(Newswire.net — December 31, 2016) — Carrie Fisher, actress best known as Star Wars royalty, Princess Leia, passed away on Tuesday at 8:55am, her daughter said in a statement.
The sad news reached millions of fans across the globe, only days after news agencies reported she had a heart attack on a flight from London to Los Angeles.
She was “loved by the world” and “will be profoundly missed,” her daughter Billie Lourd said in a statement.
Todd Fisher, her brother, said over the weekend that many details about her condition or what caused the medical emergency were unknown. “We have so little information ourselves,” he said, urging everyone to “be patient.”
The celebrity website TMZ first reported that Carrie Fisher suffered a heart attack on an airplane from London to Los Angeles, citing an anonymous source. The news was later confirmed by her family.
Fisher’s Star Wars ‘brother’ Mark Hamill was among the first who reacted publicly expressing his sadness. “No words #Devastated,” he tweeted along with posting a photograph of them together as beloved twins from Star Wars.
Other famous Star Wars co-actor, Harrison Ford, 74, praised Fisher’s talent and character in his statement. “Carrie was one-of-a-kind … brilliant, original. Funny and emotionally fearless. She lived her life, bravely. My thoughts are with her daughter Billie, her mother Debbie, her brother Todd and her many friends. We will all miss her.”
Fisher rose as a movie star after Star Wars – A New Hope changed Hollywood in 1977. Last year, she appeared in Star Wars Episode 7, as the rebellion leader. However, it was much more than her character, Princess Leia, that marked her life.
Fisher was also celebrated as a sarcastic and sharp comedian criticizing the Hollywood celebrities’ lives. She was also famous due to her uncommon life choices.
“I turn people gay. That’s what I do. It is an unusual superpower,” she told the Baltimore Sun in 2012, after her second husband, the Hollywood agent Bryan Lourd, left her for a man.
As an author, Fisher wrote numerous screenplays, one of which is Postcards from the Edge. The screenplay was later adapted into a film in 1990, starring Shirley MacLaine and Meryl Streep.
Fisher was motivated by her own life struggles to speak of addiction and mental health issues. She was diagnosed with a bipolar disorder for which she received electroshock therapy. She was also treated for LSD, cocaine and painkiller addiction.
Her latest book, The Princess Diarist, made headlines when she disclosed that she and Harrison Ford had had an affair while shooting the Star Wars movie.