Carrie Fisher Has Died at Age 60

The sad news was conveyed by Carrie Fisher’s family members to People.com today that the actress and writer best known for playing Princess Leia in the Star Wars franchise has died at the age of 60. Fisher was flying to Los Angeles on Friday when she suffered a heart attack shortly before landing. She was taken off the plane to a hospital and word had gotten out via her mother, Debbie Reynolds, that Fisher was in stable condition. Some time later, however, Fisher died, leaving behind her mother, Reynolds, and her daughter, Scream Queens actress Billie Lourd, as well as her many, many fans.

Fisher was born in 1956, the daughter of actors Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher, and if you’re looking to untangle the branches of her family tree after Fisher famously left Reynolds for Elizabeth Taylor and all that followed, you’ll do no better than to check out Wishful Drinking, her one-woman show that played on Broadway and was eventually aired on HBO , where she detailed her life in a family “related by scandal.” [Watch Wishful Drinking on HBO GO.]

At age 19, Carrie was cast in Stars Wars in the role that would change her life: Princess Leia Organa. Everything from Leia’s hairstyle in the film to her dialogue to her Return of the Jedi gold bikini would become iconic, and Fisher herself was beloved by Star Wars fandom worldwide. Fisher would often later speak of her ambivalent relationship to the kind of fame she achieved with Star Wars, exemplified in this AFI tribute to George Lucas.

Fisher’s return to the Star Wars franchise in 2015’s The Force Awakens saw her onscreen appearance greeted with rousing ovations in movie theaters and a renewed appreciation for her career.

Besides Star Wars, Fisher’s most notable film appearances were in movies like The Blues Brothers, Hannah and Her Sisters, Soapdish, and When Harry Met Sally. In 2007, Fisher appeared on an episode of 30 Rock, titled “Rosemary’s Baby,” playing a famous TV writer from the ’70s whom Liz Lemon idolized. Fisher was nominated for a guest-actress Emmy for the performance. More recently, Fisher played the mother to Rob Delaney’s character on Amazon’s Catastrophe.

Just as prolific as her acting career, if not more so, was Fisher’s writing career. She’s a credited writer on only two film screenplays: the TV movie These Old Broads (starring Debbie Reynolds and Elizabeth Taylor, along with Shirley MacLaine and Joan Collins) and the 1990 film Postcards from the Edge, based on her own memoir of her struggles with substance abuse and a famous mother. Meryl Streep was nominated for an Academy Award for playing a fictionalized version of Fisher, and Fisher herself was nominated for a BAFTA.

Uncredited, however, Fisher became one of Hollywood’s top script doctors, polishing up scripts on everything from Sister Act to The River Wild to The Wedding Singer. She wrote eight books, including most recently The Princess Diarist.

Filming on Star Wars: Episode VIII is now completed, so fans of Carrie Fisher and Princess Leia can look forward to seeing her one more time on the big screen.