CLASSIC BLOG: PRINCESS JODIE AND THE HAUNTING OF CARRIE FISHER!

An intriguing What If? Jodie Foster as Princess Leia from the original STAR WARS. Image composition: Chris Baker.

She kept her stomach butterflies in check whilst swinging across a chasm thirty five feet above a studio floor, would wear two 'Danish buns' on her head with the kind of charm and regalaty no one else could match, and near-confidently used potentially dangerous live firing blanks weaponry with game and gusto within enclosed spaces against heavily costumed can-hardly-see Imperial Stormtroopers rushing against her. The young 19 year old Carrie Fisher would equally show great aplomb when it was discovered that there could be no underwear in space and that her natural assets would have to be reined down with gaffer tape! Additionally, during and between STAR WARS films and filming, she would later fight and re-fight, then control, a deadly bulimic condition and drug induced addiction that she had deliberately, as well as in-deliberately, found herself caught up in, then managed to believably look like she was chained up to a giant super slug creature whilst still oozing tons of on screen sex appeal, in ways that would last for the next twenty five years plus. 

All the above (plus the comedic suffering of having an action figure with a facial likeness more akin with Eddie Munster) to show for herself in her iconic playing of Leia Organa, and yet there'd still be one all powerful anxiety, looming large within her heart and soul, to haunt the ever terrific Carrie Fisher to this day-and one that she will never seemingly get over. That time in April/May 1976, newly arrived in England, when she was absolutely convinced that she wasn’t right to play the soon iconic role of Princess Leia Organa (and had even been told that by one of the STAR WARS crew (presumed to be one of the casting people-whoever it was, shame on you!)), felt she was too fat and that her performance wasn’t right from the get-go-that she would ultimately be replaced by George Lucas and Gary Kurtz with the more popular, seemingly more audience appealing teenage actress Jodie Foster-already a sensation at the age of 12 for her mature performance as the prostitute Iris Steensma in TAXI DRIVER, as well as soon giving an equally superlative performance as the nightclub singer Tallulah in Alan Parker’s 1976 kid’s musical/comedy fantasy BUGSY MALONE (opposite Scott Baio). 

And yet, recent evidence comes to light that Miss Fisher should never have worried about the possibility-that Miss Foster was never, ever going to be in STAR WARS, and that the chances of her having taken the part were about as remote as England, at least so far as by 2009, ever winning another World Cup soccer tournament!!!, as evidence from an issue of the UK’s EMPIRE film magazine (October 2007) unearths some intriguing new information from an interview they conducted with the actress whilst she was promoting her revenge/vigilante movie THE BRAVE ONE,  that will hopefully help shatter and destroy Carrie’s previous anxieties and nightmares that have haunted her to this day (and mentioned numerous times in things like THE EMPIRE OF DREAMS documentary from 1994: “Nope-still too tubby-bring in Jodie Foster!!”).

Here’s the interview section…

EMPIRE (Ian Nathan): If you’d gotten the role of Princess Leia back in 1976, how do you imagine your career would have been different?

FOSTER: So, Carrie Fisher would be doing what I’m doing now? I don’t know. Had I done STAR WARS, first of all, my kids would love me way more –they just love STAR WARS. I do think my mom would have made a really big point for me to go on and do really serious other movies to get out of the whole STAR WARS thing. I’m not sure I would have done the second or third.

EMPIRE: Have you actually ever thought about it?

FOSTER: Never did, because I really didn’t get that close. They offered me the movie and asked my about my availability and I was like, “I’m sorry, I’m not available, I’m under contract at Disney and I can’t do it.”

EMPIRE: Your life could have been so different.

FOSTER; Yeah, it all could have been different. There are all sorts of other ways it could have been different, too. I mean, all the movies that all of us do that could have completely changed your life…But you know what? I only need to have one career. I only need to make the movies that I make and honestly, I don’t think I’m going to be on my deathbed going, like, “Damn! I didn’t do STAR WARS!”

So, it seems that, though Lucas and/or FOX (probably the latter, wanting more familiar stars to appear in the movie) at least talked with Jodie about the possibility of the Leia role early on in Pre-Production, the talented actress would not have been available to play the part anyway. 

Carrie, we hope that you have read this information and can now sleep easily.

You may like it at times, then again you may not, but facts are that you are the definite person/actress to bring Princess Leia to life. No one else could, or ever would, come close to the screen magic you brought to the screen in the STAR WARS Trilogy!

UPDATE - 2012. Christopher Walken, the alternate choice by Lucas for Han Solo, recently revealed in an interview with the British men's style magazine SHORTLIST that he did a test as Han Solo with Jodie Foster.

UPDATE - 2024: Foster talks again about what could have been as Leia:

Star Wars: Jodie Foster Reflects on Nearly Playing Princess Leia Before Carrie Fisher