Monica Cross

Monica Cross is a neurodivergent (ADHD/Dyslexia) playwright who lives in Northwestern Wisconsin.

Her work spans genres from historical drama to science fiction and fantasy. Wonder of Our Stage, a scifi revisionist biography of William Shakespeare’s life, was winner of the Player’s Center New Play Festival, and had its world premiere at Silk Moth Stage in 2023. Hero Dogberry, an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, was read at the Contemporary Verse Drama Play Readings at the Shakespeare Institute and had a staged reading by Meadowlark Shakespeare Players at Mary Baldwin University. The Aria of Julie d’Aubigny, a biographical play about an 18th century opera singer, was developed at Whiskey Theatre Factory and Mary Baldwin University, has been a finalist for Wisconsin Wrights, semifinalist for Shakespeare’s New Contemporaries, and semifinalist for The O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, and the world premiere was held at Theatre@First in June 2026. 

Her one act plays have been produced across the country at Fringe Festivals and Universities. Her sequel to Rostand’s Cyrano de Bergerac, Cyrano on the Moon has been produced at the Tampa International Fringe Festival, Minnesota Fringe Festival, Cincinnati Fringe Festival, Femme Fatale Fringe Festival, and by Whiskey Theatre Factory.  Her 10-minute play On Robots and Raindrops was developed at ATHE and has been produced at MadLab, Theatre Odyssey, Jersey City Theater Center, and was a semifinalist for Edgefest.  Changeling, a fairytale one act, had a reading at Tiger’s Heart Players, a workshop at the Hippodrome Theatre, and was produced by Windmill Theatre Company at New College of Florida and the University of Evansville.

She is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild of America and the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association.
She holds a Master of Letters and Master of Fine Arts in Shakespeare and Performance from Mary Baldwin College (now Mary Baldwin University), and has most recently trained at the Kennedy Center Summer Playwright Intensive under Gary Garrison.
In 2018, she was awarded the John Ringling Towers Individual Artist Award for Performing Arts. She was a Fellow at the Hermitage Artist Retreat in 2019. In 2023, she was a Semifinalist for the Dramatists Guild Foundation National Fellowship.