Why Isn't Leia a Disney Princess

Should Princess Leia become an official Disney princess? Plenty of fans think so, as most recently evidenced by a petition launched following Carrie Fisher's death. As of Thursday, the petition has 33,000 supporters who want the Star Wars character to join the official Disney Princess club, which is fairly exclusive—so far, it officially includes only Belle, Rapunzel, Ariel, Tiana, Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Merida, Pocahontas, Jasmine, and Mulan. But what would induction into this group actually mean for the character?

Before we begin, it's important to note that not all princesses in Disney movies get to be "Disney Princesses." Just ask Amy Adams, whose Enchanted character did not make the cut because of the same rule most obviously standing in Leia's way: all Disney Princesses are animated characters. (Adams's Giselle was animated for portions of the film, but Adams herself appeared on-screen for most of the movie.) As the Huffington Post points out, a character played by a live-action actress will forever be associated with that actress's image—which complicates things like, say, hiring actors to play the character in Disney parks. The fan behind the petition claims "it's time to change the rules" in Leia's favor. What it doesn't acknowledge, though, is that "Disney Princess" might actually be a reductive title for Leia.

Sure, some of those Disney Princesses contain multitudes; look at Mulan, who went to war in her father's place and earned her family honor through sheer bravery and refusal to accept a patriarchal military establishment's rules. As the emperor himself put it in the film, "You don't meet a girl like that every dynasty." It's easy to imagine Leia getting along with someone like that. But Mulan is an exception among the other princesses. (In fact, she's not even technically a princess, neither by birth nor by marriage!) Aside from obvious marketing consistency, it's hard to imagine why one would call her a "princess" in the first place. And similarly, slapping the Princess™ label on Leia foregrounds the least interesting thing about her.

Leia's promotion to General Organa in The Force Awakens marked an important shift in the character's image. Many fans and critics lauded that move; as Quartz pointed out following the film's release, we should view Leia as "a politician, a resistance leader, and a solider" as much as a princess. On-screen, we see Leia acting as a politician and a revolutionary far more than we see her performing her duties as a princess. Once again, it seems that playing up her royal status would have more to do with marketing than anything else.

Fisher once retweeted Twitter fans calling for more Princess Leia toys; given that, it seems misguided to assume the commercial aspect of being a Disney princess would have bothered the actress. But the confines of what being a Disney princess entails—wholesomeness, agreeability, generic pluck that's never too bold or threatening—might have.

Then again, why take our word for it when you can take Fisher's? The actress actually sounded off on that very subject at a comic convention in Indiana two years ago. And while she seemed to find the idea amusing, she also proved that she (and, by extension, Leia) are almost certainly too edgy to fit the Disney mold.

"Now I get to go to those Disney princess meetings," Fisher said. "So we get to wake up Sleeping Beauty. She's really pretty when she's asleep, but when you wake that bitch up? Wow. . . . And the mermaid, they don't tell you about that. That girl has really—you know what happens when you're waterlogged, [your skin] gets all crinkly. That's not a good look if someone's in a bathing suit. . . . So, it's things like that that we talk about at the meetings. And I can help them, you know, get to their real, powerful self. . . . I'm actually a very good shot so I will teach them that and, you know, I think you'll be surprised when you see Cinderella next time."

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Remembering Carrie Fisher's Life in Photographs

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From Camera Press/Redux.

The Fisher family. From left to right: Todd, Eddie, Carrie, and Debbie Reynolds at home, 1958.

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Why Isn't Leia a Disney Princess

Source: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/01/carrie-fisher-princess-leia-disney-princess

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