The ‘Star Wars’ scene Carrie Fisher regretted until her dying day: “I wish I could go back”
Carrie Fisher was only 17 years old when she made her film debut in Shampoo, and within two years, she landed the part that would cement her place in cinema history.
As Princess Leia in George Lucas’s original Star Wars trilogy, Fisher became an icon to generations. Even though her career was later derailed by bipolar disorder and drug addiction, she always held a place in the hearts of millions as Leia, and fans loved how honest she was about the movies and her real-life struggles. She was so honest, in fact, that she admitted there was one scene in the original Star Wars that she regretted, with co-star Mark Hamill suggesting it rankled her until her dying day.
Fisher was born and raised in California, the daughter of Singin’ in the Rain star Debbie Reynolds and singer Eddie Fisher. When she was 17, she crossed the ocean to attend London’s Central School of Speech and Drama. She learned her craft among other young British actors for 18 months before dropping out because she nabbed the part of Leia. Amusingly, though, Fisher found that she couldn’t help adopting some of the characteristics of her fellow students, even when she wasn’t consciously trying to – such as their accents.
In Star Wars, there is a scene in which Leia confronts Peter Cushing’s Grand Moff Tarkin on board the Death Star. “Tarkin, I should have expected to find you holding Vader’s leash,” Leia scoffs. “I thought I recognised your foul stench when I was brought on board.”
Fans have always loved the trademark Leia spunk that would allow her to talk to an intimidating villain in such a dismissive way. However, the fact that she did it with a suspiciously English-sounding accent was always perplexing. After all, Leia isn’t English in the movie, although the accent reappears several times.
In 2014, Fisher chuckled, “I was 17 when I went to drama school, so I dropped out at 19 to play Princess Leia, partly with a British accent. It was sort of a viral accent – it came and went.”
She added, “I looked a little pretentious, faking the accent.”
Then, in 2017 – only a year after Fisher sadly passed away – Hamill revealed that she once told him how badly she regretted her wandering accent in that scene. He claimed she told him, “I wish I could go back and do that scene again,” before grumbling, “I really overdid the English accent.” While he told her he had no idea what she was talking about, and the scene seemed “perfect” to him, she insisted it was embarrassing that she didn’t even realise she’d accidentally adopted the accent.
“Well, I was working around all of these English actors,” Hamill revealed she explained to him. However, it didn’t make him think any less of her. In fact, her honesty and desire to do better made him respect her even more. He smiled, “She got self-conscious about it. That’s what I loved about her.”
Interestingly, while most die-hard Star Wars fans have always laughed off Leia’s wonky accent in the scene, some don’t see it as an issue at all. In fact, there is a contingent of fans who always saw it as another manifestation of Leia’s authority-defying snark. In this reading of the scene, the Princess is using the accent as a way of mocking Tarkin’s own upper-crust British diction.
