[3][4] Sands attended Highland Park High School,[5] and went on to gain his BFA in acting from the University of Southern California (class of 2001).

In 2007, he received a nomination for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his role in the Broadway revival of Journey's End.

[citation needed] Sands also participated in the seven-episode HBO miniseries Generation Kill about the 2003 Iraq invasion, airing during the summer of 2008.

Additional theater credits include the 2009 musical adaptation of Bonnie & Clyde at the La Jolla Playhouse, The Classic Stage Company's production of The Tempest which earned him the Actors' Equity Foundation's St. Clair Bayfield Award, which honors the best performance by an actor in a Shakespearean play in the New York metropolitan area.

From June 25 to July 12, 2009, Sands appeared in the Shakespeare in the Park's production of Twelfth Night, featuring Anne Hathaway, Audra McDonald and Raul Esparza.

[13] Sands played one of the lead characters, Charlie Price, in the musical Kinky Boots which opened at the Bank of America Theatre in Chicago, Illinois, for a four-week run in October 2012.

[14] He reprised his role when the show premiered on Broadway at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre on April 4, 2013, with previews beginning on March 3, 2013.

For his role as Charlie, Sands was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical, but lost to his co-star Billy Porter.

[19] Sands and his original co-star Porter returned to the Broadway production of Kinky Boots for a limited 15 week run, starting on September 26, 2017.

[28] On May 17, 2024 it was announced that Swept Away would move to Broadway in the fall of 2024, and that the main four cast members, including Sands, would reprise their roles.