On Schitt’s Creek, matriarch Moira Rose has a lot to say, but whether or not she’s a fountain of wisdom is almost entirely based on her own opinion. Having lived a life of vapid luxury and affluence, she operates under a different set of rules and expectations than the quaint people of Schitt’s Creek, even after all of her material wealth disappeared.
A paragon of individuality and self-aggrandizement, she is her own biggest cheerleader, but she doesn’t let the positivity stop with her. Eager to meddle in -and advance- the lives of others, she expels bizarre and melodramatic advice like a Givenchy-wearing guru. While some of her pearls of self-improvement are exactly what someone needs to hear, others are nuggets only Moira would find helpful.
Best: “You just stand your solid ground, refusing to be anything but you.”
One of the most touching moments in the series comes when Stevie and Moira share a frank heart-to-heart during the production of Cabaret when Stevie is tackling some serious issues around growing as an adult. Moira is visibly impressed with her accomplishments, and wants her to know how special she is, and how many accolades she deserves.
She reminds Stevie that she has what it takes to leave Schitt’s Creek if she wants, that she can be a star anywhere, even if she isn’t surrounded by a town where everyone knows her. No matter how uncomfortable it can be to take the risk, being true to one’s self will always ground a person in a time of adversity and make their rewards more permanent.
Worst: “I can’t show you everything…you just fold it in.”
As with Alexis, Moira doesn’t spend a lot of time with David, preferring to leave him to his own devices. One day, hellbent on making her family’s “ahn-chilada” recipe, Moira recruits his help in an impromptu culinary exercise that ends in disaster and ruin.
Neither David nor Moira know the first thing about cooking, much less culinary jargon such as what it means to “fold in” an ingredient. When David asks how one folds in cheese, Moira doesn’t have anything useful to say. While it’s inappropriate to coddle one’s adult child, Moira cultivated David’s sense of self-sufficiency by being entirely absent from his childhood, so she could hardly be surprised at his lack of life skills.
Best: “One must champion oneself and say, ‘I am ready for this!’”
In their own ways, the Roses inspire everyone in Schitt’s Creek to be more confident and daring with their dreams and ambitions. Their appetites for life are large, but in such a small town, they still encounter people who aren’t ready to make a big life change, like Stevie or Twyla.
To Twyla, Moira becomes somewhat of a mother figure, attempting to imbue the shy waitress into taking bigger risks with her life than settling to work at the Cafe Tropical. “One must champion oneself and say, ‘I am ready for this!'” she’d tell her, and eventually, it seemed to sink in, because Twyla decided to buy the cafe outright.
Worst: “A heavy salad might as well be a casserole.”
Moira and Alexis don’t spend a lot of time bonding together until midway through the series, and Moira’s advice to her daughter often doesn’t reflect that she knows her very well. They spend most of their time at the Cafe Tropical, gossiping about the townspeople of Schitt’s Creek and lamenting access to culture.
Moira often orders nothing more than a fruit cup, a watercress salad, or something equally as calorically restrictive. She tells Alexis that a “heavy salad might as well be a casserole”, which while not only being demonstrably false, is liable to give her daughter an eating disorder.
Best: “Alexis what have I told you about putting your body on the internet? Never, ever without proper lighting!”
When Moira discovers to her horror that there are compromising photos of her circulating around the internet, she becomes concerned for her reputation, but not for the reason fans might think. She’s more concerned with how she looks in the photos than the fact that they’re available to be seen by every random person.
When Alexis is curating her own social media presence, Moira reminds her that there’s no such thing as “bad press”, and even in a situation where one is momentarily embarrassed, one must put one’s best foot forward. After all, social media is often a highlight reel of someone’s life and not reality.
Worst: “Don’t be a dew dropper. Put some concealer under those peepers, make like a swell, and go put on the Ritz!”
Despite Moira’s love of the eccentric and inane, there’s often some words of wisdom to be parsed out of her polysyllabic palaver. Not so with this particular adage that she used on a disgruntled David, who’d been keeping to his room for days in a fit of malaise.
When a person has depression, it’s often unhelpful to tell them to “chin up”, but that’s exactly what Moira stated in her own curious way when she told David, “Don’t be a dew dropper. Put some concealer under those peepers, make like a swell, and go put on the Ritz!”.
Best: “Gossip is the Devil’s telephone. Best to just hang up.”
Despite explaining to her children at length that she wasn’t interested in what was going on in their lives, she still couldn’t help herself being nosy. The highlight of her day became heading over to the Cafe Tropical and letting slip a few juicy tidbits about Alexis’s romantic life.
When Twyla decided to finally clarify a few pieces of gossip that Mrs. Rose was saying, she refuted her part in its dispensary entirely, hitting Twyla with one of her more sagacious turns of phrase. “Gossip is the Devil’s telephone. Best to just hang up.”. Not only was the line an iconic zinger from the series, it perfectly captured Moira’s kooky sense of morality.
Worst: “There are certain things that are just not done…”
The rules that govern Moira Rose’s world seem to operate on a different set of parameters than everyone else. Therefore, the advice she dispenses to those around her seems to be both not based in reality and dispossessed of any logic.
When Jocelyn sought her advice in Season 3 about a coat, Moira was prepared with a Magna Carta of an anecdote, “There are certain things that are just not done. Smoking in a car with a baby, unless you’re going to crack a window, tipping before tax, mixing drinks with cola, and giving away a coat that doesn’t belong to you.”.
Best: “Never assume dear, it makes an a** out of both of us.”
In Moira’s world, her entire life is catered to, her every demand met, and her every whim anticipated. She may have left a life of luxury behind when she moved to Schitt’s Creek, but her delusions of grandeur remained. When she took her meals at the Cafe Tropical, she sat like a queen holding court.
It was there that Twyla tried to take her order, which was always wrong in Moira’s eyes. Her harsh rebuke of Twyla’s efforts with, “Never assume dear, it makes an a** out of both of us.” is a tried-and-true piece of advice, altered slightly to fit Moira’s singular way of speaking.
Worst: “Everyone stay calm! Whatever you do, do not look them in the eye!”
During the premiere for “The Crowening”, in which Schitt’s Creek became an entertainment hub for the evening, Moira thought it would be a good idea to let loose dozens of crows to give virtual attendees around the world something to “crow” about.
The crows decided to dive-bomb the guests, and Moira responded by instructing everyone to stay calm. “Whatever you do, do not look them in the eye!”. Not only was this not helpful to any of the attacked guests, but when she attempted to “communicate” with the crows in “their language”, it only seemed to make them more irate.
