Entertainment
If there is one thing Schitt's Creek's Moira Rose loves more than awards season, it's talking about herself. As such, we know a lot about the extravagant life she led before the Roses lost their fortune — and even more about her not-so-illustrious acting career.
What we know less about, however, is Moira's life before she met Johnny. Unlike the rest of the Roses, she grew up in a small town similar to Schitt's Creek, which makes having to live there particularly hard for her. This isn't just a sudden fall from grace, but a return to a life she thought she'd long escaped — which explains why she clings to relics of their past life, like her wall of expensive wigs, more so than other members of the family.
Being in the town has done Moira a lot of good, allowing her to reconnect with her family and reevaluate what matters in life, but she can still be be a neglectful mother and self-centered person. Luckily, that works to our benefit in this case: similar to the way Alexis casually drops in anecdotes of her wild, globe-trotting antics, Moira has shared a few nuggets about her life before Johnny swept her off her feet at a ribbon-cutting ceremony.
1
At 16, She Was Crowned Miss Snow Cone
Season 1, Episode 10. At Jocelyn and Roland's Hawaiian luau, Moira reveals that her childhood was surrounded by people just like the ones in Schitt's Creek, then shudders to think about what could have happened if she hadn't left. "What if I had not been crowned Miss Snow Cone at age 16 and moved to the city with my driving instructor?" she asks.
2
She Was a Microwave Trade Show Hand Model
Season 1, Episode 10. During the same conversation with Jocelyn, Moira says, "And what if I had not hand modeled at that microwave trade show?" What if you hadn't, Moira? What then?!
3
She Has a Younger Sister Named Dee Dee
Season 1, Episode 11. Toward the end of Season 1, Moira's younger sister shows up in town to gleefully pay back the $50,000 the Roses once gave her, reveling in the fact that it's now Moira who needs the handout. Clearly, the sisters aren't close: they haven't seen each other in a decade, and Alexis thought Dee Dee was dead.
4
Moira's Crocodile Bag Is Part Of An Odd Family Tradition
Season 2, Episode 1. Moira freaks out when she discovers her crocodile bag has gone missing. She thinks David sold it for transportation money, but in reality, he used it as a toiletry holder, not realizing its sentimental value.
"My great grandmother took it from her husband when she left him," Moira later explains. "It has been passed down through all the women in my family as emergency currency in case we need to leave our husbands in the middle of the night."
5
She Used To Have A Lot More Life Skills
Season 2, Episode 2. Moira enlists David's help to make her family's "ahn-chiladas" recipe, but it turns out that she's lost all of her kitchen skills, including how to fold in the cheese. "When I was a young girl, my sister and I baked bread from scratch in a kitchen half this size," she tells her son wistfully. "I could make a bed, I could fix a wobbly table or start a car without a key. Then I met your father and suddenly I had people to do everything for me. And I assumed that I would maintain my proficiencies...but no, I have lost all my skills."
6
She Was A Secretary
Season 2, Episode 9. When Moira becomes convinced that her nudes have leaked online, she asks Stevie to help her find them. Stevie asks if Moira would rather do the searching herself, but she responds, "No, I can't type! And I don't care to relive my days as a secretary."
7
She Used to Sweep Up Hair at a Salon
Season 2, Episode 10. In an attempt to lock down the female entrepreneurs demographic (who Moira mistakenly assumes is a group of lesbians), Mrs. Rose explains that her first job was at 10, when she swept up hair at a beauty salon.
8
She Had a Fling with John Cougar Mellencamp
Season 4, Episode 10. After Moira drives Twyla and Alexis to a local bar, she gives them some advice. "If and when you meet someone who catches your eye, hold his gaze," she says. "Then walk up behind him, trace a single finger down his back. And if he follows you into a dark corner of the bar, it's meant to be!"
Her last target, she says, was John Cougar Mellencamp, but it was Johnny Rose who drove her home that night.
9
She Was Discovered While Working as a Gas Station Deli Hostess
Season 5, Episode 7. In 1979, when Moira claims she was 17, she tells David and Patrick that she met the director Rocky Nickels while she was "hostessing at a charming gas station deli." Nickels ordered a reuben, which Moira explains to Patrick is a sandwich. "Little did he know he would end up biting into something far more suffonsifying: a ripe young actress who he'd soon cast in the leading role, Sally Bowles, in the production of [Cabaret]," she recalls fondly.
The tangled web of events that have made Moira into the woman she is today is truly confounding, but we wouldn't have it any other way.
