Student Blogger: Lana Sage

When I wrote my most recent blog, Decisions... A Year Later, I thought my next big decision would be about studying abroad Spring 2024. Study abroad is built into Boston University's (BU) School of Theatre (SOT) spring semester of Junior Year.

As we learned in my blog, Decisions Are Hard, Boston University School of Theatre BFAers are tasked with declaring their major within the school halfway around through their second semester freshman year. It's been a year since I wrote that blog and officially made my decision to be a BFA Theatre Arts major.

We are just around midterm of the Spring semester at BU and things are going pretty swimmingly for me. I'm only taking 16 credits this semester-compared to my normal 18-20 I've been taking since my Junior year of high school-with my classes meeting only one to two times per week. A lot of my classwork is challenging but done in class with a lot of hands-on experiences and data collection.

I firmly believe that the best mode of learning for an artist is through the consumption of other art. It is so important for us to be patrons of art and artists. It’s not only a way of giving back to our fellow artists, but also a brilliant method of learning for our own artistic gain. Inspiration strikes from others, so it only makes sense that artists become inspired by the art of others. 

Happy college to me and anyone who chooses to celebrate it! Welcome to a new year of school, that one thing you wish you left back in highschool, and a chilling fall semester. I thought I’d bring you along for a week in the life of my first semester as a Sophomore BFA Acting/Directing/Playwriting at Boston University (BU)!

Through my disdain of self tapes and hope to revive the feeling of being in a physical audition room, I've created some ground rules for myself. I hope these help, because they have surely helped me.

Something they don’t tell you enough about college: you don’t have any time. You’d think that, if you’re majoring in some sort of art, you’d have ample ability and time to do, create, and work on the art you care about. I thought that. I thought wrong.

At the end of our first year in Boston University's School of Theatre performance core, we declare our major to decide the theater performance training we'll focus on: BFA Acting or Theatre Arts. For some the decision is easy, whereas for others (*cough cough…* me) it most definitely isn't. 

Dance is the function that movement flows into. The former innately harbors connotations of restricted and formed movement, while movement itself is the relinquishing to true movement. This thought process and constant practice of the release that movement provides me allowed the space and time to truly fall back in love with movement and myself.

People are walking out in the storm. I envy them but I don't. I envy their willingness to look like fools. I wish I could just fail like that sometimes. But only sometimes. I don’t envy them because walking in this weather must suck. This brought me to the conclusion that I fear I have done my first semester of my BFA wrong.

Where my last blog ended is where this current blog begins. Before officially starting my winter break from BU, I made a film... I mean, I was part of the making of a film... Being back on set was a slap in the face I desperately needed. I just hope it won't take another six years to come back...

Yet I tell the story of my artistic start over and over again, because isn’t that kind of our job as artists? Telling stories? And so, we tell stories of our lives, what brought us here and, yes, our ‘start’ in the arts. Just as all stories go, I tell mine differently every time, for every person, every instance, everything...

Welcome to Novemeber's rambling regarding holiday loathing, the roots of American Thanksgiving, and my experience of the holiday by my lonesome at Boston University.

Hi Friends! My name is Lana Sage (She/Her). I am currently attending Boston University for my BFA in Acting with a musical theatre concentration ('25). In my first blog, I contemplate my lack of homesickness and acceptance of the loneliness I've experienced my first two months of college. I hope to remind myself of the necessity that is change.