Billie Lourd: Inside Her Close Bond With Her Mom Carrie Fisher And Grandmother Debbie Reynolds
Billie Lourd is experiencing unimaginable grief as she mourns the loss of the two most important women in her life. The Scream Queens star, who lost her mother, Carrie Fisher, on Dec. 27, is now mourning the death of her grandmother, entertainment legend Debbie Reynolds, just one day later. Billie Lourd is grieving privately, but her uncle, Todd Fisher, told E! News he can’t imagine what his niece is going through.
“Carrie’s daughter is 24 years old,” Fisher told E! Of Billie Lourd. “To have to lose the girls, it’s just horrible. She’s got their genes but you can’t even imagine. I can’t imagine being 24 and having to do this and I’m 59.”
Fisher said his famous mother was overcome with grief after the death of his sister and said she “wanted to be with Carrie.” Reynolds suffered a stroke and died a day after her famous daughter passed away.
Billie Lourd will have the support of her remaining family members as she tries to cope with this profound loss. Her uncle Todd told the New York Daily News Billie will have full control over funeral arrangements for her mother, as well as anything she wants from her late mother’s estate.
“We want her to have whatever she wants. Carrie wanted that,” Fisher told the Daily News. “There is a trust set up. But we’re all pretty well off. This was her mother…We’re very proud of her. She’s handling this with amazing strength.”
Billie Lourd’s uncle revealed that there would likely be two funeral services for his sister, a private one and a public one, and that the Star Wars actress would be buried in a family plot near her mother.
“Nobody knew this was coming,” Lourd’s uncle said. “My mother has explicit plans about what she wants to do (for herself), but at Carrie’s age, she didn’t make plans. We’ll have a small family thing and then likely there will be a wider body of people involved in a second service. We have a family plot we’re looking at right now.”
While Billie Lourd and her uncle now share the horror of losing their mothers within 48-hours of one another, Billie has reportedly already taken on the important task of caring for her late mom’s beloved French bulldog, Gary. According to TMZ, Fisher’s famous red carpet companion will be placed in Billie’s care. The four-year-old puppy will join Lourd’s own French bulldog, Tina. The two dogs are reportedly best friends.
Billie Lourd was extraordinarily close with her mom. In an interview earlier this year with Teen Vogue, Lourd said her mother raised her to be open minded.
“She told me to be true, and kind, and confident in yourself,” Billie said. “She raised me to not think of men and women as different. She raised me without gender. It’s kind of the reason she named me Billie. It’s not about being a strong woman — it’s about being a strong person.”
Billie Lourd’s last public appearance with her mom and grandmother was last year, when the trio attended the 2015 Screen Actors Guild Awards, according to E! News. At the time, Reynolds joked that she wore a “big, ugly bun” in the classic movie Singin’ in the Rain, and that she warned her daughter to “be careful of any weird hairdos” when she landed the high-profile role of Princess Leia in Star Wars.
“So, luckily, George [Lucas] gave her two buns. Thank you, George,” Reynolds joked.
Debbie Reynolds, Carrie Fisher and Billie Lourd's last public appearance together was magical: https://t.co/gsOCqqQ3IM pic.twitter.com/yQ8d8kidSq
— E! News (@enews) December 29, 2016
Billie Lourd recently said the supersized fuzzy earmuffs she wore as Chanel No. 3 in Scream Queens is actually an homage to the famed Cinnabon-size buns her mom wore in Star Wars.
“They are a little bit of a Princess Leia homage,” the 24-year-old revealed during a recent appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers.“It’s kind of a family tradition.”
Billie, who had a small role in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, said none of her costars, including Abigail Breslin and Emma Roberts, wanted to wear the supersized earmuffs, but she was “drawn to them because of genetics.”
“I saw them in the fitting and was immediately gravitated towards them because I had to be,” Billie explained. “I just went into the fitting, saw them, [and] recognized my family heritage – which is to have weird things over your ears and cover them all the time.”
Earlier this year, a proud Billie Lourd talked to People about the documentary about her mom and grandmother, Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds, which made its debut in Cannes.
“I was [interviewed] a little bit [for the documentary],” Lourd said. “It was more of a Debbie-Carrie thing. I’m always proud of my mother, she’s killing it right now. She’s incredible.”
Lourd also said it was “such an incredible thing to get footage” of her grandmother’s younger days as a dancer and actress.
“She’s had such an incredible career and she’s done so many shows that people don’t even know about,” Billie said. “It’s an incredible thing for people to see what a full star she is. She really does it all.”
Billie described Reynolds is “an incredible grandmother,” and she revealed that they lived together in a family compound.
“She is incredibly funny,” Billie said at the time.
“I was downstairs with her just a week ago – she lives downstairs at my house, we’re all on this crazy actors compound that is insane. And I went down there and she was trying to convince me to start my own act, because she thinks that that’s the way that acting happens.”
Billie also said her grandmother was a huge fan of Scream Queens.
“She thinks it’s hilarious, she loves it so much,” Lourd said. “She loves the costumes. [She’s] obsessed with fur and ear muffs and all of that.”
It’s clear that Billie Lourd had a very close relationship with her famous family members, and that her mom and grandmother were extremely proud of her. In one of her final tweets about her daughter, Carrie Fisher wrote:
“My daughter Billie Lourd from Scream Queens. She’s MUCH more than my kid. Witty & pretty, I aspire 2 deserve her.”
[Featured Image by Ethan Miller/Getty Images]
