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Completely Carrie
In Star Wars, we first see Princess Leia wearing a hairstyle since described by spoofers as a Danish on each ear. But despite what could've been a hindrance, Carrie Fisher managed to be both ravishing and commanding in the role of the tom-boy princess who takes matters into her own hands when her planet and her people are threatened by the Empire.
And Carrie Fisher has since been successful in her careers as an actress and a writer, but life hasn't always been Hyperdrive-streaked starlight and Alderaanian roses for this member of Hollywood royalty.
(Image of Carrie Fisher at the post-premiere party for Fist, 1978, taken by Alan Light)
Hollywood Royalty
Carrie Fisher is the daughter of actor Debbie Reynolds and singer Eddie Fisher, and the step-daughter of Elizabeth Taylor, so it was hardly surprising that she followed the family business, firstly joining her mother's shows in Las Vegas from the age of 12.As happens with royalty occasionally, Carrie and her mother had all the credentials, but none of the money (Reynold's second husband, Harry Karl, managed to bankrupt them both). Carrie's often difficult and unusual childhood, her bi-polar disorder, and the sense that those credentials were merely an accident of birth, allowed Carrie an outsider's perspective of an insider's life. Later, this would develop into a very dry sense of humour.
At the age of 17, Carrie won a small role alongside her mother singing and acting in the musical Irene. At 19 she was cast in Shampoo, and at 21 she hit the big time as Princess Leia Organa in George Lucas's Star Wars.
Towards the end of her six-year involvement in the Star Wars phenomenon, Carrie married singer Paul Simon. Although they were only married a year, they remained close for a long time.
Carrie was also briefly engaged to Dan Ackroyd, with whom she starred in The Blues Brothers.
In 1992 Carrie had a baby daughter, Billy, with acting agent Brian Lourd.
(Image credit: Photographer unknown, source: Geocities.com/carriefisher2)
"I always wanted to do what my mother did - get all dressed up, shoot people, fall in the mud. I never considered anything else."
Shampoo
Carrie Fisher had one other film credit before Star Wars shot her to stardom. At the age of 19, she was cast as Lorna in the comedy Shampoo, alongside Warren Beatty, Goldie Hawn, and Julie Christie.
Shampoo
Warren Beatty plays a womanising hairdresser whose escapades get him in a lot of very funny trouble. Carrie Fisher plays the daughter of a salon financier seduced by Beatty.
Amazon Price: $11.49 (as of 07/26/2008)
Star Wars
When I think of Carrie Fisher in Star Wars, I always see her grinning impishly, as if she's sharing some insider joke with Harrison Ford or Mark Hamill - which undoubtedly she was. But unfortunately there may have been another explanation for her bright-eyed, tongue-in-cheek happy mood.
Carrie brought her delightfully dry sense of humour to the role of Princess Leia. Some of her best lines are delivered with more than a few barbs, and she makes it very clear that Princess Leia wouldn't have been anywhere else but the frontline of defence and infiltration if she could help it.
Star Wars Episode IV - A New Hope (1977 & 2004 Versions, 2-Disc Widescreen Edition)
Princess Leia is introduced as a hologram, begging the help of someone called "Obi Wan Kenobi". When Luke Skywalker tracks her down in order to rescue her, he finds that she's really the kind of woman who can rescue herself most of the time.
Amazon Price: $14.99 (as of 07/26/2008)
Star Wars Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980 & 2004 Versions, 2-Disc Widescreen Edition)
The episode where Princess Leia falls in love, and she is allowed to ditch the Danishes for the more flattering plaited coil hairstyle she sported at the end of Episode 4.
Amazon Price: $14.99 (as of 07/26/2008)
Star Wars Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983 & 2004 Versions, 2-Disc Widescreen Edition)
Captured and enslaved by Jabba the Hut, this movie sees Princess Leia transformed instantly from fun, friendly, Danish-wearing tom-boy, to skimpy gold-bikini-clad slave girl with a body that became the focus of every boy and man's dreams for the next 20 years. Then it's time for some real fun - Princess Leia gets to ride a lightning-fast 74-Z speeder bike through the forest and play with cute Ewoks on the forest moon of Endor.
Amazon Price: $14.99 (as of 07/26/2008)
Princess Leia Organa
Carrie Fisher posing in the costume she wore for Star Wars Return of the Jedi. Princess Leia had been captured and enslaved by Jabba the Hut.
Carrie Fisher is inducted as an honorary member of the 501st Legion.Photo by K...
Princess Leia's gold slave-girl bikini
Get your own piece of Star Wars
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"I signed my likeness away. Every time I look in the mirror, I have to send Lucas a couple of bucks."
Tribute to the tomboyish Princess Leia
Leia Ladylike - Star Wars Vid
Just because Leia is a princess doesn't mean she has to be all prim and proper
Runtime: 2:38
88225 views
10 Comments:
Her name was Leia, she was a princess, with a danish on each ear, and Darth Vader drawing near.
(tune, Copacabana by Barry Manilow)
Star Wars Cantina
Star Wars Cantina
A Slideshow I made to the song 'Star Wars Cantina' by Richard Cheese. I accept that the song is neither by Weird Al and that this is a slideshow and not a video, two grievous errors some very helpful youtube users have pointed out to me.
Runtime: 3:02
143422 views
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Drug problems
Was Carrie high in Star Wars?
As part of her recovery, Carrie again took another long, light-hearted look at herself and her life, and decided to write a comic monologue, Wishful Drinking.
Postcards From the Edge
Carrie Fisher bitingly portrays some themes from her own life in her first novel - namely her struggle to find her own voice in the shadow of her mother's stardom and her descent into drug addiction, with the self-deprecating humour she saw in the rehabilitation process.
Postcards From The Edge was critically acclaimed and made into a successful movie, starring Meryl Streep in the role of Suzanne Vale, while Shirley MacLaine provides the perfect counterpoint as Doris Mann, the singer-actor mother who manages to outshine her daughter at every turn, whether she intends to or not, and even when her star has faded and the business has tossed her aside.
Debbie Reynolds, Carrie's real-life mother, had hoped to win the role of Doris Mann, but director Mike Nichols decided on MacLaine.
Postcards from the Edge
Amazon Price: $8.49 (as of 07/26/2008)
Postcards from the Edge
Amazon Price: $13.46 (as of 07/26/2008)
Carrie's other books
The Best Awful
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Surrender the Pink
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Delusions of Grandma
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When Harry Met Sally
In When Harry Met Sally Carrie Fisher plays Sally's best friend, Marie, whom Sally thinks is the perfect date for Harry.
When Harry Met Sally...
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"If my life weren't funny, it would just be true. And that would be unacceptable."
Carrie Fisher's sense of humour
In 2001, Carrie wrote a screenplay for a tele-movie called These Old Broads. The delight of this movie is that it stars her mother, Debbie Reynolds, her step-mother, Elizabeth Taylor, and also Shirley MacLaine, who played Doris Mann, the character supposedly based on Debbie Reynolds in Postcards From The Edge. Carrie wrote a scene where Debbie and Elizabeth's characters start fighting over the fact that one of them stole the other's husband - a man referred to as "Freddy".And, as a reference to the real life headaches Postcards From The Edge caused because it was erroneously believed to be true, Carrie included a scene where a wig Debbie Reynolds is wearing is ripped off to reveal a full head of hair. In Postcards From The Edge, Doris Mann suffered from hair loss, causing speculation as to the state of Debbie's hair.
These Old Broads
Cameos as a celebrity
In Charlie's Angels : Full Throttle Carrie plays the very strict Mother Superior.
In Austin Powers : International Man of Mystery she has an uncredited role as a therapist introducing Dr Evil and Scott to the rest of the therapy group.
Scream 3 (Dimension Collector's Series)
Amazon Price: $10.99 (as of 07/26/2008)
Charlie's Angels (Superbit Deluxe) / Charlie's Angels Full Throttle (Unrated Widescreen Special Edition)
Amazon Price: $23.99 (as of 07/26/2008)
Austin Powers - International Man of Mystery (New Line Platinum Series)
Amazon Price: $8.99 (as of 07/26/2008)
Carrie now
A Conversation with Carrie Fisher
Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia)
ComicCon 2006
Carrie on...
- Carrie Fisher's official website
- Visit Carrie's official site.
- Carrie Fisher at Star Wars
- Carrie's bio on the official Star Wars website.
- Princess Leia Organa Solo
- All the canon you ever wanted to know about Princess Leia across the Star Wars Extended Universe at the Star Wars Database.
- Wookipedia
- A Star Wars Wiki.
- Star Wars Cantina
- The lyrics to the Star Wars Cantina by Mark Jonathan Davis.
