Princess Leia and Carrie Fisher are almost synonymous with each other at this point. But Fisher was almost not our general. It has been rumored that the role was offered to a younger actress, one we love very much: Jodie Foster.
While talking with Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show, the host brought up this bit of history and Foster confirmed that it’s true. “I was, yeah,” Foster said. “They were going for a younger Princess Leia but I had a conflict. I was doing a Disney movie and I just didn’t want to pull out of the Disney movie because I was already under contract.”
Fisher was 19 years old when Star Wars, which eventually became Episode IV: A New Hope, was filmed. If Foster had been cast, she would have been a younger take on the princess, as Foster was 13 or 14 years old at the time. Not much younger than Fisher, but significantly younger than Harrison Ford (who was 33 at the time) and Mark Hamill (who was in his mid-twenties). What that would have meant for the future arc of Star Wars, we don’t know because Carrie Fisher was cast instead.
Foster went on to talk about the “amazing job” they did in casting Carrie Fisher in the role and then poked fun at Leia’s iconic cinnamon bun hair, saying “I don’t know how good I would have been. I might have had different hair. I might have gone with a pineapple.” Joke aside, Leia would have been different if Foster took the role, but still a badass.
It would have been a different vibe but a cool one, for sure.
Princess Leia is sassy, headstrong, and a woman who will speak her mind when she wants to. Carrie Fisher brought that to life in a very Carrie way. Seeing Jodie Foster take on that energy (especially at the time) would have worked but it would have just been different.
Foster is known for playing women who possess an undeniable strength. But it is almost a quiet strength. Clarice from Silence of the Lambs isn’t someone you want to mess with. That is an energy that Leia does possess, but the way that Foster approaches roles is different than Fisher. And maybe that would have been cool to see. We probably wouldn’t have had her with Han Solo in the end, and it may have changed the “twins” aspect of it all.
Then again, Foster’s energy in Taxi Driver, which was released in 1976, showed a freer side to the actress. All this to say that it would have been a different take on our beloved Princess but one that would have been cool to see. Then again, we got her take on Clarice instead and that’s one for the history books!
(featured image: Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures)
