The Tale of Rebecca Sugar

Rebecca and the Crewniverse

self portrait of Rebecca Sugar. beside her are four rubies. 

Profile of Rebecca Sugar: 

Rebecca Sugar is born July 9, 1987, from the area of Silver Spring, Maryland. You may know her as an animator, but to her fans she is known as the creator of one of the more revolutionary tv series out there, Steven Universe. In the first art book for the series, Steven Universe Art & Origins, we go in depth of Sugar’s story on her journey through the creation of Steven Universe.  Her love for animation sprouted at a young age, starting from the introduction of the age of the golden cartoons from her father Rob Sugar. At the young age she started to learn about the appreciation of well-made cartoons and realizing that they aren’t all necessary for a younger audience. Throughout her childhood, she constantly drew, including drawing her mother dancing which ultimately broke the chain of dancers in the family. Her recreational doodles progressed into starting with her first collaboration on a self-publishing comic in Einstein High School in the Visual Arts Center with a fellow comic fanatic Frans Boukas, creating SugarBoukas. She later left and pursued her dream of becoming an animator at the School of Visual Arts in New York. Around this time, she also decided to attempt drawing more femenine figures after having conversations with her younger brother Steven. Previously she felt a negative feeling when it comes to representing herself as a female artist and drawing females were not as ideal. She might have felt this way due to not being able to relate to more ‘girl focused’ cartoons in her childhood, and instead was more interested in ‘boy’ cartoons. This has resulted in her in crediting herself as R.Sugar when it comes to her older pieces of work. At some point she felt lost when it came to animating and was even deciding to go back to comics, only to have her now significant other, Ian, to revive her passion in that field. After her college days, she was recommended to apply to Cartoon Network, who at the time were in the midst of searching for indie cartoonist. She ended up with a position as a storyboard revisionist for Adventure Time. Not only did she help revised story boards, but she contributed episode pitches, songs, and development of different characters. One of the songs written for the series years ago also seems to have a connection to her 2019 Steven Universe film, making her known as the foreshadowing queen in the SU fandom. After working with the team of Adventure Time for a while, she decided to start creating a storyboard for a series of her own, based mainly on her brother Steven and the ideas of growing up. After the creation of the pilot, the show became sort of a hit and sort of ran with the ideas of gender non conforming gems from outer space living their daily lives. But within the simple idea of a fantasy cartoon came many subjects of growth, gender, relationships, consent, questioning authority and so on. Many of these ideas reflect the childhoods that weren’t readily available when they were younger, an example of this the uniting of two gems which can be taken as same sex marriage. Another example of this is how she handles the idea of a ‘toxic’ friendship and how such may occur in the recent Steven Universe movie. This specific friendship resulted from miliumieums of abandonment of the pink gem Spinel by Pink Diamond. And Sugar’s work is ever so evolving as she starts to become more comfortable with her sexuality and incorporating it with her work. 

This specific artist has sparked an interest in me because of how influential she is through her many pieces of work, from songs to her writing. As a fan of the works she is apart of, I just feel a surge of happiness when I either hear the music she worked on or watch clips of her work from Cartoon Network. I enjoy how well she is able to convey very specific emotions through different storylines. I am just at peace whenever I think about her artworks. Other than the fan side of things, I am also interested in her because of her journey from her childhood to her current position in life and how it really all came to light because of many years of support in her passion. It is kind of inspiring to read about her process when it came to the steps she took to where she is right now. It started out as doodling moving onto working on comics and ultimately starting animations. I also admire her for her work in the LGBTQ+ community, how she always includes same sex relationships in the series which one of them also resulted in a wedding, teaching consent between different relationships and overall how people change when it comes to these different ideas. There is a reason why more and more young adults are being attracted to this series and being a kid’s show isn’t one of them. 

Questions: 

1. What gave you the courage to go against the concerns of the network and work with the subject of using ideas from the LGBTQ+ community in your series? 
2. I know that your passion for drawing came from a very young age, but what gave you the drive to continue what you are doing right now? Have you at any point wanted to give up? 
3. What are some suggestions you can give to someone who wants to contribute more to the LGBTQ+ community who finds it hard to speak out? 
4. What is your secret to writing Steven Universe? I mean there are foreshadowings seasons prior to things that happen later on in the series, how long did it take to plan everything out? How were you and the crewniverse inspired for each of these little parts and how were you able to keep up with every little detail? 

To: Rebecca Sugar 

Subject: True Kinda Inspiration 

Dear Rebecca Sugar, 

How do you do? I am Sabrina Koon, and I am a fan who really looks up to you and the work you have done for both Adventure Time and Steven Universe. I have always felt a deep connection and a surge of strong emotions whenever I listen to songs you’ve sung or watch the stories you wrote unfold. I’ve read through the Steven Universe Art & Origins book and became intrigued with your journey from a child all the way up to the Steven Universe series, and I am reaching out to you so I can conduct an informational interview with you. Think of it as more  of a cup of coffee at your local cafe and we can chat about your stories, my stories, your show and the choices you have made that became apart of your marvelous work. I am yearning to also hear the stories about becoming comfortable with yourself and how your childhood might have affected your growth coming up in the world. Similarly to your passions in drawing from a young age, I also have a strong passion in cooking, or at least I had before I got busy with work and school. I would like to discuss how you are able to keep your drive for such a long time, because even for me when it comes to cooking, I sometimes fall into despair, especially I manage to do something incorrect and slowly give up. Also, what gave you the courage to incorporate the subjects of the LGBTQ+ community into the show when the network felt a bit uneasy about it? The Ruby and Sapphire wedding was very beautiful, my favorite part was when Ruby actual proposed and their little happy theme song played, but did the Crewniverse suffer any consequences when it came to the specific episodes (The Proposal and The Wedding)? Do you also have any advice for a shy person like myself to contribute to the LGBTQ+ community? As being apart of the community, I feel like I haven’t done much to represent such a big group of beautiful people. And with the influence of your show, I want to do more, and get myself out there. 

I am hoping this email reaches you and that you are well. 

I hope to hear from you soon!

Sincerely, 

Sabrina Koon