Q&A: How to Become a Magical Entity with Moth Moth Moth
Photo by Chloe Littlefield
Drag performer, writer, and conceptual artist Moth Moth Moth is like really creative. Read the Q&A from our interview available on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.
ZACK:
So I'm joined by Moth who is a phenomenal performer, writer, persona creator, musician. Everything that you can think of creatively. Oh, and also a really good visual artist. Can't forget that. So I first started interacting with you—you were working with Focus Magazine, and you had just started the writing section. Fiction writing and poetry. And I reached out to you, and you graciously let me submit a story. You included me, and that was the first time I had been published in a Memphis publication, and it like it, truly-you really believed in me and it really inspired me to keep going. And so we've collaborated before on some projects, on some music projects.
MOTHIE:
More to come.
ZACK:
I wanted to bring you on here because you're one of the most creative people I know consistently, so thank you for joining me.
MOTHIE:
Thank you. Oh, honey. Like, thank you for being available at 9:00 in the morning.
ZACK:
I would move mountains to have you on this show.
MOTHIE:
You're sweet. I'm going to ask everybody to move mountains because I want to replace RuPaul.
ZACK:
Yeah, I can definitely see that. I mean, you have the Rainbow Rumble, which is kind of your own competition reality show. Talk a little bit about Rainbow Rumble? What what made you want to start that? How did that come about?
MOTHIE:
On a napkin. It was 2020. I wanted to kill myself. And, I loved, loved, loved my day job. I had the best fucking day job in the world. And an incredible boss and mentor. But, you know, it was—I've been doing the same thing for six years. And, you know, I just wrote about this, last night. I got to a point in my life where I was just like, I'm going to be pigeonholed as, like, Amelia this, like Amelia Bedelia, like Barney the dinosaur fucking Mister Rogers bullshit. And I am so proud of everything that I got to do as an educator.
But my God, it's exhausting. And in the world today, I want to be Cher, you know, like, I have legs. I need the world to see them. So in 2020, I was like, I just don't want to be a teacher right now. I'm just tired. I saw the all the bullshit storm coming from a mile away and nobody believed me because nobody ever does.
And I was like, y'all, it's going to be really hard for the LGBT, for the alphabet people. It's going to get really weird and mean and ugly. And it did. And, I still couldn't avoid the financial ruin that came with it, but at least like, I was culturally impactful and I made myself available to be culturally impactful.
So, in 2020, I left my full time job and I decided to just cook up a program everywhere that I had a foothold in. So I made it my goal to have a program in each venue that I had an opportunity in. So I quit that March and then by—I quit March of 2021, and stayed for a year.
And then, sorry, buffering happens— diva with the disability.
Shelda [Edwards] and I had an opportunity at Black Lodge because, we had helped Lisa [Michaels] produce Queer as Fuck there. And, you know, we were still pretty raw after Lisa's death in 2020, so we didn't feel like we could pick up the reins on Queer as Fuck and return that project by ourselves just yet. Maybe in the future that may be something Shelda and all of us, like Lisa's family return to one day. But we just started. We were like, what's everybody need? What would make everybody excited? Like, what would make drag feel more like Beyblade, like, you know.
And y'all, we got some good Beyblades. I was talking to, Vivica Vanity on Facebook last night.
I was like, we're going to turn you into a Beyblade that's going to kill.
ZACK:
I was a Beyblade kid.
MOTHIE:
Me too. Darling, I had my Hunter green draceil Beyblade Defense. You know, had the magnetic ball in the bottom, you know? Yeah, darling, the magnetic ball, I was ready. Had my beast together.
Did I answer your question? I'll lose points at the pageant for that.
ZACK:
Yeah, it was good. So what is it like taking the leap and going full force with your art? I know that's something that can create a lot of fear in people. Creates a lot of fear in me. You know, my goal eventually is to be a full time artist, and I look to people like you who do it? What made you take that leap?
MOTHIE:
I'm really bad at working for other people. In working situations, I've been called an angel. A real pleasure. I always had a note sent home that said, “He's a real pleasure to have in the classroom, but, my God, sometimes he just goes sideways.”
And I am—just—if you lose my trust, I just gotta go or if you are shady or piss me off, like I have never once stayed in a working situation if it was giving me the ick, then I left. And, I keep going on record like the two jobs that treated me the best out of the like 25 jobs that I've had in my career to sustain myself are the Dixon Gallery and Gardens.
ZACK:
Shout out to the Dixon.
MOTHIE:
Listen. They treated me and every queer that's been through there in the past 15 years, 20 years has been treated beautifully by the Dixon.
ZACK:
The Dixon is my happy place.
MOTHIE:
Same. That was the first place I ever felt home in Memphis, and I still do when I need to get grounded and see my family. Like I go back and visit everybody at the Dixon and spend time with the portrait of Judith Holding the Head of Holofernes which is hanging in a stairwell. It's easy to miss, but that's my probably my favorite painting in the whole place, because, I don't know, it's inspirational. But the Dixon and then, Cafe Eclectic.
Like, I put myself through college working at Cafe Eclectic, slinging coffee and running eggs. And I was treated so well and they always checked in on me and wanted me to do well. So shout out to our Memphis Bigs.
ZACK:
I want to talk about young Moth. I don't know much about young Moth.
MOTHIE:
You'll find out you'll find out a little bit more soon, but I'll tell you whatever you want to hear.
ZACK:
Ooo, suspense. So when you were young—
MOTHIE:
Were? Young?
ZACK:
When you were a little baby still in the womb, what led to the creation of the character of Moth? I want to know, was there any inspiration from childhood that led to that? What was going on in your life around the time that you created Moth.
MOTHIE:
Quick notes version. You'll find out more later. But also, I never really quite tell things straight in my fiction or memoirs. I can't help but be simultaneously vulnerable and really veiled.
ZACK:
As all good pop stars are.
MOTHIE:
I can't can't help it. It drives me crazy. Where did Moth come from? When I was little, I was very sick. I had sleep paralysis constantly. All the time. I'd be surrounded by my stuffed animals in bed, all my Beanie Babies, because I was like, somebody got to witness this shit with me throughout the night. So I had a real rogue's gallery of horrors that I did not understand what it was coming from or what I was going through. It was just because I was very sick.
I was deprived of oxygen when I laid down, I couldn't breathe, I had operations to fix that, blah blah blah blah blah.
The night nurse was a hard femme, baby. Hard femme. Darling. Bleach blond, bad belt, butch body. As miss Jasmine Crockett would say. But, save it for for later, though, Mothie. The whole point is, I basically, like, hallucinated my way through most nights of my childhood because of sleep paralysis. And, I had to develop some type of mechanism so that I could sleep and like get four hours a night so that I didn't die as a child and I could show up at school.
I remember falling asleep in class all the time. So in order to soothe myself, I would picture this like golden rainbowy light radiating out of me. And I would like, push it through the entire house. And that would be me like pushing the entities away in my brain. And I was very scared for my little sister.
My mom find me asleep next to her crib, because it's like I was like, “Ain't nothing getting my [sister], you know, that's my baby,” like that—my little sister was my baby, you know? And that just wasn't going to happen.
My first connection with the entity that is Moth begins in that golden light and also that really—I've been doing a lot of pondering about what's my function, what's the point of me doing any of this?
And I am a part of like the comfort economy. And that is something that I've got to remember and make sure that it is a greater part of my message. And I don't tarnish that with my endless chaos and big teeth and yelling, but ultimately, I exist and people need me most as a comfort.
And I think that my work is a comfort to people. So I'm really trying to craft my mission based around that. It's more gentle. But, you know, the activism side, it's a little aggressive because it has to be. It just has to be. So Mothie really came from that golden light. I'll also tell you, I'll say it more veiled later, but, you know, I'm a person that has had many, many mental health struggles in my life, and I've had magical experiences and, godly experiences and, flashes of clairvoyance.
And there was a time that I was going to do some real damage to myself, and it was like I got a flash of an angel with auburn hair or something. And it just like, you know, it was just the hand of a spirit. Just like pulling me back, pulling me back. And it was just a very like, commanding thing, you know?
So in many ways, Mothie has always been just behind me. And anytime the shit really goes sideways, she's like, “Don't hurt that. That's mine.” She owns my ass. Don't like damage that.
ZACK:
So do you find inspiration in mental health struggles? Does that affect your art anyway?
MOTHIE:
I think it does. I'm working on how my process can be more consistent so that I am no longer relying on some of the art school muscles that I used to have, which is: think about it, sketch about it for two months, and then wait until right before the deadline, whether it's set by somebody or set by me, and then use the anxiety of the three days leading up to that to make the work and have this like breakthrough experience and, you know, the way that it goes.
Nothing's better than a than a tight deadline. And that is just not really conducive to the way that I think anymore. So my mental health journey is mirrored by my process. You know, I'm spinning a lot of plates and I'm getting ready to get some magic on autopilot again. But, you know, and I'm really good at biting off more than I can chew.
I'm trying to be very direct with what I want to give my audience very direct with how I'm wanting to guide my brand back into a more gentle, happy, safe place. You know, it takes doing, darling. God, I'll talk your ear off.
ZACK:
I have so many questions.
MOTHIE:
Ask me. All of them. I love to talk.
ZACK:
You say you like to do a lot. You have so many different mediums. List them off for me And then we’ll dive deeper into those.
MOTHIE:
I'm a writer. I'm an artist. Which means that I'm a printmaker. I'm a drawer, I experiment with photography. I live in printmaking and papermaking and drawing. I love doing digital stuff. Part of my degree is in creative writing and design.
I love typography, love typesetting. As a performer, I didn't have any experience outside of speechwriting and speech competitions. Until I was 22, and I hopped on microphones and became a comedian and a drag queen and was under the tutelage of the marvelous Lisa Michaels. So I don't turn anything away. Einstein was known for his mathematics, but when he got stuck and could not move forward, he would go and play the violin and it would unstick his channels. So I am trying to right now get all of my channels unstuck. Even the way that I speak, like my diction is really annoying me lately because I have all of these vocal crutches that I've picked up.
So a lot of, ums and uhhs, and I buffer more than I ever—I'm literally going to a psychiatrist to be like, I need, like, you know, let's get the girl talking a little smoother. I think that I'm a little bit rusty on the side of new media, so.
And then I've had two podcasts that have been remarkably successful. And then the third one, Mothie's List, is going to launch the third week of March. That's what my calendar says.
ZACK:
Tune in to Mothie’s List.
MOTHIE:
It's a fun program where, I make a list, I check it thrice, and you're not going to like anything that's on it.
ZACK:
I'm sure they’ll find a few things or it could be very controversial, which will increase your viewership.
MOTHIE:
Here's a list of three twinks that are going to go to hell. Three twinks from history that are going to hell. No, it will be a drama free podcast. It is 15 to 30 minutes of comfort, and I promise not to yell at everybody.
It is education focused, but also humor focused from a distinct LGBTQIA lens. And it's a one lady show, but sometimes I'll have some guests. I have one guest take over that is planned. And it's mine. All mine. There are no sponsors.
ZACK:
So with all these projects, at the genesis of these projects, what is your process? Are you a planner or do you just have an idea and all of a sudden you just start doing it? What is your creation process like?
MOTHIE:
I wait until my boyfriend's blood sugar is low, and then I start talking over the television program that we're watching. And then I say, “Baby, I just got to talk about this.”
And then I talk at him for about 45 minutes, and by then, by the end of that, usually I have a plan together, and I'll take that plan and I'll say, “Baby, I think we gotta pause this, and I just got—I think I gotta go and do some work.” I'll go and write it all down in my notebook.
And then, by then I'll be tired. I'll need some more coffee. So then I'll drink some more coffee, and then I'll have anxiety about all of the bills that I haven't paid yet. And then, I'll just put the writing on hold till the next day.
ZACK:
When you get an idea, all of a sudden you have to act on it fast sometimes.
MOTHIE:
Gotta talk about it. Gotta talk about it. Gotta conceptualize.
ZACK:
And it’s good to have those people to talk about it with. How have the people in your life inspired your creativity? What does creative support look like to you?
MOTHIE:
Well, I mean, my family and sister and one of my best friends in the world, Shelda Edwards, is the other 51% of the Rainbow Rumble, because if she didn't have that 1%, it'd be mutiny.
And like, my chaos is only so controllable. And Shelda has known me for 15 years, and she's my oldest friend in Memphis. When I moved into Fogleman Hall at MCA, I came up the stairs and the first thing that I saw were these bare feet. Her original handle was DirtyFeetEdwards. Everybody called her Dirty Feet. So I saw her and she said, “Hey, my name is Shelda.” I said, “Zelda?!” She said, “No Shelda with a sha.” She had the most beautiful ponytail. I was like, she's awesome. What an awesome girl. And she was just my sister.
Always. From then on out. She was always a part of my life. I love her. God, she's put up with just me being a demonic idiot. Just being stupid. God damn. She said, “You gotta kill Bad Girl Mothie, I can't work with her anymore.” That's the thing—my inner circle—y'all have no idea what everybody is tamping down on because Everett, like, my boyfriend Messiah, my business partner, Shelda, all of my mentors, you know, Sister Twinkle, Colleen Couch, Vanessa, they're all like, we gotta hold it back, Mothie.
Don't be too crazy. Don't make any bomb threats.
ZACK:
No bomb threats. We don’t need you on any lists.
MOTHIE:
This ain't 2022.
ZACK:
You were talking about mentorship, and you mentioned, Lisa Michales, and you said you were 22 under her tutelage. Talk about Lisa and what that mentorship was like?
MOTHIE:
The first time I saw Lisa, I saw her walk through the door, and I have not had the feeling in my life, really where I saw somebody and it was like, I have to become their—I have to become their best friend. I was like, I have got to be that lady's like best friend. She has to mentor me. I just saw a halo around her. And the night that I met her, I had just been fighting my way through six days of food poisoning.
So I was really skinny. And I was wearing a dress from Dress Barn that I continue to wear this day. I split it down the middle. I never hemmed it, and I tie it around my waist like when I do my Alien Lady Godiva looks. And like that was like the first dress that Lisa ever complimented me on.
And that was the first dress that Lisa ever saw me perform in, because we were both there to do stand up comedy and, this fucking asshole—Memphis is filled with ugly, greasy, asshole comedians, and y'all are filthy and dirty and you need a mother. Memphis has an amazing, vibrant comedy scene and is also toxic and rotted. It is not very safe for the girlies. And,folks are doing things about it. There are some better comedy nights and situations happening that I'm proud of in the city. I started comedy at the P&H, and the P&H was an awesome crowd because it took all types. It was a very warm crowd. They were receptive, but there were rough characters.
So, you know, it was a wonderful way to percolate my style of sort of aggressive queer comedy that has this, like gentle, pseudo religious, kind of serious religious, but not really. But maybe—Jesus is King—air that my comedy had, and the first night, Lisa and I sat across the table from each other and we chatted.
We had a beer. She didn't do her set that night. They put us at the very end. We sat through, like, 17 sets of the worst comedy I've ever heard. Like, you know, jokes about, like, getting R-worded by ghosts and, like, blowjobs and dick jokes. And it was all dudes that couldn't deliver a punchline out of their way of a paper bag.
Just the most unlikable people you've ever met in your life. God and the ugliest people ever.
ZACK:
Motherless.
MOTHIE:
And I got up and did my little set, and Lisa got up, and she just screamed at them and she said, “I don't want to get up here and hear any fucking jokes about fucking rape.”
She laid into them. Like she just, I've never seen anybody with a microphone just like *cutting noise* blood on the dance floor. And that was what was so amazing about Lisa, because she saw the way that every woman and queer person in that building cringed through that entire night, and she said, “They'll come and hear my jokes later.” Lisa said, “We're going to have to set the temperature right in here, and I'll guarantee you, those motherfuckers will never forget it.” Because she spent seven minutes, like fixing some people's lives in there. And that was what was so epic about her, because I was like, she swas working on her set all night, you know, and she was like, nah, actually, there's other things to say.
She set such a high benchmark for me and everybody around her. So yeah, Lisa motherfucking Michaels.
ZACK:
So there's some Lisa in Mothie because you were talking about that comfort that is also mixed with that aggressive activism. What else goes into Mothie? You've talked to me a little bit about the Mothie lore and without revealing too much, because I know there’s big things coming with that, tell me a little bit about the character and these worlds you’ve created because it's so fascinating.
MOTHIE:
After I get through my birthday weekend and we get through this birthday show, I am working to get my Patreon set up, which will be a portal that you can access two projects through—for right now. And the first one is a huge set of literature that I plan to drip feed you all for the next five years, probably for the next 3 to 5 years.
It’s a lot. It's over 300,000 words.
ZACK:
That just gives me chills thinking about all that work.
MOTHIE:
And a little bit of that time. A little bit at a time. Yes. That will be accessible in some part in February. I'm looking at probably three tiers. First one gets you through the door, gets you whatever you know gets you the lit, gets you the podcast.
Second one is, a lot of this stuff comes out a little bit earlier and you get a little bit more backstage access. And then the third one, you get a mid-summer care package from your Mothie every year. Nothing's over $35, so it's accessible. This is about building a long term relationship for these two titles, these two pieces of media that I really care about that I haven't been able to find the home for and something that makes sense.
So the literature, it's all one series for right now. There will be other things. There will be some stuff that is more from John and outside of the Mothie universe as extras. But right now we're really focusing on all the Mothie characters. So the first part that will be coming out later this month is called Negative Three Wind.
And I'm about on the seventh or eighth draft of it at this point. It's a memoir with poetry. It is very revealing. It is about 50 pages. And, it's really something very close to the flesh and as vulnerable and as honest as I can get with everybody. That will just be for free, that is there, accessible.
Whoever wants it can get it once everything's up. But then behind the paywall will be an epic, amazing poem that is a mirror to that. An epic poem. So a long, giant, verbose poem that tells a story. Don't worry, you won't be reading couplets for 45 pages, but you get John with Negative Three Wind, and then with Negative Two Flower, you get Moth Moth Moth.
So we start, and very intentionally starting on planet Earth, with my feet on the ground in reality. Then the next piece, the next movement in this series is talking about Moth, Moth, Moth. You know, what did I use to spit out at people at the bar when I was first started drag and to entertain and fascinate? Hey, you know, I'm Moth Moth, Moth. I'm a giant insect clown witch from the planet Phorena. I'm a magical librarian, baby. Like, you know, just bullshit. The fucking bullshit that I made up just to make people laugh. But I went home and cooked that in my brain for years, and I was like, you know there kind of are a lot of unanswered questions.
And it all became like a religion or like God. It became the lens that I think I see everything through now. So having this duality, these two first pieces gives you such a wonderful introduction to the character and the viewpoint that I'm trying to craft here. We've got something that's very Joan Didion and very sparse, and we have something that's more like Ovid's Metamorphosis, and it's very flowery, like intentionally super flowery Forget Me Not Flowers to be incredibly clear.
And then the third part, which will, remain unnamed right now, is, more like, Xena Princess Warrior/Game of Thrones territory and will be very fascinating. But I don't want to chum the waters too much right now because, like, it's really fun. Everything after that is much more fun and fantastical.
But the first two parts are really pillars that are more inspired by classical literature, which is something I study and train in, and so I'm trying to show everybody through my method and through the techniques that I'm trying to use and show you through the writing that I do have this real academic, highfalutin erudite side I care about, you know, being a museum person, being someone that believes that culture and civilization lives inside a library, inside an art gallery, inside a museum.
I'm showing my hand with stuff that feels a lot more serious. But as soon as we get the foundation built to that later on this summer, we will get to have so much fun together. We will get to have so much fun together and that I can promise. I'm so excited.
ZACK:
That is very exciting. The word that kept popping up in my head was genius—the way you're showing yourself, but also showing this side of this character you created. What have you learned about yourself personally through this process?
MOTHIE:
I do believe in God. But that my concept of God is so different. I don't believe in worshiping things. Never will. I don't believe in intelligent design. A concept that you'll see me explore through all of my work from this point forward is this concept of wind and God's wind, and there being a sense of, you know, God is not this man with a beard that's at a computer programing the universe.
I don't think that. I don't think that God can care. I don't think that God is a thing like that. I think that it's a gentle, playful, curious, gentle twist and twirl around your fingers that tells you you're in trouble, tells you the direction of your journey. You feel your wings fluff out sometimes.
And I think that that is as close to God, an understanding of God as I and I think humans might actually ever get. And I think that to say that you have any, you know, that you speak for God or that you know, you have any inclination towards being able to, give anybody any surefire answers about spirituality.
That person should not be trusted. They're trying to trick you and they're trying to sell you something. Nobody speaks for God. I don't believe in worshiping things. I think all that sounds really demonic, actually. And controlling and fascist. So through this literature, I have healed my relationship with God. And I feel that, like, that has been something that has helped me be much more well.
ZACK:
Yes, I'm with you 100%. I love the act of creating your own God. Personal. I learned it through The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. I’m an Artist’s Way gurlie.
MOTHIE:
Me too, but only like the first 25 pages because I never got further.
ZACK:
It’s hard. She demands a lot of you. But, I've done it twice.
MOTHIE:
She's a top.
ZACK:
She's a top. She was definitely topping Martin Scorsese back in the day when they were married.
MOTHIE:
Shut up. Shut up.
ZACK:
I grew up going to church. Very like you're going to hell and very scary, very controlling. And so I had to reconceptualize the idea of God. My God is an entity. It's not a person. It is a glowing orb of light that is above me at all times putting warmth on me. And whenever I have something negative going on, I give it to that entity and it transforms it and gives goodness back to me. And that's how I stay well, too. And it's been such a game changer for me to connect with that. So I'm glad that you had that similar mode of God. It's very important to my creativity to ask it for a creative energy too, you know, and just know that it’ll transform it into something good.
MOTHIE:
So that being said, at 3:00 in the morning when I'm seeing shadows shifting in my apartment, you best believe I grabbing my kitty and start saying, “Jesus, Jesus baby, Jesus Christ, please protect me. Please protect me with your beautiful hair and your bare feet and your abs.” I just I really like—I like it all.
I like everything at the buffet table. You know, sometimes I need Artemis and all the moon goddesses. And sometimes I need Jesus. Sometimes I'm like, “JC, like help me.” But, I really think that people need to loosen the buttholes when it comes to religion and whatnot.
And be careful, because, like some of us queers can can proselytize, too.
ZACK:
Yeah. They'll get you.
MOTHIE:
I'll get you. You know, come on, favorable wind.
ZACK:
I would join the Church of Mothie.
MOTHIE:
Hey, don't tempt me.
ZACK:
I really appreciate you coming on. You're such a golden light like you said, when you were creating Mothie or finding Mothie. I really can't wait to see what you do. I know you have plans beyond plans.
MOTHIE:
It stresses me out.
ZACK:
But like you said, you're directing your action and you're being more intentional and you're going to fucking blow everybody away. Mothie is going to be its own entity. And I can't wait. So thank you for joining.
MOTHIE:
Oh, thank you Zack. And, I tell people a lot these days, baby, I ain't trying to be RuPaul. I'm trying to be Mickey Mouse. Trying to be Mickey Mouse. Motherfucker. Hey, I appreciate you so much.
And thank you for being an inspiration to me. You are a relentless creator as well. You wake up in the morning, you make plans, and I'm so proud to see you spinning every plate that you possibly can. So just know that you yourself makes me feel so much less alone, so much less insane. And as a writer, as a person in new media, as one of my musical collaborators, I just I really thank you.
And I think you hung the moon. Thanks for everything. Hope you tip me at my show If you don't, I'll remember.
Where to find Moth Moth Moth
Instagram: @magicalmissmothie