Originally from Southlake, Texas, Shana received her BFA in Acting from the University of Utah’s Actor Training Program. While attending the University she interned two summers at the Sundance Theatre Lab where she observed some of the first workshops of Spring Awakening, and I Am My Own Wife. In her Junior year, she was hired for her first professional acting job by the Creede Repertory Theatre, performing in their season & touring the Four Corners region.

Shortly after graduating, she moved to New York City, where she continued training at the Actor’s Center, studying with such notable teachers as actress Dianne Wiest and Scott Freeman. She also completed a Shakespeare course at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art and a summer intensive at The National Theatre Conservatory.

Although much of her training has been on the stage, she has gained extensive experience with on-camera work through various means. As an intern for Mackey-Sandrich Casting for a year, she was an audition reader and camera operator with Ms. Mackey’s office for hundreds of actors – both well-known and up-and-coming. She returned often afterward to assist with various projects.

In addition, she has taken many on-camera audition/technique classes from casting directors such as Julie Tucker, Marci Phillips, David Vaccari, Erica Jensen, and Sig De Miguel (for whom she has also been a reader & camera operator).

Shana can be seen in films such as All Your Faults Are in Me, an official selection of the LA Shorts Film Festival in 2011, Silver Tongues, and the yet-to-be-released The Lonely Isles. Favorite stage roles include Artie in Eleemosynary; Agnes in Marion Bridge, which she co-produced with the Director’s Company along with Laila Robins, who directed the show; and Donna Paige-Miller in Books on Tape, which performed as part of the 2011 NYCFringe Festival.

The project she has been most fulfilled by to date was producing and performing in Eleemosynary, which garnered excellent feedback from a NYC audience. Reviews of this endeavor can be found here.