Carrie Fisher: Star Wars actress, author dies aged 60 following heart problems

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Sorry, this video has expired Video: Actress Carrie Fisher dies aged 60 (ABC News)

Actress Carrie Fisher, who found enduring fame as Princess Leia in the original Star Wars, has died aged 60, according to a family statement.

Key points: Fisher had been hospitalised since last Friday

She is best remembered as the tough and feisty Princess Leia in 1977's Star Wars

Fisher was also an accomplished author who openly detailed her experiences with addiction and mental illness

Fisher's daughter, Billie Lourd, released a statement through her spokesman saying Fisher died on Tuesday just before 9:00am (4:00am AEDT on Wednesday).

"It is with a very deep sadness that Billie Lourd confirms that her beloved mother Carrie Fisher passed away at 8:55am this morning," read the statement from publicist Simon Halls.

"She was loved by the world and she will be missed profoundly."

Fisher had been hospitalised since Friday when she had heart problems on board a flight to Los Angeles.

She made her feature film debut opposite Warren Beatty in the 1975 hit Shampoo and also appeared in Austin Powers, The Blues Brothers, Charlie's Angels, Hannah and Her Sisters, Scream 3 and When Harry Met Sally.

But Fisher is best remembered as Princess Leia with her now-iconic braided buns in the original Star Wars in 1977, in which she uttered the immortal phrase, "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you're my only hope".

Fisher played a part in which she was tough, feisty and powerful, even if at one point she was chained to Jabba the Hutt.

She reprised the role in Episode VII of the series, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, in 2015, and her digitally rendered image appears in 2016's Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

'I'm a product of Hollywood inbreeding': Fisher

Fisher was also an accomplished author who detailed her experiences with addiction and mental illness in several best-selling books.

She said she smoked pot at age 13, used LSD by 21 and was first diagnosed as bipolar at age 24 — she was treated with electroconvulsive therapy and medication.

In 1987, her thinly veiled autobiography Postcards From the Edge became a best seller — it became a 1990 film starring Shirley MacLaine and Meryl Streep.

Ever ready to satirise herself, she has even played Carrie Fisher a few times, as in David Cronenberg's dark Hollywood sendup Maps to the Stars and in an episode of Sex and the City.

In the past 15 years, Fisher also had a somewhat prolific career as a television star — her one-woman show, Wishful Drinking, which she's performed on and off across the US since 2006, was turned into a book, made its way to Broadway in 2009 and was captured for HBO in 2010.

Little was off-limits in the show — she discussed the scandal that engulfed her superstar parents, Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher (he ran off with Elizabeth Taylor); her brief marriage to singer Paul Simon; the time the father of her daughter left her for a man; and the day she woke up next to the dead body of a platonic friend who had overdosed in her bed.

"I'm a product of Hollywood inbreeding. When two celebrities mate, something like me is the result," she said in the show.

At another point, she cracked: "I don't have a problem with drugs so much as I have a problem with sobriety."

"Hail Hail! A genius has vacated this realm-RIP Carrie Fisher," Roseanne Barr posted on Twitter.

In her memoir The Princess Diarist, Fisher revealed she had a three-month affair with Star Wars co-star Harrison Ford during filming. She was only 19 years old at the time, while he was a married 33-year-old.

Ford released a statement after Fisher's death: "Carrie was one-of-a-kind … Brilliant, original. Funny and emotionally fearless. She lived her life, bravely.

"My thoughts are with her daughter Billie, her mother Debbie, her brother Todd, and her many friends. We will all miss her."

Walt Disney chairman and chief executive officer Bob Iger said in a statement: "Carrie Fisher was one-of-a-kind, a true character who shared her talent and her truth with us all with her trademark wit and irreverence.

"Millions fell in love with her as the indomitable Princess Leia; she will always have a special place in the hearts of Star Wars fans as well as all of us who were lucky enough to know her personally."

Star Wars creator George Lucas said Fisher would be "missed by all".

"She was extremely smart, a talented actress, writer and comedienne with a very colourful personality that everyone loved," he said.

Besides her daughter, Fisher is survived by her brother, Todd Fisher, and her mother.

ABC/wires

Topics: death, film-movies, united-states

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