Meet Maggie Moe, who is bringing addiction and recovery to the stage
This Q&A, facilitated by Jeremiah Gardner of the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, was originally published for Hazelden Betty Ford’s monthly Recovery Advocacy Update. If you’d like to receive our advocacy emails, subscribe today.
Maggie Moe is a lyricist, writer, voice actor and comedian from the Bay Area of California, now living in New York City. She has been writing, producing and performing since 2007 — so prolific that she once even wrote and performed in “Busted!” a cabaret, just to pay off an egregious parking “misunderstanding.” Maggie has a bachelor’s degree in acting from Ithaca College and a master’s degree in musical theater writing from New York University’s world-renowned Tisch School of the Arts. She also is a graduate of the ACT Summer Training Congress in San Francisco and The Second City’s Comedy Studies Program in Chicago, and completed level four at the Upright Citizen’s Brigade Theatre in Los Angeles.
Throughout her earliest creative ventures, Maggie also struggled with addiction. And in 2016, she spent three months in treatment, initiating her recovery that continues today. Maggie captured the essence of her recovery story in her thesis musical at NYU. Written with fellow student Joshua Vranas, My Pet Dragon is now being produced by 35th Parallel Productions and recently had a successful industry reading. We look forward to seeing the story on a stage someday soon, and were happy to connect with Maggie for this month’s Advocacy Update.
Q: What does recovery look like for you, and how has it empowered different aspects of your life?
For me, recovery means staying sober from all mood-and mind-altering substances, and attending support meetings as many days as I can. I’m currently doing 90 meetings in 90 days, which can be tough, but it’s a good discipline for me when I want to revive my recovery. I moved from California to New York City right before COVID and left behind my Twelve Step family. I wasn’t as diligent as I hoped in establishing a new core group, so I’m reconnecting with the community now. In Palo Alto, CA, where I had lived since initiating recovery at an addiction treatment center in 2016, all of my best friends were in recovery. I also was in a long-term relationship with someone in recovery (I know — not always the best idea, but stick with the winners and wait a year and it might just work out for you!). We are no longer together, but I credit that relationship, as well as some of my close friendships, for keeping me sober in those first few years. People, places, and things, right? It’s been vital to surround myself with people who are rooting for my recovery right along with me, including my parents, with whom I’ve been able to repair and re-establish a great relationship.
Q: What does it mean for you to share your recovery with others?
Of course, my favorite topic is MYSELF! Seriously, though, I love listening to others and relating to them on our darkest, most twisted whims and thoughts. When I first acknowledged, “I’m Maggie and I’m an Alcoholic and Addict” at my first peer support meeting (while still detoxing at treatment), it was the most freeing thing in the world. It meant I wasn’t alone. I spent years on the merry-go-round-of-hell and finally felt a semblance of peace in knowing there was an explanation — that I hadn’t lost my mind. Being able to share my recovery today and hear others relate to it is incredibly rewarding, and also provides me with a healthy reminder of where I came from. Community is so powerful, and connection is what has saved my life. I love being able to be part of others’ community.
Q: What inspired you and your collaborator Joshua to write the musical, My Pet Dragon; what are your dreams for it; and what’s the message and/or inspiration you ultimately want others to take from it?
Josh and I set out to do two primary things:
- Destigmatize addiction: Throughout my recovery, I have met some of the most brilliant, incredible, beautiful people: all who struggled with addiction at one time in their lives. Society seems to think that if we aren’t on the street corner, we don’t exist. I see people on the street corner and think “that could’ve been me: that IS me.” And whether or not someone IS struggling with addiction, we all know someone — or can at least relate to the insidiousness of the disease and how many people it affects. If we can shine more light on addiction, and recovery, the public will see beyond the stereotypes.
- Provide HOPE: When you hear the word “addict” or addiction, many think “overdose,” “death,” “opioid epidemic,” “fentanyl,” “Prince died from … ,” “Michael Jackson died from … ,” etc. The truth is, I was addicted to opioids for 10 years. And I’ve been sober for six. One day at a time, but I don’t plan on using tonight. Or tomorrow, for that matter. Recovery IS POSSIBLE. When the media consistently pushes the narrative of death, people miss the possibility of life in recovery. Addiction is not a death sentence: there is life on the other side. But that story doesn’t get told as frequently.
Josh and I want to be part of changing how our entire society views addiction. So, our goal is to get this show in front of as many people as humanly possible. Hopefully, we get the support we need and you’ll be seeing it at a theater near you very soon! We are also open to potentially doing a movie if that opportunity arises, but it was written for the stage, so we are going to start there. When we have a cast album (like the soundtrack in a movie), I hope the story will reach and resonate with even more people. As a kid, I was a fan of so many musicals that I had never seen — simply from listening to the cast recording on repeat like the little nerd I was. I believe the music has the power to convey our message almost as effectively as the live show.
Josh and I always talk about how cool it would be for people to leave the show and say “Hey, Dad … I have a Dragon.” Or, “You know, my nephew who struggled all those years — he wasn’t just a teenage dirt-bag. Maybe he just had a Dragon.” To help change the way society views and discusses addiction would be incredible, and I believe our show has the power to do that.
Q: What challenges and rewards have you experienced in your personal recovery journey as a result of your studies and work in the arts?
For a long time, I tended to remain anonymous about my recovery outside the rooms of my support group. If someone pressed me on why I didn’t drink, I would tell them, but I didn’t go around with a tattoo on my face that said “I’M MAGGIE & I’M A RAGING ALCOHOLIC” or anything.
During my first year at NYU, we were assigned a “SAGA” song. They urged us to write about something happening in the news that we were particularly passionate about. With the opioid epidemic spiking, and it being a personal thing I could relate to, it was the natural choice for a song topic. I wrote a song called “Hooked” (with collaborator Bela Kawalek), and when she sang it, it shut the house down. Her voice is incredible, but my classmates and teachers were riveted and tearful about the message: how easy it is to become hooked on drugs, and how drugs could even kill that sweet, smart girl in your class that you always admired. My teacher asked me if I knew anyone like the girl in the story. “I’m the girl in the story.” I still get chills thinking about it. I had never been so vulnerable to a room of 30 “normies” before. What I was met with was warmth, praise, acceptance and many hugs. I cried, but not necessarily because I was sad. I was overwhelmed at how I could use the tool of writing to convey a message I believed in so strongly. These normies GOT what I was trying to say. I think we’ve all had at least one uncomfortable situation where someone reacted negatively to us opening up about our recovery: “I didn’t know you were one of those people.” But that’s certainly been few and far between for me, and this situation was the opposite of that.
Our assignment for the next year was to write a full length musical, and that is how My Pet Dragon was born. How could we have written about anything else? It was heavy to delve back into what my addiction used to say to me, or how awful it was to do the same stupid thing over and over and expect different results, but the reception has been incredibly rewarding. Josh and I both feel that we set out to do what we wanted to do.
Q: What would you like more people to understand about recovery?
RECOVERY IS POSSIBLE. PERIOD. SHOUT IT FROM THE ROOFTOPS! WE EXIST!
