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Carrier Fisher

What Scripts Did Carrie Fisher Rewrite?

Carrie Frances Fisher was a popular writer and actress from the United States. She was best known for portraying Princess Leia in the Star Wars films, for which she received four Saturn Award nominations. But did you know what scripts Carrie Fisher re-wrote in her career? 

Carrie Fisher was a well-known Script Doctor or someone who performed uncredited rewrites on screenplays. She rewrote Hook, Lethal Weapon 3, and The Wedding Singer, among others.

Princess Leia and Her Role as a Script Doctor

Even though her legacy in Hollywood—both on-screen and behind the scenes—extends far beyond her Star Wars debut decades ago, Carrie Fisher is still best known for her role as Princess Leia.

Fisher deserves to be remembered, but not as the gold bikini-clad sex symbol that will likely dominate her search engine results for decades to come, despite her wish that she had fought against that outfit. In that spirit, let us give Carrie Fisher a little more credit for a very different and significant role that she repeatedly played in the film’s world: script doctor.

Script doctoring, also known as script consulting, is a talent that frequently goes uncredited and unacknowledged in Hollywood. Writers will be hired to polish an existing screenplay; similar to doctors, they will diagnose problems and recommend solutions. In the case of script doctoring, this can range from adding a few new jokes to making significant structural changes or reworking entire characters and scenes.

In the 1990s, Carrie Fisher’s career as a script doctor became legendary. Hook in 1991, Sister Act in 1992, Lethal Weapon 3 in 1992, and The Wedding Singer in 1998 were repaired by Fisher. Carrie Fisher was named one of the most sought after doctors in town by Entertainment Weekly in 1992, which was high praise and one of the only accolades Fisher would ever receive in print, given that she was not credited by name as a writer for any of the films in which she had a hand.

However, some projects to which Fisher may not have wanted her name attached. Fisher is one of the script doctors working on all three Star Wars prequel scripts. Even Fisher’s writing abilities and Star Wars knowledge couldn’t have saved those projects. Every doctor understands that not all patients can be cured.

Fisher told Newsweek in 2008 that she hadn’t done script doctoring in a few years, but it had once been a lucrative career for her. Nowadays, she says, the process is very different: to be considered for script consulting gigs, you must submit your notes and ideas in advance. But, as Fisher points out, they can keep those notes and not hire you.

Free work. That’s what I always call life-wasting events

Carrie Fisher

(Source: The Mary Sue)

Did Carrie Fisher Rewrite Princess Leia’s Lines? 

Yes, she did rewrite some of her lines as Princess Leia.

It is easier as an actor to go into rewriting because you know what would fit into your mouth dialogue-wise. We would tell George Lucas, You can type this shit, but you can’t say it

Carrie Fisher

Fisher says she was rewriting some of Princess Leia’s dialogue when Return of the Jedi came out. It’s probably worth noting that an image of an Empire Strikes Back script page with handwritten notes has been circulating the web recently, but those notes were not written by Carrie Fisher, as many sites claim. (Source: The Mary Sue)

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