Actress, screenwriter and author Carrie Fisher died today at age 60:
Via CNN
Actress Carrie Fisher, whose grit and wit made “Star Wars'” Princess Leia an iconic and beloved figure to millions of moviegoers, died Tuesday in Los Angeles. She was 60.
Fisher died four days after suffering a cardiac event on a flight from London, according to a source familiar with the situation.
The actress and advocate who got her start in Hollywood in 1975 in the film “Shampoo,” was the daughter of screen legend Debbie Reynolds and singer Eddie Fisher.
Her big break as an actress had come just a few years after she dropped out of high school to appear alongside her mother on Broadway.
It was 1977 and she beat out the likes of Jodie Foster and Amy Irving for the part of Leia in George Lucas’ “Star Wars.” The tough-as-nails princess was strong and independent — and the role positioned Fisher in the decades that followed as something of a feminist icon.
“I was trained in celebrity, so I did the only thing I knew,” Fisher once told Rolling Stone. “I went into the family business.”
“Forty-three years ago, George Lucas ruined my life,” she wrote in her book, “Wishful Drinking.” “And I mean that in the nicest possible way.”
I have never been a big Star Wars fan (I know!) but I’ve read a few of Fisher’s memoirs. A witty and insightful writer, her work resonated. She was never afraid to share even the darkest aspects of her life, which included addiction and mental illness–and always with a searing honesty and sharp humor.
#RIP Carrie Fisher. Thoughts go out to her family, particularly her mother the great actress Debbie Reynolds. Outliving your children is a terrible thing.
Of course the last week of f*cking 2016, the worst year ever, had to deliver two more heartbreaking celebrity deaths.
