Eden Sher

Intro

Eden Sher is an American actress, comedian and author known for playing Sue Heck in The Middle and voicing Star Butterfly in Star vs. the Forces of Evil. Her work connects an extended live-action sitcom performance with animation, writing and a personal stage show. Sue's optimism made the character a recurring center of comic energy across nine seasons, while Star offered a different setting for Sher's voice. Her later live work turns attention toward the performer behind a character audiences had come to recognize over many years.

Career snapshot

Born in Los Angeles on December 26, 1991, Sher began performing in school and local theater before moving into television. Early roles included Gretchen in Weeds and Carrie Fenton in Sons & Daughters, followed by appearances in series such as The O.C. and The Middleman. The Middle began in 2009 and continued through 2018. Playing Sue across that span gave her a sustained place in the Heck family ensemble, and she won the 2013 Critics' Choice Television Award for supporting actress in a comedy series for the performance.

The entry point

Animation brought the role of Star Butterfly, a teenage princess sent from another dimension to live with the Diaz family on Earth. Disney's production record identifies Sher alongside Adam McArthur as Marco Diaz and Alan Tudyk as Ludo and King Butterfly. Star vs. the Forces of Evil previewed on Disney Channel in January 2015 before its Disney XD debut that March. Star's adventures combine high-school life with the responsibilities and dangers of a magical wand. The part extended Sher's comedy into a performance built around voice and animation rather than a live-action camera.

Screen identity and style

Sher also developed a writing project while working on television. The Emotionary, illustrated by Julia Wertz and published by Razorbill in October 2016, invents words for feelings that can be difficult to name. Its format combines definitions with comics, turning awkward or complicated experiences into a playful vocabulary. The publisher's original 2016 publication date is distinct from the paperback edition issued the following year. Wertz's illustrations are part of that collaboration, so the book is not simply a collection of Sher's prose detached from its visual storytelling.

Collaborations and patterns

In a 2016 interview with The Knockturnal, Sher described writing as a natural extension of acting and of having more ideas and feelings than a performance could contain. She explained that creating words also changed how she thought about earlier experiences. This account helps connect the book with her broader interest in self-expression, without treating its invented vocabulary as a clinical system. Both the comic definitions and her explanation of the process show a writer using humor to make emotionally complicated situations more recognizable and easier to discuss.

Era reflection

Her one-woman show I Was On A Sitcom reached the Edinburgh Fringe in 2023. Speaking to BroadwayWorld, Sher said the material had begun loosely as a television pilot, but became more effective when she told it as herself directly to an audience. Directors Sara Rejaie and Charlie McDermott helped shape the work; McDermott had played Sue's brother on The Middle. Sher's account distinguishes this project from simply performing the sitcom character onstage. Its subject is her own relationship to the series, to public recognition and to life after a long television assignment.

Legacy and rediscovery

Sher told British Comedy Guide that familiarity with The Middle was not required to understand the show. Although fans might recognize additional details, she intended the material to address identity and personal experience rather than retell sitcom plots. Her official site later listed Edinburgh dates in 2025, extending the stage project's public history. The two selected photographs reflect those different parts of her career: a 2017 Comic-Con animation-panel portrait and a 2025 Edinburgh performance image. They preserve separate occasions and creators, with the earlier image clearly identified as an archive portrait crop.

Selected screen roles

• Weeds: Gretchen — 2006
• Sons & Daughters: Carrie Fenton — 2006
• The Middle: Sue Heck — 2009-2018
• Star vs. the Forces of Evil: Star Butterfly, voice — 2015-2019
• The Outcasts: Mindy Lipschitz — 2017
• Step Sisters: Beth — 2018
• Jane the Virgin: PJ Fields — 2019

A career in pictures

A stage performance and an animation-panel portrait document two distinct public settings, with separate credits and licenses.

Edinburgh performance (2025)

I Was On A Sitcom

Bryan Berlin photograph dated July 31, 2025, at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Comic-Con animation panel (2017)

Star vs. the Forces of Evil

William Tung photograph dated July 21, 2017; archive portrait crop from the Disney XD panel photograph.

Rewatch notes

• Won a 2013 Critics Choice Television Award for Sue Heck.
• Voiced Star Butterfly in Star vs. the Forces of Evil.
• The Emotionary combines her invented words with Julia Wertz illustrations.