Of all of the roles Carrie Fisher embodied throughout her career, Princess Leia might be the most recognizable — not only because of General Organa's overall badass-ery, but also because of her iconic costumes from the original trilogy. There's the high-neck white gown, the metal belt, and, of course, the two oversized hair buns covering her ears. Following Fisher's passing this week, many fans have been paying tribute with their own takes on Leia's buns. Before that, though, Billie Lourd, the daughter of the late, great actress, had snuck her own shout-out to Leia through her Scream Queens wardrobe.
Nowadays, Lourd is best known for playing Chanel #3 on the Ryan Murphy show who, like Princess Leia, prefers to keep her ears covered on camera. (Chanel's ear-obscuring accessory choice is a pair of pink, fuzzy earmuffs.) In a December 8 interview on Late Night with Seth Meyers brought back to our attention by People, the 24-year-old actress revealed that it's not entirely a coincidence. "They are a little bit of a Princess Leia homage," Lourd told Meyers. "It's kind of a family tradition. I saw them in the fitting and was immediately gravitated towards them because I had to be."
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She goes on to explain that while her character wasn't originally meant to always be wearing earmuffs, once she "recognized [her] family heritage, which is to have weird things over your ears and cover them all the time," the opportunity couldn't be wasted. Writer Brad Falchuk decided to write them into Chanel #3's backstory, and the rest was television history.
In a separate segment on Today, Lourd admitted that sometimes the earmuffs can make it hard to escape comparisons to her mother, but she couldn't deny the draw of them in the wardrobe room. "I saw them and said, 'I need these. This is my destiny right here,'" she joked. Lourd has also described Chanel #3's earmuffs as "the ideal cult thing for me to wear" on Live with Kelly. We couldn't agree more.
While we may have missed this subtle nod at first, it's no less touching of an homage.