Star Wars fans celebrated a particularly special May 4th this year when Carrie Fisher was finally awarded her own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Before the late icon’s daughter, Billie Lourd, delivered a moving speech, Mark Hamill opened the ceremony with his own loving words about Fisher.
Hamill began his remarks by recalling meeting Fisher for the first time when he was 24 and she was 19. He didn’t expect much from the actor given her age, but he quickly realized that “she was so charming, so funny, so adorable, so wise beyond her years…And brutally frank.” From there, he turned to a note he wrote about Fisher shortly after her death in 2016.
“Carrie was one of a kind who belonged to us all, whether we liked it or not,” Hamill said. “She was our princess, dammit, and the actress who played her blurred into one gorgeous, fearlessly independent, 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. She played such a crucial role in my professional and personal life. Both would’ve been far emptier without her.”
Hamill continued, “Was she a handful? Was she high maintenance? No doubt. But every thing would’ve been so much drabber and less interesting if she hadn’t been the friend that she was. I’ll never stop missing her, but I’m so thankful we had her as long as we did. I’m grateful for the laughter, the wisdom, the kindness, and even the bratty, self-indulgent crap my beloved space twin drove me crazy with through the years. So thank you, Carrie. I love you.” Watch Hamill’s full remarks below, and be sure to stay on the clip to see Lourd’s speech as well.
Fisher’s Walk of Fame ceremony was marred by controversy earlier this week when the actor’s siblings revealed that Lourd did not invite them to the event. Lourd confirmed the accusation and explained her decision was based her mother’s siblings “capitalizing” on her death by doing press and writing books about Fisher without Lourd’s knowledge.
“I found out they had done this through the press,” Lourd said. “They never consulted me or considered how this would affect our relationship.”
Celebrate Fisher and May 4th by revisiting our ranking of every Star Wars film and series.