Sorry to hear about the death of Carrie Fisher. Not being much of a Star Wars fan, I admired her more for her other activities, which included some very witty and honest writing. She struck me as an extremely bright woman who was miscast — though I'm sure to great financial advantage — doing the "eye candy" part of Princess Leia's role. Not that she wasn't cute doing it but I used to cringe years later when I came across Internet messages complaining she didn't look like she did in the first movie. It was as if (a) that was all she was good for and (b) she should have had the decency to not age.
I'm sorry I don't have a lot of great personal anecdotes about her but I only met her twice. The first time, we were skinny-dipping together. Don't get too excited about that concept. I was ten years old and she was six.
The next time was around 45 years later. It was at a bachelor party for my friend, Paul Dini. Some entertainment had been arranged — a couple of attractive young women were going to perform burlesque dances in the classic tradition, meaning they had expensive, elaborate costumes and they'd be dancing to prerecorded music and removing very few of their garments.
The first dancer was introduced. The door into the room opened and in came…Carrie Fisher and Tracey Ullman? Huh? The male audience was quite puzzled but here's what had happened —
The party was in the back room of a fancy Beverly Hills restaurant. There was no other place for the dancers to change so they had done so in the ladies' room. Ms. Fisher and Ms. Ullman had been dining in the front part of the restaurant and they'd gone to the loo in tandem and seen the performers there, getting into their ornate outfits. They had peppered the young ladies with questions about their wardrobe and artistry and then, fascinated with it all, decided to crash the bachelor party to see the performances. So they were slipping in ahead of the ecdysiasts.
Once in the room, Carrie looked over in my direction, yelled "Mark!" and came running my way with arms extended as if about to engage in some serious hugging. I thought for a split-second, "She recognizes me from when I was ten?"
Then I remembered I was sitting next to Mark Hamill. Oh, yeah. She would know him.
After the show, Mark introduced me to her and we talked a little about skinny-dipping (she kinda remembered it) and for some reason, about a then-recent offer she'd turned down to appear at some fan convention. I remember asking her if she sold her book, Postcards from the Edge, at these events. It's a very good book, by the way.
She said, "Sometimes, but they just buy it for the autograph. I don't think very many of them read it." If you admired her at all, you might want to get a copy and read it — and that probably goes for any of her books. You'll have a lot more reasons to admire her if you do.