Movies Aimed at Teenagers and the Non-Existent Older Person

In a content analysis, the portrayal of older people in the sixty most popular teen movies from the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s was examined, twenty from each decade. For this purpose, older people were defined as those appearing to be 55 years of age or older (note: a rather large group of very different ages and generations), identified based on the presence of one or more of the following characteristics: appearance of retirement, extensive grey hair, wrinkles, extensive loss of hair or balding, cracking voice, use of an aid (cane or wheelchair), parent of a daughter or son who is middle-aged or older, grandchildren or great-grandchildren. Three coding categories were used: young old (55-64), middle old (65-74), old old (75+). Physical characteristics (health status, physical activity, physical portrayal) and personality traits (e.g. forgetful, angry, helpless, lonely, sad, senile) were also coded, so were their portrayals as either consistent or not consistent with positive and negative stereotypes.

While some portrayals were favourable showing older people as active and healthy, mostly, they were marginalised in terms of plot, featured as background characters, and their personalities were based on stereotypes and negative traits. Older people's underrepresentation relative to their actual number in the US-American population was extreme, only 7% of characters in teen movies were old. Almost a third of the movies did not contain any older characters, six of these films were from the 1980s (e.g. Pretty in Pink, Footloose), eight from the 1990s (e.g. Clueless, 10 Things I Hate About You), five from the 2000s (e.g. Friday Night lights, Snow Day). In line with these findings, the movies with the highest number of older characters were recent: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire contained seven older characters, The Princess Diaries contained six. Apart from that, no statistically significant differences were found between the decades suggesting that the representation of older characters has remained relatively consistent in teen films over time (at least the time examined).

The primary character role fulfilled by an older character was that of worker (n=27.30%), followed by grandparent (n=18.20%), and boss (n=18.20%). Only 13% of older characters were coded as friends (e.g. Doc from Back to the Future). Grandparents were mainly featured in minor or incidental roles, only two of the 18 grandparents were featured in major roles.

Those who had either major or minor roles were significantly more likely to have teeth (...), to be portrayed as intelligent (...), loving (...), or eccentric (...), and to exhibit the Golden Ager (...), John Wayne Conservative (...), or Perfect Grandparent (...) stereotype. Major and minor characters were significantly more likely than incidental characters to be portrayed in an overall positive manner, while incidental characters were slightly more likely to be portrayed as neutral or negative (...).

The dominant personality trait of older characters (n=32, 35%) found was "angry/grupy/stern", the second-most (n=23) was "friendly" (25%). Men were significantly more often shown with grey hair than women, women - on the other hand - were significantly more likely to be shown as hunched over.

Positive and negative attitudes to older people might crystallise during late childhood and adolescence, a time characterised by young people seeking out "specific forms of media to actively acquire the norms and beliefs of the culture in which they live", by a process of formulating one's identity, and heavy media consumption.

The stereotypes that adolescents today hold toward older people were reflected in older character portrayals in these popular teen films. Given the negative representations of older people that adolescents are exposed to in their teen years, it is no wonder that they express negative attitudes toward older people. After years of exposure to media that negatively depict older adults, adolescents may have been cultivated to stereotype older people. This has the potential to influence the quality of their interactions with older people, and also influence the way they come to view the prospect of getting old.

Since, at least in "nuclear family cultures", children and teenagers have less intergenerational contact with older people than in the past and at the same time the media plays a more crucial role, it is likely that the latter turns into a socialising agent shaping them and the source they get most of their information about older people from. Adolescents with heavy TV consumption might get the idea that older people are vanishing from the population since they are almost non-existent in movies (Magoffin, 2007).

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- Magoffin, D. L. (2007). Stereotyped Seniors: The Portrayal of Older Characters in Teen Movies from 1980-2006. Brigham Young University: Theses and Dissertations, 977, link
- photographs of teenagers by Joseph Szabo via and via

Just human traits

"If you list the qualities that we consider feminine, they are patience, understanding, empathy, supportiveness, a desire to nurture. Our culture tells us those are feminine traits, but they're really just human."

Sydney Pollack

image of Sidney Pollack with Robert Redford via

The Ageing Body of an Actor and the Only Answer to the Question: "Bothered by the required nudity?"

“It didn’t matter to me because it’s the only body I’ve got. At least it was a reality. An aging body, to people who are not old, this is what’s going to happen to you. So don’t get too smart about it.” 

Michael Caine

photographs by Brian Duffy via

"Sad to be at a stage in your life where you have to play 'old people'?"

“The only alternative to playing old people is playing dead people. I’ll pick elderly people. I have three grandchildren and I live for them. But also, I remember, I once read a script and I sent the script back [to the producer] saying the part was too small. He sent it back to me saying, ‘I did not want you to read the lover. I wanted you to read the father.’ And that’s when my career changed. I suddenly realized I wasn’t going to get the girl anymore. But I was going to get the part, and I really did get some parts.” 
Michael Caine

photograph via

Women in French Cinema vs US-American Cinema

"In America, you get older faster. It’s like Dorian Gray--you are old at 40. The French give women the opportunity to age gracefully and to be feminine. French film allows them to be sexual and sensual in a way we don’t. We don’t allow women to be sexual after 40, and you see that in the way movies are cast. Movies are a reflection of the culture."

James Ulmer

In his "James Ulmer's French Hot List", Ulmer examines the so-called bankability (the degree to which an actor's name can raise financing for a film) of French actors and comes to the conclusion that, as of 2002, seven of the top 15 bankable stars are women and - except for one - all are older than 35. The US-American list, by contrast, includes only two women who at the time are either turning or have just turned 35 (via).

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photograph of Catherine Deneuve via

The Ageless John Forsythe and the "Old" Ladies

"Well, I think this shows how ageism in Hollywood is. I was in my forties when I got that role, and Linda was in her thirties. John was 62. Do you think any of the press ever mentioned that he was 62? It was always "the older women, Linda and Joan, you know, in their thirties and their fourties". Never mentioned it. And I would bring this up in interviews because I don't like ageist people. And Mr Forsythe didn't like it. And he would say, "Why do you have to mention my age?" I say, "because our is mentioned, Linda's and ours is mentioned all the time and we want equality, you know. They are mentioning ours and we are mentioning yours." Joan Collins

photograph via

Best Picture Nominations & Ageism

It may not really come as a surprise: Seniors are scarce in movies. 25 films nominated for Best Picture between 2014 and 2016 were analysed. The results: 8% of the speaking characters were 60 years of age or older, 77.7% of them men, 22.3% women.

 

42.9% of the 14 films with a leading or supporting senior character featured a derogatory comment about ageing - referring to health, movement, cognition, senses, appearance or death (Choueiti et al., 2017)



- Smith, S. L., Choueiti, M. & Pieper, K. (2017). Over Sixty, Underestimated: A Look at Aging on the "Silver" Screen in Best Picture Nominated Films, LINK
- photographs of the amazing Donald Pleasence (1919-1995) by Allan Warren via and via

The Beauty-and-Goodness Stereotype in Hollywood

The beauty-and-goodness stereotype is rather learned, at least partly ... and not so much from direct observation of people of varying attractiveness but acculturation where the entertainment media plays a crucial role. Hollywood filmmakers, in fact, "have been portraying physically attractive individuals more favorably than their less attractive counterparts in terms of their moral goodness, romantic activity, and life outcomes" (Smith, McIntosh & Bazzini, 1999)



Abstract: Physically attractive individuals are often viewed more favorably than unattractive people on dimensions that are weakly related or unrelated to physical looks, such as intelligence, sociability, and morality. Our study investigated the role of U.S. films in this "beauty-and-goodness" stereotype. In Study 1, we established that attractive characters were portrayed more favorably than unattractive characters on multiple dimensions (e.g., intelligence, friendliness) across a random sample from 5 decades of top-grossing films. The link between beauty and positive characteristics was stable across time periods, character sex, and characters' centrality to the plot. Study 2 established that exposure to highly stereotyped films can elicit stronger beauty-and-goodness stereotyping. Participants watching a highly biased film subsequently showed greater favoritism toward an attractive graduate school candidate (compared with ratings of an unattractive candidate) than participants viewing a less biased film.



- Smith, S. M., McIntosh, W. D., & Bazzini, D. G. (1999). Are the beautiful good in Hollywood? An investigation of the beauty and goodness stereotype on film. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 21(1), 69-80.
- photograph of Oliver Reed via and Capucine via

Hollywood, the Other, and US-American Identity. Excerpts.

(...) Hollywood has systematically vilified groups of peoples as part of the business, but with clear ideological bonds/repercussions. The Russians have been both evil and the redeemed partner, according to the exigencies of the times, and their Asian counterparts have coped the Otherness in a good share of Hollywood’s movies, especially when addressing the Vietnam War.



Meanwhile the Arabs, who seem to have substituted them in recent years, have impersonated vilified roles from Early Hollywood cinema. But all of them seem to represent for the Americans a set of ancient, modern and latent threats that reassure the identity of this hastily built country. We may even go further and affirm that these Others are, somehow, the American identity itself. In the times in which it was about forming a nation, the Indians served as the opposite force; when it was the prevailing power in the world that was emerging, it was the turn of the Russians then the Arabs to take up that role.

In the end, it seems unlikely that Hollywood machinery will be able to live without these recurrent Others, fresh fodder for stereotypes, degradations and, ultimately, obliteration. The United States have historically created a cast of enemies who are already part of themselves, by stressing the bonds of the states by identifying common fears and threats. Hollywood’s role in the process is not only undeniable; but possibly vital and indispensable, too. (Gelado & Sangro, 2016)

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- Gelado Marcos, R. & Sangro Colòn, P. (2016). Hollywood and the Representation of the Otherness. A Historical Analysis of the Role Played by the American Cinema in Spotting Enemies to Vilify. comunicación, 6(1), 11-25.
- photograph via

"... to use our voice for the voiceless." Joaquin Phoenix

I’m full of so much gratitude now. I do not feel elevated above any of my fellow nominees or anyone in this room, because we share the same love – that’s the love of film. And this form of expression has given me the most extraordinary life. I don’t know where I’d be without it.



But I think the greatest gift that it’s given me, and many people in [this industry] is the opportunity to use our voice for the voiceless. I’ve been thinking about some of the distressing issues that we’ve been facing collectively.
I think at times we feel or are made to feel that we champion different causes. But for me, I see commonality. I think, whether we’re talking about gender inequality or racism or queer rights or indigenous rights or animal rights, we’re talking about the fight against injustice.
We’re talking about the fight against the belief that one nation, one people, one race, one gender, one species, has the right to dominate, use and control another with impunity.
I think we’ve become very disconnected from the natural world. Many of us are guilty of an egocentric world view, and we believe that we’re the centre of the universe. (...)
We fear the idea of personal change, because we think we need to sacrifice something; to give something up. But human beings at our best are so creative and inventive, and we can create, develop and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and the environment.
I have been a scoundrel all my life, I’ve been selfish. I’ve been cruel at times, hard to work with, and I’m grateful that so many of you in this room have given me a second chance. I think that’s when we’re at our best: when we support each other. Not when we cancel each other out for our past mistakes, but when we help each other to grow. When we educate each other; when we guide each other to redemption.

Joaquin Phoenix's Oscars speech, 2020

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photograph by Craig McDean via

Capucine on Women Screenwriters

Interviewer: (....) And of course male screenwriters almost invariably give more dialogue to male characters.
Capucine: That is why I think it is much more important or influential for women to write movies than to direct them. It is the writers who give us what we see and hear on the screen.



- Hadleigh, B. (2016). Hollywood Lesbians. From Garbo to Foster. Riverdale: Riverdale Avenue Books.
- photograph of Germaine Hélène Irène Lefebvre "Capucine" (1928-1990) via

Quoting Ricky Gervais

"Sometimes being old is used as an insult, which is bizarre because, if you're lucky, that's literally going to happen to you. It's a strange thing to gloat about: being born recently."
Ricky Gervais



"There are no Hollywood stars speaking out for the elderly. They're forgotten, bewildered, and I don't think it's because people are cruel or don't care. It's because you don't want to think about your own mortality. I think people don't talk about it enough."
Ricky Gervais

"I think our elderly are forgotten sometimes."
Ricky Gervais

"I'm a fan of the kind of political correctness that is about not promoting prejudice. But some people in America are offended by equality because when you've had privilege for so long, equality feels like oppression."
Ricky Gervais

"I don't like it when I see a racist comedian go up and say, 'What are we gonna do about all these immigrants?' and they get a round the applause. I think, 'Well that's not a joke. That's just your biased opinion."
Ricky Gervais



photographs via

Quoting Vanessa Redgrave

"A conservative frame of mind is very limiting for an actor, and a human being, too."
Vanessa Redgrave

"Nothing I do is political. Nothing. I campaign for human rights based on human rights law. That for me is the be all and end all."
Vanessa Redgrave




"I was surprised when I was asked to play Miss Daisy and wondered if I could – only in part because she was Jewish but, also because she was a Southern woman who has hardly opened her mouth before she declares she's not prejudiced, and yet everything she does shows how totally prejudiced she is."
Vanessa Redgrave

"Politics is about divisions. Wherever you come in on the subject, there are divisions."
Vanessa Redgrave

"I've identified all my life with refugees."
Vanessa Redgrave

"I've been working for refugees for years and years and years."
Vanessa Redgrave

"I think everybody, including myself, are in danger of losing our humanity."
Vanessa Redgrave




photographs by Bert Stern (1967) via and via and via and via

Born this day ... Dorothy Dandridge

"Dorothy Dandridge was a fighter. Growing up in The Depression and making her way through Hollywood in the ’40s, she encountered resistance — to her skin color, to her refusal to play demeaning roles — at every turn. She was assailed in the press for dating white men, and blamed herself for her husband’s philandering and her daughter’s brain damage. Nearly every societal convention was against her."
the hairpin



Dorothy Jean Dandridge (1922-1965) was a US-American actress, singer, and dancer, the first black woman featured on the cover of Life, and the first black American nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress (for a leading role) (via). While her mother, Ruby Dandridge, played stereotypical "Mammy" roles, Dorothy was told to be too pretty to play a servant. At the beginning, the fact that "she didn't look like the traditionally cast African American actors" was a barrier to her career (Murgia, 2018). Dorothy Dandridge became the ultimate metaphor of the "tragic mulatto" (Hall, 2008).
Later, the civil rights movement helped her become more and more accepted and popular (Murgia, 2018)

African American visibility as more than just an uneducated, undesirable entity in the eyes of white America was being challenged by an actor who wanted to step out of an archaic stereotype and system. She was a bridge that transitioned pigeon-holed views about African Americans, however, her role was complex, and her self-awareness made that a difficult connection to maintain. Her features and lighter skin tone would bring colorism or a caste system to the forefront in both negative and positive ways, or as she called it, her 'fortune or misfortune.' She was a beauty icon, opening doors for people of color to be more desirable, actually moving within white society circles with ease, but would create a limbo for less-exotic-looking blacks who weren't seen as attractive by white society. (Murgia, 2018)

Dandridge had relationships with white men - actors and her director Otto Preminger - at a time, the Motion Picture Production Code banned romantic relationships between black and white actors on screen (Murgia, 2018).

She wanted strong leading roles, but found her opportunities limited because of her race. According to The New York Times, Dandridge once said, "If I were Betty Grable, I could capture the world." Belafonte also addressed this issue, noting that his former co-star "was the right person in the right place at the wrong time."
With Hollywood filmmakers unable to create a suitable role for the light-skinned Dandridge, they soon reverted to subtly prejudiced visions of interracial romance. She appeared in several poorly received racially and sexually charged dramas, including Island in the Sun (1957), also starring Belafonte and Joan Fontaine, and Tamango (1958), in which she plays the mistress of the captain of a slave ship.
Among the missed opportunities from this period, Dandridge turned down the supporting role of Tuptim in The King and I (1956), because she refused to play a slave. It was rumored that she would play Billie Holliday in a film version of the jazz singer's autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues, but it never panned out. (...)
While making Carmen Jones, Dandridge became involved in an affair with the film's director, Otto Preminger, who also directed Porgy and Bess. Their interracial romance, as well as Dandridge's relationships with other white lovers, was frowned upon, particularly by other African-American members of the Hollywood filmmaking community. (via)

It's a story of a life wasted as we see her determination swayed by society and the social norms of the time, as well as a mismanaged career. Her place in cinematic history is still relevant as the struggle for visible minority representation continues in the boardrooms of high-powered film executives today. Murgia (2018)

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- Hall, R. E. (2008). Racism in the 21st Century. An Empirical Analysis of Skin Color. New York: Springer Science + Business Media
- Murgia, S. J. (2018). The Encyclopedia of Racism in American Films. Lanham, Boulder, New York & London: Rowman & Littlefield.
photographs via and via and via

There Is Black. And There Is Black.

"The lighter an African American actor or model is and the more Anglo-white her features, the greater her chances are of accessing certain societal rewards such as movie or other media exposure. (...) Darker African women are made into societal misfits who are targeted for more devaluing than their lighter counterparts by the white cultural artists."
Jean & Feagin, 2015: 87f



- Jean, Y. S. & Feagin, J. R. (2015). Double Burden. Black Women and Everyday Racism. London & New York: Routledge.
- photograph of Lena Horne (1917-2010) by Wayne Miller, 1947 via (copyright by owner)

Quoting Diahann Carroll

"In the beginning, I found myself dealing with a show business dictated by male white supremacists and chauvinists. As a black female, I had to learn how to tap dance around the situation. I had to ... find a way to present my point of view without being pushy or aggressive. In the old days, the only women I saw in this business were in makeup, hairdressing, and wardrobe departments. Now I'm surrounded by women executives, writers, directors, producers, and even women stagehands."
Diahann Carroll




"I suppose our lives need to be more integrated. We have white communities and black communities and white country clubs and black country clubs. It's very important when we integrate ourselves, and it helps us to have a better understanding of the world, to people all over the world and this is the time in history that we have become very aware of how important that is, so I think it's just really-we have to know each other and work together and play together in order to write about each other."
Diahann Carroll



photographs (1969) via

Maureen O'Hara and Hollywood's Idea of Being a Woman

"There's a terrible truth for many women in the picture business: Aging typically takes its toll and means fewer and less desirable roles.
Maureen O'Hara



Irish film star Maureen O'Hara to-day charged Hollywood producers and directors with calling her "A cold potato without sex appeal" because she refuses to let them make love to her, says the Mirror New York correspondent.
"I am so upset with it that I am ready to quit Hollywood," Maureen says. "It's got so bad I hate to come to work in the morning.
"I'm a helpless victim of a Hollywood whispering campaign. Because I don't let the producer and director kiss me every morning or let them paw me they have spread word around town that I am not a woman - that I am a cold piece of marble statuary. I guess Hollywood won't consider me as anything except a cold hunk of marble until I divorce my husband, give my baby away and get my name and photograph in all the newspapers. If that's Hollywood's idea of being a woman I'm ready to quit."
Snippet from 1945

::: More: Maureen O'Hara stood up to men, The Guardian, LINK

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photograph via

Quoting Frances McDormand

"We have a lot of conversations about aging and how difficult it is in our culture. I go on rants about it, I get a little too zealous about it and he cautions me to remember that not everyone ages the same way and I've been fortunate that I'm happy with the way I look and how I age."
Frances McDormand



"... the entire business for female actors that is a difficult proposition and one of the things is waiting for someone to give you an interesting role. I was a trained to be a classical theatre actress. If I had followed my career in the theatre I would have had many good roles because they've been written and they're there. There's a whole canon - you age through the three sisters and check off, you age through the Skakespearean canon. In film, the canon is a male protagonist canon. So, really, the only way to age as a female in male protagonists driven stories is in the relationship to the male protagonist: a daughter, sister, mother, grandmother..."
Frances McDormand

"This is me. I, you know, this i why I got up this morning and this is how I looked."
Frances McDormand

"I want to be really connected to this (shows her face), how I've aged, how proud I am of what I have. I want to be a symbol for men and women to move through this very dangerous thing that we've created with the culture of celebrity and the need to be something other than ourselves. It kind of seems to me, at least in America, no one should age past 40. And if you do you should put a bag over your head or crawl into a hole."
Frances McDormand

"One of the reasons that I am doing press again after 10 years' absence is because I feel like I need to represent publicly what I've chosen to represent privately — which is a woman who is proud and more powerful than I was when I was younger. And I think that I carry that pride and power on my face and in my body."
Frances McDormand

"I want to be a role model for not only younger men and women — and not just in my profession, I'm not talking about my profession. I think that cosmetic enhancements in my profession are just an occupational hazard. But I think, more culturally, I'm interested in starting the conversation about aging gracefully and how, instead of making it a cultural problem, we make it individuals' problems. I think that ageism is a cultural illness; it's not a personal illness."
Frances McDormand

"I have not mutated myself in any way. Joel (Coen, her director husband) and I have this conversation a lot. He literally has to stop me physically from saying something to people — to friends who’ve had work. I’m so full of fear and rage about what they’ve done."
Frances McDormand

"I've got a rubber face. It has always served me very well and really helps, especially as I get older, because I still have all my road map intact, and I can use it at will."
Frances McDormand

"You are someone who, beneath that white hair, has a card catalog of valuable information."
Frances McDormand

"I want to be revered. I want to be an elder; I want to be an elderess. I have some things to talk about and say and help."
Frances McDormand

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photograph via

#OscarsSoYoung

"One of the worst things you can be in Hollywood is old."
Kathy Bates

"The outcry over the lack of diversity at Hollywood’s premier award show has failed to recognize the value of senior voices on screen. While 2016 best picture nominated films are more diverse when it comes to gender and some racial and ethnic groups, ageism is still an accepted form of exclusion in cinematic storytelling." Stacy L. Smith

A study led by Stacy L. Smith analysed 1.256 speaking or named characters in the 25 best picture-nominated films from 2014 to 2016. The results show that even in "the most critically acclaimed films", ageing characters were either underrepresented (only 11.8% were 60 years of age or older) or stereotypically portrayed (including e.g. comments such as "mentally feeble, sick old ladies" or "just sit here and let Alzheimer's run its course") (via). Of all "leads and co-leads driving the action, only one was a character 60 years of age or older" (via).

"Clearly, there’s more work to be done before we can say precisely how inaccurate media portrayals impact self-image in seniors, from their sense of being valued to their sense of optimism, but what really concerns me as a physician is how a diminished sense of self-worth can, in turn, impact a senior’s health. In our survey, we showed that aging Americans who report feeling more valued in society tend to have more healthy days. At Humana, we believe aging with optimism contributes to health, and that’s why we’re committed to reversing societal perceptions and promoting aging with optimism." Yolangel Hernandez Suarez

photographs of Kathy Bates via and via

Carrie Fisher & the Gold Bikini: Intersection of Sexism, Weightism and Ageism.

"I'm what psychology journals refer to as batshit crazy. It's a delicate mix of bipolar disorder, which I'm able to control through serious medication, and a completely untreatable case of I don't give a shit. 
Unfortunately, for a woman, the side effects of this condition include: reduced employment, phone calls from terrified PR flacks and tremendous difficulty getting myself down to a weight that's acceptable to some 35 year old studio executive whose deepest fantasy and worst nightmare somehow both involve me in a gold bikini."
Carrie Fisher



"There was this thing on Fox News about this father not being able to explain to his daughter what the outfit was. What, that my character was forced to put on that outfit against my will, and I took it off as soon as I could kill the guy who picked out the outfit? I had so much fun killing [Jabba]. They asked me if I wanted my stunt double to kill him, but I wanted to. I sawed his neck off with that chain. I really wanted to kill him."
Carrie Fisher

"To the father who flipped out about it, 'What am I going to tell my kid about why she’s in that outfit?' Tell them that a giant slug captured me and forced me to wear that stupid outfit, and then I killed him because I didn’t like it. And then I took it off. Backstage."
Carrie Fisher, 2015



"I didn’t even think it was going to be in the movie. She’s a princess. What the hell is she doing walking around in a bikini?"
Harrison Ford



"My favorite one to see is the metal bikini — on men! That is what has been happening a lot. A lot. And not thin men, by the way! So that makes me feel good about myself, kind of a before-and-after thing — this is way after. Not only is Princess Leia fatter, she's a guy!"
Carrie Fisher on her favourite Comic Con Princess Leia costume



"Where am I in all of this? … I have to stay with the slug with the big tongue! Nearly naked, which is not a style choice for me. … It wasn’t my choice. When [director George Lucas] showed me the outfit, I thought he was kidding and it made me very nervous. I had to sit very straight because I couldn’t have lines on my sides, like little creases. No creases were allowed, so I had to sit very, very rigid straight.
What redeems it is I get to kill him, which was so enjoyable. ... I sawed his neck off with that chain that I killed him with. I really relished that because I hated wearing that outfit and sitting there rigid straight, and I couldn't wait to kill him."
Carrie Fisher, 2016



"Don't be a slave like I was. You keep fighting against that slave outfit."
Carrie Fisher to Daisy Ridley



"Fisher tells a story of how George Lucas asked her to come out to San Francisco to discuss the script for Return of the Jedi. When she arrived, he pulled out a picture of Leia in that iconic bikini, and she remarked, “No, George, but seriously.” The slave bikini, chosen by Jabba the Hutt, left her vulnerable to the occasional wardrobe malfunction, too. “If I lay like this”—she arches her back flat—“and it doesn’t adhere, it is like plastic, so that is a problem here”—she points to you-know-where—“because if I lay down, it doesn’t go with me. I didn’t inform him, but I always thought that if Boba Fett were of a mind, he could see all the way to Florida.”" (The Daily Beast) George Lucas told Fisher to lose weight to wear the bikini (Yahoo).

"I started checking for any bounce or slip after takes. It was, !CUT. Hey, how they doin'? The hooters in place?'"
Carrie Fisher, 1983



The gold bikini was auctioned for $96.000,- in 2015 (via).



photographs via and via and via and via and via and via and via and via