Actress Carrie Fisher received her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame this week, and Mark Hamill was there to celebrate and honor her life with a touching speech. This took place on May 4, which is Star Wars Day, a date chosen to honor Fisher’s Star Wars legacy as Princess Leia.
Hamill met Fisher when he was 24 and she was 19. They went out to dinner at the start of filming on the first Star Wars to get acquainted. From their first meeting, Hamill said he knew Fisher was special. “Every expectation I had was just obliterated. She was so charming. So funny. So adorable. So wise beyond her years. I just couldn’t believe it,” Hamill said.
She told him brutally frank and intimate stories about her family after they had just met, something that surprised Hamill but he later came to understand, “That was Carrie.”
After Fisher passed away in 2016, Hamill wrote some thoughts in a notebook, and he shared them with the audience in attendance at the Walk of Fame ceremony.
“Carrie was one of a kind, who belonged to us all, whether we liked it or not. She was our princess, dammit. And the actress who played her blurred into one gorgeous, fiercely independent, and ferociously funny take-charge woman who took our collective breath away. Determined and tough but with a vulnerability that made you root for her and want her to succeed and be happy,” Hamill said, noting that Fisher played a crucial role in his own personal and professional life.
“Was she a handful? Was she high-maintenance? No doubt! But everything would have been so much drabber and less interesting if hadn’t been the friend she was. I’ll never stop missing her. I’m so thankful we had her as long as we did,” Hamill said.
The Luke Skywalker actor went on to say he is grateful the laughs, the wisdom, and the kindness that Fisher shared with him over so many years. He called Fisher, “my beloved space twin.”
“Thank you, Carrie. I love you,” Hamill said, wrapping up his speech.
Fisher’s daughter, Billie Lourd, also appeared at the Walk of Fame ceremony where she shared stories and wisdom from her mother. “One of my favorite quotes of hers is, ‘Take your broken heart and make it into art.’ And she did just that,” Lourd said.
Fisher died on December 26, 2016 at the age of 60. Her mother, Debbie Reynolds, passed away a day later at the age of 84. You can watch the entire Walk of Fame ceremony in the video above.
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