Carrie Fisher: Wishful Drinking (2010)

I'll tell you why so serious

i must have seen a different film!!

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

For some odd reason I never was aware of Carrie's "Wishful Drinking" show before after her untimely passing. So when I did happen to find it, I jumped at the chance to watch this. And I was sort of thrilled, because I have never seen her perform in something like this, much less did I actually know that she also did this kind of work.It turned out that "Wishful Drinking" was a nice show on a couple of different levels. First and foremost, it was nice and open view into Carrie's life, past and struggles, and she didn't really wrap much in bubble wrap. And it was also a fun show, with a good amount of laughs and enjoyment.I was genuinely surprised to see Carrie do this, and must admit that she excelled at it, and she felt very much at home on the stage. Watching "Wishful Drinking" does offer a good look into the real Carrie Fisher, especially if you haven't read her autobiographies beforehand. There are some very personal issues being aired, and they are delivered with honesty and often an approach that is spiced up with a pinch of comedy.Now, this is not a stand-up comedy routine, so you should not expect that kind of show if you sit down to watch this without knowing what it is about."Wishful Drinking" is a very honest show, and one that all fans of Carrie Fisher should take the time to watch.

Carrie Fisher's one woman show is, in a word, hilarious.Fisher tells it all, growing up in Hollywood, having Eddie Fisher for a father, the Liz-Debbie-Eddie triangle, Princess Leia, her drug addiction, and her "invitation to a mental hospital." She gives us a look via a big board of Hollywood Genealogy 101 ("but don't worry, Eddie wasn't alone for long...") filled with pictures and arrows of her parents, their spouses, their children, and her own two marriages and daughter, trying to find out if her daughter and another young man on the board could date, or were they, in fact, related? Due to his retention of the Star Wars licensing, Fisher advises us that George Lucas owns her image and likeness so that "every time I look in the mirror, I have to pay him a few bucks." And she tells the audience, "If you have a chance to be a Pez dispenser, DO IT." All in all, a fun evening, obviously from the mind that brought us the entertaining "Postcards from the Edge." Fisher sees the irony in life and mines it up and down roller coaster ride for all the humor there is. She is, after all, the daughter of Debbie Reynolds, who was nominated for an Oscar for "The Unsinkable Molly Brown"..."but lost to Julie Andrews for her multilayered, emotional, deep performance of Mary Poppins."

The show plods along with a few interesting and witty bits, but mostly is very negative, unfunny and nasty. I've seen Debbie's show, and though self deprecating and sometimes "bad taste" Debbie is also VERY FUNNY! I compare the two because Carrie because she has a similar humor, but much more bitter and hits "punch lines" over the head like a sledge hammer and actually waits for the audience to laugh, and when they don't, she insults them! Mostly the show was just uninteresting, a thing I wouldn't have thought possible considering her life story.In the interview with her mom, Debbie said Carrie didn't ask her for advice or notes, and only asked Debbie's opinion AFTER the show had closed. There's no telling how much better it might have been had Carrie groveled to ask for her mother's advice...

I know that I'll be in the minority here, but I did not like this Carrie Fisher one-woman show.Besides her rather obnoxious voice, she prances around the stage and discusses items that really shouldn't have been brought up again. We didn't need to hear about her relationship with her parents and how her father went from one woman to another after his divorce from Liz Taylor. Equally in poor taste, we didn't have to hear about Debbie's love life after Eddie. She didn't miss any details.Some of the funny lines included Debbie losing the 1964 best actress Oscar for "Unsinkable Molly Brown" to Julie Andrews's "Mary Poppins." The way she describe it, making Andrews a dramatic performer there was funny.Even George Lucas, Carrie Fisher's director in 1977's "Star Wars" comes under unnecessary scrutiny.Both at the beginning and end, Ms. Fisher sings "Happy Days are Here Again." To me, that was achieved when the show ended.The show was in poor taste and that board showing the Fisher-Reynolds lineage was a joke, and a bad one at that.