When I was a kid Willy Wonka was Gene Wilder and not Johnny Depp. David Bowie as the Goblin King in Labyrinth was equal parts freaky and fascinating and George Michael’s stubble was so handsome. Prince was the soundtrack of Friday nights at the roller rink and my very first make-out sessions. Nancy Reagan told us to “Just Say No” to drugs (which made me want to do them). I was a little girl who watched Geraldine Ferraro on TV and thought for sure, by the time I grew up, a strong, smart woman would be more than just a running mate—she could actually be president. This year, it feels like all my childhood dreams died.
Star Child
I don’t remember a life without Carrie Fisher. I was born in 1977, just before the original theatrical release of Star Wars. One of my earliest memories is sitting in a dark movie theater watching Fisher’s portrayal of Princess Leia, who became my childhood heroine. Leia Organa was everything. She had cool boots, beautiful shiny hair and a gun! She was a bold, intelligent, beguiling girl in the sci-fi landscape of my childhood where women were either overtly sexy or just annoying little sisters (sorry, Gertie). Leia stole the show.
My older brother made sure I knew what an X-wing fighter was and forced me into mock light-saber fights practically as soon as I could walk. We played for hours, pretending we were Star Wars characters. He would be Luke Skywalker, Lando Calrissian, a storm trooper—even the Dark Lord—but I was always Princess Leia. (Come to think of it, I always kicked his ass, too.) I imagined my Underoos were Leia’s gold bikini from Return of the Jedi and practiced twisting my hair into two perfect, giant cinnamon buns above my ears. We weren’t good at sharing, so we had separate sets of Star Wars action figures. In order to tell them part, our mom painted pink nail polish on the bottom of the feet of mine.
Crazy Train
Years later, my brother sold all our action figures on Ebay behind my back (I hope he didn’t get much for the ones with pink feet) and I found out Fisher and I had more in common than shiny brown hair. Turns out we both struggled with addiction and mental health disorders. Apparently, she was snorting piles of coke behind the scenes while she filmed the early Star Wars movies. She admitted to partying during filming, including one drunken night spent with the Rolling Stones and co-star Harrison Ford, where she rolled onto the set of The Empire Strikes Back still wasted the next morning (like, who hasn’t done this? Minus the famous people and movie set.). In a 2010 interview with The Sydney Morning Herald, she claimed she was so messed up in the early 1980s that none other than John Belushi told her she needed to lay off the drugs. Fisher famously stated, “I didn’t even like coke that much, it was just a case of getting on whatever train I needed to take to get high.” As a fellow train rider, I totally relate to this.
Luckily, we both made it to the station alive. Fisher battled her addiction to coke and pills and struggled publicly with bipolar disorder, anxiety and depression. In spite of these issues, she never stopped trying to get better and built a fabulous life. She leveraged her status as a Hollywood kid (the child of singer Eddie Fisher and actress Debbie Reynolds) and one-time “it” girl into being a successful writer, known for her dry wit and sharp intelligence. She famously edited the dialogue of Leia in the Star Wars scripts and went on to have a celebrated career as a Hollywood “script doctor” and write four novels and three memoirs.
Growing Up
Fisher’s first book, the semi-autobiographical 1987 novel Postcards from the Edge, which was made into a movie that starred Meryl Streep and Shirley MacLaine, was her most influential. It chronicled the struggle of a burnt-out Hollywood actress trying to get her shit together in rehab after an OD and stomach pumping. It was the first realistic account of addiction recovery and mental health issues in popular fiction. Back in the early 1990s, I was just fitting it in between bong hits, issues of Sassy magazine and episodes of Twin Peaks but Postcards resonated with this depressed teenage drug addict way more than The Bell Jar or Go Ask Alice. It wasn’t quite a hologram hidden in a droid, but it was like a message from future me, saying “You’re not alone—there’s a way out.”
The whole world is acutely feeling the loss of Carrie Fisher right now. She will always be considered a timeless film icon for her role as Princess Leia. She inspired my hairdos and Halloween costumes for over three decades. But she was much more. She was an unapologetic and outspoken advocate for recovery and mental health. Fisher set an excellent example of how those facing addiction and co-occurring disorders can build successful lives.
This has been a hard year. I’ve said goodbye to some of my idealism and childhood heroes and maybe my heart has hardened a bit. But I will never forget the way Princess Leia made me believe in myself—and in a woman’s ability to kick ass.
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