About Lana

Lana is a lover of play, ensemble, and creative expression. Over the past 20 years she has performed on stages across Canada and the US including the Citadel Theatre, Theatre Northwest, Persephone Theatre, St. Lawrence Shakespeare Festival, Driftwood Theatre, Classic Theatre Festival, Seat of the Pants, Dobama Theatre, Rubber City Theatre, and Shakespeare at the Castle. Much of her experience lies in classical theatre and musicals, as well as the development of new work. Lana has an MFA in Acting from Kent State University and is a graduate of Sheridan College’s Music Theatre Performance Program, the Banff Citadel Professional Training Program, and Red Deer College.

Currently, Lana is an Assistant Professor of Theatre at University at Buffalo in New York, where she teaches a variety of acting courses and directs productions. Previously, Lana has taught at University of Minnesota Morris, Kent State University, University of Akron, and Malone University. She is a core member of Seat of the Pants, an ensemble-based, process-driven theatre company in Northeast Ohio. Lana is represented by Docherty Agency in Cleveland and was most recently seen in a print and video ad for the Nemacolin Resort.

As a director, Lana is drawn to new work and has directed readings of plays at the Valdez Theatre Conference in Alaska, and at the Mid-America Theatre Conference. In 2023 she assisted Michael Barakiva and Mark Brokaw on Ken Ludwig’s Moriarty at the Cleveland Playhouse. Lana also helmed a new Rust Belt adaptation of Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People, written by local playwright Les Hunter, with Rubber City Theatre in Akron. This was Lana’s second project as director with RCT, having directed a staged reading of the new musical Nothing to See Here by Bryan Blaskie and Laurie Hochman as part of the Musical Incubator Series.

Lana has been a certified yoga teacher since 2009, and leads classes, retreats, and facilitates in yoga teacher training programs internationally.
Details can be found at http://sugarmanyoga.com

A life long learner, Lana continues to study and evolve as an artist. She is a Certified Teacher of the Michael Chekhov Technique with the Great Lakes Michael Chekhov Consortium and has studied Intimacy Direction with IDC and TIE. Offstage, you can find Lana cooking, strolling through a farmer’s market, having a dance party, or snuggled up with her cat Smooshie and a cup of matcha.