Carrie Fisher
Carrie Fisher (born Carrie Frances Fisher, ✦October 21, 1956 – †December 27, 2016) was an American actress, writer, producer, and humorist. She was the daughter of singer Eddie Fisher and actress Debbie Reynolds. Fisher was known for playing Princess Leia in the Star Wars film series. Her other film roles included Shampoo (1975), The Blues Brothers (1980), Hannah and Her Sisters (1986), The 'Burbs (1989), and When Harry Met Sally (1989).
Fisher wrote several semi-autobiographical novels, including Postcards from the Edge, the screenplay for the film of the book, an autobiographical one-woman play, and a non-fiction book, Wishful Drinking, based on the play. She worked on other writers' screenplays as a script doctor. In later years, she earned praise for speaking publicly about her experiences with bipolar disorder and drug addiction.
Fisher died at the age of 60 on December 27, 2016, four days after experiencing a medical emergency near the end of a transatlantic flight from London to Los Angeles.
- Carrie Fisher
Personal life
Fisher dated musician Paul Simon from 1977 until 1983 after meeting him on the set of Star Wars.[69] In 1980, she was briefly engaged to Canadian actor and comedian Dan Aykroyd, who proposed on the set of their film The Blues Brothers. She said: "We had rings, we got blood tests, the whole shot. But then I got back together with Paul Simon." Fisher was married to Simon from August 1983 to July 1984, and they dated again for a time after their divorce. During their marriage, she appeared in Simon's music video for the song "Rene and Georgette Magritte with Their Dog after the War". Simon's song "Hearts and Bones" is about their relationship.
She subsequently had a relationship with Creative Artists Agency principal and talent agent Bryan Lourd. They had one child together, Billie Catherine Lourd (born July 17, 1992). Eddie Fisher stated in his autobiography (Been There Done That) that his granddaughter's name is Catherine Fisher Lourd and her nickname is "Billy". The couple's relationship ended when Lourd left to be in a relationship with a man. Though Fisher described Lourd as her second husband in interviews, according to a 2004 profile of the actress and writer, she and Lourd were never legally married.
In her 2016 autobiography, The Princess Diarist, Fisher revealed that she and Harrison Ford had a three-month affair in 1976 during the filming of Star Wars.
Fisher also had a close relationship with singer James Blunt. While working on his album Back to Bedlam in 2003, Blunt spent much of his time at Fisher's residence. When Vanity Fair's George Wayne asked Fisher if their relationship was sexual, she replied: "Absolutely not, but I did become his therapist. He was a soldier. This boy has seen awful stuff. Every time James hears fireworks or anything like that, his heart beats faster, and he gets 'fight or flight.' You know, he comes from a long line of soldiers dating back to the 10th century. He would tell me these horrible stories. He was a captain, a reconnaissance soldier. I became James' therapist. So it would have been unethical to sleep with my patient."
On February 26, 2005, R. Gregory "Greg" Stevens, a lobbyist, was found dead in Fisher's California home. The final autopsy report lists the cause of death as "cocaine and oxycodone use" but adds chronic, and apparently previously undiagnosed, heart disease as contributing factors. Media coverage of an initial autopsy report used the word "overdose," but that wording is not in the final report. In an interview, Fisher claimed that Stevens' ghost haunted her mansion, which unsettled her: "I was a nut for a year", she explained, "and in that year I took drugs again."
Fisher described herself as an "enthusiastic agnostic who would be happy to be shown that there is a God". She was raised Protestant, but often attended Jewish services, the faith of her father, with Orthodox friends.
She was a spokesperson for Jenny Craig weight loss television ads that aired in January 2011.
Bipolar disorder and drug use
In appearances on ABC's 20/20 and The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive with Stephen Fry for the BBC, Fisher publicly discussed her diagnosis of bipolar disorder and her addictions to cocaine and prescription medication.[77] She said that her drug use was a form of self-medication; she used pain medication such as Percodan to "dial down" the manic aspect of her bipolar disorder. "Drugs made me feel normal," she explained to Psychology Today in 2001. "They contained me." She discussed her 2008 memoir Wishful Drinking and various topics in it with Matt Lauer on NBC's Today that same year, and also revealed that she would have turned down the role of Princess Leia had she realized it would give her the celebrity status that made her parents' lives difficult. This interview was followed by a similar appearance on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson on December 12, 2008, where she discussed her electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) treatments. At one point, she received ECT every six weeks to "blow apart the cement" in her brain. In 2014, she told The Telegraph that she was no longer receiving the treatment.
Fisher revealed in another interview that she used cocaine during the filming of The Empire Strikes Back. "Slowly, I realized I was doing a bit more drugs than other people and losing my choice in the matter," she noted. In 1985, after months of sobriety, she accidentally overdosed on a combination of prescription medication and sleeping pills. She was rushed to the hospital, creating the turn of events that led to much of the material in her novel and screenplay, Postcards from the Edge. Asked why she did not take on the role of her story's protagonist, named Suzanne, in the film version, Fisher remarked, "I've already played Suzanne."
In 2016, Harvard College gave Fisher its Annual Outstanding Lifetime Achievement Award in Cultural Humanism, noting that "her forthright activism and outspokenness about addiction, mental illness, and agnosticism have advanced public discourse on these issues with creativity and empathy." In her later years, Fisher had an emotional support animal, a French Bulldog named Gary, whom she brought to numerous appearances and interviews. Following her death, reports indicated that Fisher's daughter Billie Lourd would take care of Carrie's dog, Gary.
Death
On December 23, 2016, Fisher was on a United Airlines flight from London following the European leg of her book tour when she had a medical emeregency fifteen minutes before the plane landed at Los Angeles International Airport. A passenger seated near Fisher reported that she had stopped breathing. Another passenger performed CPR on Fisher until paramedics arrived at the scene. After being taken by ambulance to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, she was placed on a ventilator.
Fisher died on December 27 at 8:55 a.m. (PST) in Los Angeles at 60 years of age. Fisher's daughter, Billie Lourd, confirmed her mother's death in a statement to the press. News of Fisher's death spread quickly online where fans from around the world responded with tributes and condolences. Many of her costars and directors from Star Wars and other works also shared their thoughts on Fisher's death.
At the time of her death, Fisher was survived by her mother Debbie Reynolds, now is survived by her daughter, brother Todd Fisher and their half-sisters Joely Fisher and Tricia Leigh Fisher along with her beloved dog Gary. Reynolds died the following day after being rushed to the hospital from her son's house, where they were meeting to plan Fisher's funeral. Todd Fisher said his mother had suffered a stroke, and told ABC News, "The only good thing about this is that my mom wanted to be with my sister."
In her book, Wishful Drinking, Fisher wrote about her eventual obituary: "I want it reported that I drowned in moonlight, strangled by my own bra." Several obituaries and retrospectives featured the quote.
Because Fisher does not have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, fans created their own memorial using a blank one.
Debbie Reynolds
Debbie Reynolds, Carrie's mother, died of heart failure on the day following Carrie Fisher's death (December 27, 2016
Chat rooms • What links here • Copyright info • Contact information • Category:Root