Playing Out the Fisher String

Eddie Fisher, the real life Anakin Skywalker, has died of complications of hip surgery at the age of 82. A teen idol as a singer in the 1950s, Fisher sold millions of records with such hits as "Thinking of You," ''Oh, My Pa-pa," ''Lady of Spain" and "Count Your Blessings," and with wife Debbie Reynolds made up America’s favorite couple, producing 2 children, including eventual Princess Leia and memoirist Carrie Fisher. In 1958, Fisher’s best friend, producer Mike Todd, was killed in a plane crash, and Fisher rushed to be at the side of his widow, Elizabeth Taylor. He soon moved around to the front, and divorced Reynolds to marry Taylor in 1959, effectively ruining his career, as his TV show was cancelled and his record sales plummeted. Within 5 years, the worm turned, as Taylor left Fisher for her Cleopatra co-star Richard Burton. The celebrity marriage musical chairs continued as Fisher married Connie Stevens, had 2 more kids, then racked up 2 more divorces and 2 more ex-wives. He tried making a comeback in the 1980s, but hadn’t outlived his notoriety, and instead tried to cash in on it, with two scathing autobiographies, accusing Reynolds of being self-centered and controlling and Taylor of being crazy, with a blow by blow of his Hollywood sex life that led Carrie Fisher to say, “I'm having my DNA fumigated."