Dan Aykroyd's Relationship With Carrie Fisher Explained
Dan Aykroyd and Carrie Fisher first met on the set of "Saturday Night Live" in November 1978, per Vanity Fair. Their relationship would continue to blossom over the years, morphing from romance to a deep lifelong friendship, but one thing is clear throughout: These two talented, funny stars definitely had a soft spot for each other.
Dan Aykroyd was one of the original cast members of "SNL," and he went on to star in "The Blues Brothers" and later became one of the stars and head writers of "Ghostbusters," per Looper. Carrie Fisher, best known for her role as Princess Leia in the Star Wars franchise and widely beloved for her candidness about her own struggles and penchant for funny commentary, passed away at age 60 on December 27, 2016, per Britannica. Shortly after her death, Aykroyd penned a moving tribute to Fisher that showed the depth of his love and respect for her, published in Empire Magazine.
In the essay, he offers details about the pair's sometimes tumultuous but always affectionate relationship. According to the essay, Aykroyd and Fisher fell in love on the set of "The Blues Brothers," and the pair soon moved in together. While they were together, their relationship was a wild ride from start to finish.
Carrie Fisher and Dan Aykroyd's whirlwind romance
While filming "The Blues Brothers," Aykroyd and Fisher began a relationship, and at one point Aykroyd even proposed to Fisher — though not under the most traditionally romantic of circumstances. "On 'Blues Brothers,' he proposed in the trailer on set," Fisher said to the Chicago Tribune in 2008. "He was forcing me to eat because I was very thin in those days ... and I inhaled a Brussels sprout, and I started choking. He thought I was laughing, and then he saw that I was dying, and he did the Heimlich maneuver, and then like 10 minutes later he asked me to marry him."
Fisher agreed to marry him, and the pair apparently even went and took blood tests to determine their genetic compatibility, according to The Guardian. Per Aykroyd's essay in Empire, they also had a number of memorable adventures. The pair once spent a weekend on a Lake Tahoe estate, which included "three days of full-on weeping to Christmas classics," and which Aykroyd describes in the essay as "certainly one of the planet's greatest occasions where LSD was a factor."
Carrie Fisher and Dan Aykroyd's romance turns into a lifelong friendship
But unfortunately for Aykroyd, Fisher's heart belonged to someone else. Fisher had an on-again-off-again relationship with Paul Simon, and was attempting to reconcile with him during her relationship with Aykroyd.
"She had long conversations on the phone in my presence with Paul Simon, with whom she was attempting to reconcile at the time of my relationship with her," Aykroyd told Entertainment Weekly. "Here I found myself in love with a woman who was returning to a former intimate, and might I say a much better choice. But a woman who confided deeply in me and who valued my counsel."
Their relationship's death knell came when Aykroyd and Fisher moved to a house in Martha's Vineyard, which Aykroyd was in the process of renovating. "It was mid-century and really quite lovely," Judy Belushi said to Vulture. "But it was in some disrepair. Carrie hated it!" In 1980, Fisher left Martha's Vineyard and Aykroyd and moved back to New York to be with Paul Simon, whom she married in 1983 and divorced one year later, according to Vanity Fair.
Through it all, Aykroyd and Fisher remained close friends. "Throughout the process of her decision to not marry me and wed another, the reward for my unwavering support in whatever decision she wanted to do was the time I had with her as a trusted friend and fellow night hawk," wrote Aykroyd in his farewell tribute. "She married him but I hope she kept my ring."