Today in TV History: Carrie Fisher, Resident of Little Chechnya on ‘30 Rock,’ Was Born

Of all the great things about television, the greatest is that it’s on every single day. TV history is being made, day in and day out, in ways big and small. In an effort to better appreciate this history, we’re taking a look back, every day, at one particular TV milestone. 

IMPORTANT DATE IN TV HISTORY: October 21, 1956

WHY IT’S IMPORTANT: Carrie Fisher‘s 59th birthday comes at a particularly momentous time for her career. After a couple decades of hard times and languishing career possibilities — though it’s important to remember that amid those downs there were ups; she wrote the screenplay to Postcards from the Edge (adapted from her own semi-autobiographical novel); she appeared in a one-woman show, Wishful Drinking, on Broadway) — Fisher is back in what certainly seems like the biggest movie of the year, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, in the role that made her famous. Just that one shot of her in the trailer was enough to elicit cheers from longtime Princess Leia fans (hello!).

But before The Force Awakens, Carrie Fisher’s best contribution to popular culture of the last 15 years was her appearance as Rosemary Howard on the “Rosemary’s Baby” episode of 30 Rock. As a legendary comedy writer of the 1970s, Rosemary was a repository for everything from Laugh-In references (“the mailbox was Haldeman!”) to jokes about the excesses of the “Not Ready for Primetime Players” era of Saturday Night Live. The episode was also, in Fey’s capable hands, a pretty interesting take on feminism and corporatism and compromises, with Rosemary as a kind of fallen avatar of pure comedic idealism. But don’t think about that part of it for too long or else you’ll really bum yourself out. Just think about the dozens of A+ jokes the episode churns out. It’s one of the series’ funniest.

Happy birthday, Carrie Fisher! You deserve this next wave of success!

[You can watch 30 Rock‘s “Rosemary’s Baby” episode on Netflix]

RELATED: CARRIE FISHER’S NOT-SO-SECRET CAREER AS A HOLLYWOOD SCRIPT DOCTOR

Joe Reid (@joereid) is a freelance writer living in Brooklyn. You can find him leaving flowers for Mrs. Landingham at the corner of 18th and Potomac.

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