Carrie Fisher is receiving a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, a May the Fourth tribute to one of the Star Wars franchise's most beloved figures. However, the event has stirred up some family drama...
ADVERTISEMENTToday, Fisher - who died in 2016 - joins Star Wars co-stars Harrison Ford and Mark Hamill on the Hollywood tourist attraction.
The trio's stars are all located on the 6,800 block of Hollywood Boulevard, near where the original film debuted in 1977.
Fans have long campaigned for Princess Leia Organa to receive a Walk of Fame star. The honour comes on May the Fourth, essentially an official holiday for Star Wars fans that's a play on a line “May the Force be with you.”
Fisher will be given the 2,754th star on the Walk of Fame and her daughter Billie Lourd will be accepting the star on behalf of her mother.
The event has already stirred some controversy, as Lourd, who has been seen on the big screen in films like Ticket to Paradise, Booksmart and the third trilogy of Star Wars films (The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, The Rise of Skywalker) has opened up about the reasons why she excluded Fisher's siblings from the Hollywood Walk of Fame event.
In a statement received by The Hollywood Reporter, Lourd first apologized to “anyone reading this for feeling the need to defend myself publicly” from the family members, adding that she’s only doing so after being “publicly attacked by them” via statements given to gossip outlet TMZ and posted on social media.
She then confirmed that she did not invite Fisher’s siblings Todd, Joely and Tricia Leigh Fisher to the Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony and “they know why.”
“Days after my mom died, her brother and her sister chose to process their grief publicly and capitalize on my mother’s death, by doing multiple interviews and selling individual books for a lot of money, with my mom and my grandmother’s deaths as the subject. I found out they had done this through the press. They never consulted me or considered how this would affect our relationship,” reads Lourd’s statement.
“Though I recognize they have every right to do whatever they choose, their actions were very hurtful to me at the most difficult time in my life. I chose to and still choose to deal with her loss in a much different way.”
Fisher’s brother, Todd Fisher, told TMZ: “It’s heartbreaking and shocking to me that I was intentionally omitted from attending this important legacy event for my sister, Carrie.”
Fisher’s sisters, Joely and Tricia Leigh Fisher, released a joint statement posted on Joely’s Instagram that confirmed that they were also not invited to attend: “For some bizarre, misguided reason our niece has chosen not to include us in this epic moment in our sister’s career. This is something Carrie would have definitely wanted her siblings to be present for. The fact that her only brother and two sisters were intentionally and deliberately excluded is deeply shocking.”
Lourd’s statement concludes that the press release Todd Fisher gave to TMZ and the posting Joely Fisher placed on Instagram “once again confirms that my instincts were right.”
“To be clear - there is no feud. We have no relationship. This was a conscious decision on my part to break a cycle with a way of life I want no part of for myself or my children. The people who knew and loved my mom at Disney and Lucasfilm have made this star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame to honour her legacy possible. This moment is about Carrie Fisher and all that she accomplished and what she meant to the world. I’m going to focus on that. May the 4th be with you.”
