plenty of green makeup, going
Speaker 1: back to Broadway reminded her of what you moved to
Speaker 1: Chicago for in the first place.
Speaker 3: Part of the reason we moved to Chicago was that
Speaker 3: we wanted to start our family. Surprisingly, it's not that
Speaker 3: easy to get pregnant. I think they lied to me.
Speaker 3: I feel like I've been lied to my whole life
Speaker 3: that it's just like really really easy. That's been like
Speaker 3: the underlying plan of the whole thing is that like
Speaker 3: find the stable life, go back to Chicago, start your family.
Speaker 1: How have you been handling that emotionally? I understand from
Speaker 1: a lot of friends a lot. I feel like everyone
Speaker 1: I know who has gone through it that it just
Speaker 1: it really takes a toll on you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's exhausting, and people don't talk about it a lot.
Speaker 3: You don't know much about how awful it is. I
Speaker 3: think the thing that is the hardest thing for me
Speaker 3: is that as a woman, I think society kind of
Speaker 3: pushes hard that motherhood is the thing you do with
Speaker 3: the rest of your life till your kids are eighteen,
Speaker 3: and then you go and you retire and you like
Speaker 3: have a fabulous retirement. I think I always just assumed
Speaker 3: that was going to be this part of my life,
Speaker 3: and so now that it's taken longer, it's kind of
Speaker 3: starting to grapple with the idea of like, oh, what
Speaker 3: if I'm not going to be a mother, and what
Speaker 3: is my life going to look like if that doesn't
Speaker 3: work out. That's weird because I don't think I've spent
Speaker 3: a lot of time fantasizing about my life as an
Speaker 3: adult without children in her forties and fifties. I mean,
Speaker 3: there are women who do that right, Like I have
Speaker 3: friends who are like, oh, I never want children, and
Speaker 3: I'm like great, But like, even though I wasn't ever
Speaker 3: sure I wanted children, I didn't spend a lot of
Speaker 3: time fantasizing about my life at that age without them
Speaker 3: or in general. So there's just kind of this this
Speaker 3: conversation that my husband I keep happening of well if
Speaker 3: this isn't going to work out, what do we do?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: What is next? Who are we?
Speaker 3: And I'm like do we stay in Chicago? And as
Speaker 3: I've been doing the fertility stuff, I've had to kind
Speaker 3: of take a step back from a lot of things
Speaker 3: because it is emotionally exhausting. It's really hard, you know.
Speaker 3: So like a lot of things I've been put on
Speaker 3: the back burner, I've had to say no to.
Speaker 1: Well, rethinking your expectations for yourself and your life that
Speaker 1: feels crushing even interested me to think about it.
Speaker 3: I try to think about it in terms of I'm
Speaker 3: really good at I keep saying it, but pivoting, right,
Speaker 3: Like if I hit wall, which I have before, I
Speaker 3: can say, Okay, this is what I'm meeting, this is
Speaker 3: what I'm dealing with. How can I make the most
Speaker 3: of it, and I have in the past been very
Speaker 3: good at that. I have made it work, whether maybe
Speaker 3: sometimes I've hit rock bottom in order to crawl out,
Speaker 3: but like, I have been faced with some things that
Speaker 3: have been very difficult for me that I've had to
Speaker 3: kind of find my strength in. My expectation for what
Speaker 3: I want my life to look like has changed many,
Speaker 3: many times. So I'm okay with it changing.
Speaker 1: Not gonna lie.
Speaker 3: It's a little exhausting after having to keep reinventing yourself,
Speaker 3: but I think life is long and I plan on
Speaker 3: living till I'm like one hundred, so I gotta get
Speaker 3: used to it.
Speaker 1: You do a lot of TikTok and Instagram social media
Speaker 1: talking about not just pivoting changing but encouraging I think,
Speaker 1: particularly women and particularly in the arts, into rethinking their lives.
Speaker 1: It's really focused on the professional side. Do you think
Speaker 1: that that has become the outlet for you to focus on?
Speaker 3: Really interesting thing that happened when I went back to
Speaker 3: Wicked was there was like these couple waves, right. The
Speaker 3: first wave was, oh my gosh, software engineer a broadway
Speaker 3: that makes no sense, But like, if I can show
Speaker 3: other people that it's okay and that there is a
Speaker 3: world where you can do multiple things right, where the
Speaker 3: thing that your college self decided you wanted to do
Speaker 3: for the rest of your life doesn't have to be
Speaker 3: the thing you do for the rest of your life.
Speaker 3: And if there is a way to find value in
Speaker 3: yourself alongside your journey as an artist, so you're not
Speaker 3: constantly seeking it from somebody else, why not find that
Speaker 3: That was just not ever a thing that anybody presented
Speaker 3: to me as an idea when I was younger, Right,
Speaker 3: it was like struggle, starve, weight tables, and then you're
Speaker 3: going to be a star, right, and that's going to
Speaker 3: be your story.
Speaker 1: And like we like.
Speaker 3: Promote those stories all the time. We love to talk
Speaker 3: about them. The girl who who was waiting tables and
Speaker 3: got discovered and now she's whatever, and we love that story.
Speaker 3: But it's just like it's not going to be everybody's story.
Speaker 3: It's not going to be most people's stories. So finding
Speaker 3: ways to like be confident in your life by having
Speaker 3: that Maso's hierarchy of needs, having good health and comforts
Speaker 3: and things so that you don't have to worry about
Speaker 3: just like the baseline things, so that you can achieve
Speaker 3: your greatests. Whatever.
Speaker 1: Well, Thank you so much, Carl it'sen great to have
Speaker 1: you on.
Speaker 3: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: Carla still works in tech and recently started working for Spotify.
Speaker 1: She lives in Chicago with her husband and they're both
Speaker 1: happy after pivoting out of the theater industry. Oh, Carla
Speaker 1: still dabbles in her own Broadway roots from time to time.
Speaker 1: You can follow Carla on TikTok and Instagram at stickler
Speaker 1: Carla and hear more about her journey with fertility, life
Speaker 1: and tech and a little Broadway gossip from time to time.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening. Thanks for listening to this episode of
Speaker 1: she Pivots, where I talk with women about how their
Speaker 1: experiences and significant personal events led to their pivot and
Speaker 1: eventually their success. Be sure to follow us on Instagram
Speaker 1: at she Pivots the podcast and leave a rating in
Speaker 1: comment if you enjoyed this episode to help others learn
Speaker 1: about it. A special thank you to our partner Marie
Speaker 1: Claire and the team that made this episode possible. Talk
Speaker 1: to you next week. She Pivots is hosted by me
Speaker 1: Emily Tish Sussman, produced by Emily Eda Voloshik, with sound
Speaker 1: editing and mixing from Nina Pollock and research and planning
Speaker 1: from Christine Dickinson and Hannah Cousins.
Speaker 2: I endorse she pivots