Maddie Ziegler has achieved more in her 21 years than most people do in a lifetime
- PhotographerJordan Rossi
- WriterRyan Cahill
Clad in an oversized T-shirt, with her hair pulled to one side in a scrappy plait, Maddie Ziegler is just out of bed. It’s barely daybreak in California, and the 21-year-old actor and dancer is fresh-faced but bleary-eyed. “Sorry, I look a little crazy right now,” she says with a laugh, before settling down on the sofa in her LA home, the morning sun streaming in from the windows behind her and giving her a soft glow.
For those of us who revelled in the reality TV boom of the early 2010s, you’ll recognise Ziegler as the talented and fiercely driven stand-out star of the hit series Dance Moms, which chronicled the lives of youngsters and the relationship between their mothers at a dance school in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Ziegler appeared in over 100 episodes of the show, spanning multiple seasons, with the series charting much of her adolescence alongside that of her younger sister, Mackenzie.
Over the years since, she has been vocal about her desire to separate herself from the show and has arguably become its biggest success story. But with so much footage charting her early years out there, and internet memeology being commonplace, she’s accustomed to seeing old clips of herself online. “It is weird. I sometimes see them on my TikTok that I’ve never even seen before. I’m like, ‘I don’t even remember filming that,’ which is crazy because every second of my childhood from when I was eight was documented,” she tells me. “I think at a time when it was such high stress, I dissociated from a lot of things, and so seeing it on the internet is insane. Some [clips] break my heart because I’m just like, ‘Oh, I just want to give my younger self a hug and tell her that everything is going to be OK.’”
A reunion show to commemorate the series aired earlier this year and featured much of the original cast, including Brooke Hyland and JoJo Siwa, but Ziegler and her sister were notably absent. When I ask her about her decision not to join, she says resolutely: “I think I’m just at a different point in my life and I don’t want to revisit something that brought me trauma and sadness.”
In recent years, she has managed to shake off her Dance Moms origins as the muse of the Grammy- nominated artist Sia, with whom she started working in 2014, when she appeared in the music video for “Chandelier” aged 11. Since then, she has danced in a further five music videos for Sia, joined her onstage at Coachella and starred, in the lead role, in Sia’s directorial debut, Music, alongside Kate Hudson and Leslie Odom Jr. The partnership has helped Ziegler forge a career that spans film, television, music, dance and fashion, and has arguably made her a recognisable face around the world. The impact that their creative collaboration has had on her life and career is not lost on Ziegler. “What we did in terms of the art we made was unlike anyone has ever really done, in a way, because normally the artist is at the forefront of everything that they do. [For Sia] to turn that over and have someone be their muse, let alone an 11-year-old, is crazy,” she says expressively. “I’m so grateful because that was such an incredible time in my life, like going on a full world tour as a 13-year-old and performing at the most insane venues, doing the Grammys – all of these things were crazy!” And while she doesn’t want to “fully close the door on the work”, it would need to “make sense” if she were to collaborate with the musician again: “There’s nothing lined up, but she’s such an important person in my life. It’s family. She’s always supportive of me and I’m always supportive of her.”
This excerpt was taken from HUNGER Issue 31: The Dreamers. Full story is available in stores worldwide now.
- StylistMarc Eram
- Makeup ArtistTonya Brewer at Dew Beauty Agency using YSL BEAUTY
- Hair StylistGraham Nation at The Wall Group using SEXYHAIR and FEKKAI
- Photography AssistantAlexander Moura
- Executive ProducerAndrew Bear
- ProducerAdam Cohen
- Production AssistantQuinn Pierce
- RetouchingAlice Constance
- LocationHypeStudios
