Rosa Hesmondhalgh is a Northern writer who trained as an actor at LAMDA and graduated in 2017. Shortly after graduating, Rosa was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and left the industry to go through treatment. Whilst on chemo, she started writing about her experiences with cancer on a blog, Madame Ovary. After the blog was shared over 50,000 times online, she turned it into a one woman play of the same name that opened at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2019, was picked up for a UK Tour, won Vault Festival’s Pick of the Pleasance award and went on to receive its US premiere in Philadelphia in November 2023.