James Blunt blames "pressure" to be thin for Carrie Fisher's 2016 death.
The singer made the claim while promoting his memoir Loosely Based on a Made-Up Story at the Hay Festival in Wales, per The Independent.
The British "You're Beautiful" singer was speaking about his "American mother" when he said that Fisher was pushed to drop weight to reprise her role as Princess Leia in the recent Star Wars trilogy.
Star Wars: The Last Jedi was released in 2017, after her death.
Blunt told the audience at the festival:
“I was with her the day before she died, when she came down to my house."
He and Fisher became close friends in the early 2000s after meeting at a party, according to his website.
The singer continued that Fisher hadn't been taking care of herself.
“And she’d been really mistreating her body.”
He attributed this mistreatment to "pressure to be thin" for her role in Star Wars.
“So she was really on a high and a positive, but they had applied a lot of pressure on her to be thin."
"She spoke about the difficulties that women have in the industry, how men are allowed to grow old, and women are certainly not.”
He added that she began using drugs again in response.
“She really put a lot of pressure on herself, started using drugs again and by the time she got on the plane, she had effectively killed herself."
“They say it was heart failure of some kind, but she had taken enough drugs to have a really good party.”
Fisher went into cardiac arrest on a flight from London to Los Angeles. She died days later.
A toxicology report showed the actor had cocaine, heroin, MDMA and methadone in her system.
People on social media agreed the pressure to be thin in Hollywood, especially for women, is unhealthy and often times unrealistic.
And, of course, they're still mourning the loss of Fisher.
Fisher had been open about losing weight for her role, as well.
In 2015, she told Good Housekeeping UK that she lost 35 pounds for Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
“They don’t want to hire all of me — only about three-quarters!”
“Nothing changes, it’s an appearance-driven thing. I’m in a business where the only thing that matters is weight and appearance."
“That is so messed up. They might as well say get younger, because that’s how easy it is.”
In his memoir, Blunt revealed he indulged with Fisher on occasion, despite knowing she struggled with substance abuse.
“Charlie, her best friend, confronted her more directly and told her she needed to quit drugs."
“I took a different approach and did them with her, pretending to myself that I would guide her to redemption one day — just not today. As a result, her daughter Billie [Lourd] blames me in part for her death, and no longer speaks to me.”
Neither Lucasfilm nor Rian Johnson, who directed the 2017 film Star Wars: The Last Jedi, have responded to requests for comment.
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