Inside the hard-party days that fueled and finished her friendship with John Belushi.
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This would be an important but, ultimately, sadly significant friendship for her.
John liked Carrie immediately because she made him laugh.
Interestingly, at the time, the show had as many female as male writers.
TheSNLers were a smart, young in crowd, and Carrie fell right in with them.
That said, they were also somewhat provincial: From Canada.
From the Midwest and the South.
She was the only person weever metwho had flashbulbsfrom strangers, not relativesin her face from childhood!
Her family was like the Kardashians today: everyone knew everything about them.
We might have been smart and arrogant, and we got successful so fast!
But we had ordinary backgrounds.Shehad cameras trained on her since the day she was born.
SNLs venerated star writer, the sadistically dark-humored Michael ODonoghue, was from Rochester, New York.
Oh, what a mischievous dandy Michael was!
He was devilish and he could charm anyone.
A part of Carrie badly wanted to be a literary writer, and ODonoghue was one.
He would become one of Carries best friends.
Carrie started including theSNLers at parties in her apartmentdazzling parties.
At these get-togethers, Shuster recalls being really amazed at Carrie and Griffin Dunne.
The way they operated togetherI dont know how romantic it was, but it was really notable and striking.
I had a really strong sense of the Nick and Nora Charlesness of them.
Carrie was so sophisticateda little girl with such a big voice.
Carrie was, indeed, now, the toast of young Manhattan.
She lit up a room when she came in.
Her eyes lit everything up, and there was also her dangerous surprises.
Carrie and Paul began an intense romance.
(Papp fell in love with Carries voice the minute he heard her sing.)
After proudly telling Sarah she was now dating Paul Simon, Carrie started missing rehearsals; she had bronchitis.
Is she done yet?
John and Carrie had become very close right away, says Judy Belushi of her husbands platonic friend.
He didnt suffer fools.
Carrie was very feisty.
And they had something else in common: a predilection for cocaine.
In Carries case, her vulnerability to drugs was inherited from her father.
Carrie and John Belushi started doing cocaine together.
Others, of course, indulged as well.
Carrie was in the two biggest movies of 1980:The Empire Strikes BackandThe Blues Brothers.
The latter starred her twoSNLbuddies, John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd.
Everybody wanted Carrie for a small but important cameo role, and she said yes.
Princess Leia as the Mystery Womanhow cool was that!
We were so excited!
says the films producer Sean Daniel.
But Carriewasthe Mystery Woman: Jake Bluess hyper-vengeful ex-fiancee.
Carrie was totally committed, a total pro during the shooting, Sean Daniel says.
Danny and I decided to break up when he was startingThe Blues Brothers, Rosie Shuster says of Aykroyd.
That was hisliteralidea of a blind date.
As for Dan, he had, people say, a desire to save Carrie.
Carrie had fun with Judy Belushi during theBlues Brothersshoot.
The pool hall was connected to a bar that was being filmed in the movie.
The giggling women took hilarious Polaroids (the selfies of the day) of each other.
When the women got back to their hotel, they ran into their friend Eric Idle in the elevator.
Everyone was too stoned to talk, only laugh.
I dont think they loved each other.
They were both just happening and attractive andagain the wordinfatuated, says Judy Belushi.
Then came a dramatic moment.
Dan was playing the Boy Scout to Carries heedlessness.
He insisted she eat wellincluding vegetables: Brussels sprouts.
A bit high, she put awholesprout in her mouth and started choking.
Dan dashed over, wrapped his arms around her, and performed the Heimlich maneuver.
Danny saved Carries life, Sean Daniel says.
The Dan-and-Carrie infatuation/salvation scenario deepened into romance.
Debbie cooked for them!
And the tech wizard Todd Fisher drove him around in his muscle cars with Miguel Ferrer.
Dan and Carrie became engaged.
I bought her a sapphire ring.
We went for blood tests.
As for Carrie, she recalled the interlude bemusedly and said, I started saying Eh?
In the guesthouse they spent three days full-on weeping to Christmas classics that played on TV, Dan said.
But the engagement ended as quickly as it began.
Carrie wanted to give Danny a wardrobe upgrade, says Rosie Shuster.
That was not him.
It was mid-century and really quite lovely, Judy Belushi says.
But it was in some disrepair.
It looks like it was abandoned by Fred and Wilma Flintstone, Carrie said of the house.
Carrieyounger than the otherswas intensely fragile.
She was generous, brilliant, witty, charismatic, caringand deeply vulnerable: friends could see that.
When they all got to the Belushis Vineyard house, my brother was most concerned about her.
He had to carry her limp body from room to room.
He wanted her to know that he knew this and she should know it, too.
In 2009, she remembered Johns words as if theyd been uttered yesterday, she toldVanity FairsNed Zeman.
On the night of March 4, 1982, Carrie was back in New York with Paul.
Carol, a writer for the edgy monthlyNew Times, as well as forRolling StoneandEsquire, was writing screenplays.
Carol was friends with Judy Belushi.
When she was turned down, I called Judy, Carol recalls.
It was 9:00 a.m. East Coast time, and said, I cant get through to him.
The Belushis assistant called Carol and said, Carol, youve got to go over there.
Theyve found him, with a needle in his arm.
We knew John was terrified of needles.
And then the nightmare began, Carol says.
It was nearing noon in New York when the phone rang in Paul Simons apartment.
AnotherSNLstaffer was there with Paul and Carrie.
They were about to hop in the sauna.
The friend on the phone said, Turn on TVnow!
There was the news: John Belushi was dead.
We were so shocked.Stunned, the staffer says of her and Pauls and Carries reactions.
It was, Oh God, how could this happen?
We were young!Johnwas young!
And then it switched to Oh my God, this wasboundto happen!
It was There but for the grace of God go I. Itcouldhave been me.
Excerpted fromCARRIE FISHER: A Life on the Edgeby Sheila Weller.
Published by Sarah Crichton Books, an imprint of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, November 12th 2019.
Copyright 2019 by Sheila Weller.
