I always thought it strange to ask for autographs. But my mother gave me a book for them one Christmas. Strange because my Mum knew a shit load of influential people and never paraded any photos of her and ‘them’ in front of me. Even as an aspiring young actor I couldn’t see the point. I actually met these people. And then actually worked beside them! Why do I need a squiggle on a sheet of paper? Or God forbid the 2014 ‘Andy Warhol’ equivalent photo op of a ‘selfie’. Perhaps Rene Descartes on acid: I digitize with them therefore I am. My Mum was actually, cleverly preparing me for the world’s reality: that it is very hard to sparkle in that great sea. Something I thought I’d surpassed her on but in realty has always and will always be the same. Mr Williams would have chortled at that autograph album with great affection for my Mum I am sure. When you see a documentary about how being obsessed with a particular rock band or whoever saved the participants lives I totally buy it. At least it beats drugs!
I remember watching Robin on a UK talk show many years ago- was he happy, sad?- it is always hard to tell because great talents just don’t indulge themselves like that. But he was tired, jet-lagged maybe on something but then most probably maybe not. He was as sharp and funny, funny as sharp as ever. He laughed at a pair of scissors. (This was the post 9/11 years. But he was respectful and understanding if totally frustrated by the idiocy of it all.) He didn’t say “oh btw did you pack the Islamic joke book yourself, sir?- nor –‘I hear the ‘car bomb’ part isn’t that funny as they got the wiring wrong. Had they never heard of someone called a joke writer?’ [addition- memory is strange nay often funny so perhaps THIS interview became conflated with another or maybe there was no other....; This post has obviously been amended here. The most searing comedy of course is based in real tragedy.]
[another addition-Feb 7, 2015:
Stefan Molyneux’s Life of Robin Williams youtube post (very bravely a day after his death) is Robin Williams without the jokes. Or rather: without the soul. If you have watched much of Robin Williams material and heard his ‘entertaining’ nay ‘carcinogenicaly funny’ version of his life then it's a post so sadly sobering. How much fun is life being ‘sober’ is the question? Point being: Stefan Molyneux’s post is something to be very considered amongst the Williams’ archive. Molyneux is a very, very, very brave focker- have you tried guesting on Lenny Bruce's St Peter's Failed Warm-ups- Mr Williams is saying beyond the grave: God bless you! -Like AA on earth only it's the place to drink Panda bamboo juice and fell good about yourself! Some beautiful women in the word exist Mr. Molyneux (1-800 # Brilliant Adventures - mention any Saint for the next 30 days and receive a 5% discount). Methinks they are not eating that vital TV cereal every morrow elsewhere on la planet where 'clean air' and 'clean water' are less negotiable commodities.
Robin Williams will always be Robin Williams. And nobody ever took nor will THAT away from him.
This battle fares like to the morning's war,
When dying clouds contend with growing light,
What time the shepherd, blowing of his nails,
Can neither call it perfect day nor night.
Now sways it this way, like a mighty sea
Forced by the tide to combat with the wind;
Now sways it that way, like the selfsame sea
Forced to retire by fury of the wind:
Sometime the flood prevails, and then the wind;
Now one the better, then another best;
Both tugging to be victors, breast to breast,
Yet neither conqueror nor conquered:
So is the equal of this fell war.
Here on this molehill will I sit me down.
To whom God will, there be the victory!
For Margaret my queen, and Clifford too,
Have chid me from the battle; swearing both
They prosper best of all when I am thence.
Would I were dead! if God's good will were so;
For what is in this world but grief and woe?
O God! methinks it were a happy life,
To be no better than a homely swain;
To sit upon a hill, as I do now,
To carve out dials quaintly, point by point,
Thereby to see the minutes how they run,
How many make the hour full complete;
How many hours bring about the day;
How many days will finish up the year;
How many years a mortal man may live.
When this is known, then to divide the times:
So many hours must I tend my flock;
So many hours must I take my rest;
So many hours must I contemplate;
So many hours must I sport myself;
So many days my ewes have been with young;
So many weeks ere the poor fools will ean:
So many years ere I shall shear the fleece:
So minutes, hours, days, months, and years,
Pass'd over to the end they were created,
Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave.
Ah, what a life were this! how sweet! how lovely!
Gives not the hawthorn-bush a sweeter shade
To shepherds looking on their silly sheep,
Than doth a rich embroider'd canopy
To kings that fear their subjects' treachery?
O, yes, it doth; a thousand-fold it doth.
And to conclude, the shepherd's homely curds,
His cold thin drink out of his leather bottle.
His wonted sleep under a fresh tree's shade,
All which secure and sweetly he enjoys,
Is far beyond a prince's delicates,
His viands sparkling in a golden cup,
His body couched in a curious bed,
When care, mistrust, and treason waits on him.
Was Live at the Met a Me+ show (in Molyneux terminology)? Perhaps. But rarely, very rarely was the + that obvious. If it were then the audience wouldn’t laugh. Because they would see more the performer and not themselves. If we all told the sobering truth would there be unlikely a world left in which to tell jokes? Maybe on the back of Robin’s gravestone there should be (amongst other unseen things-(Popeye was a work of genius: 'f' you Stefan Molyneux- if it weren't for my Dad's sperm my gravedigger might have lost his job and Molyneux might have been run down by a skateboarder that day;) Fuck being a shepherd!
I remember Robin bouncing down the center aisle stairs at the 1999 Deauville Film Festival to join the very very great of Hollywood as they gathered on stage to be gaped at and honored. He didn’t bounce to be noticed. Or different. It was, in truth, just all a bit of a circus at the end of the day. But when the circus comes to town it always makes people smile and gasp. I saw the Broadway revival of Pippin. I thought of Robin at the ending. The illusion. The reality. The something that you never want to take away from people’s dreams. And yet you just know it may well never happen without dire consequences.
To my mind Robin’s greatest film roles were One Hour Photo and World’s Greatest Dad. Both were about the longingly perpetuated myth of family and belonging. When people say that Robin Williams brought laughter and hope into people’s lives rather than despair it is no truer than in these two films. World’s Greatest Dad isn’t about cynicism it is about human hypocrisy. And how through exposing that one may indeed find one’s true family and being. Not even the 'great Dad', though, is portrayed to be without a sincerely self-serving streak.
You are now in a beautiful place Robin. The world always disappointed you and yet the irony was that you would have had absolutely nothing to say if the people were perfect. You would have had 3.2 kids, 2 dogs and a BBQ every summer where you would all bitch and preen and be happily, happily nothing. YOU was what people aspired to be. A free, intelligent, irreverent yet respectful spirit. (Did I say rich: the very thing you just were not that interested in. Unless a divorce came along;)
We will never make that movie together now Robin. But does it matter? We already made it! The movie was there always in our heads. And our hearts. And that is all that really matters in this hilly world of beans that complains about whether the little 'bleeders' were baked or organic. Just to be a bean. Now isn’t it?
The Daily Show Robin Williams survival Omnibus (It REALLY is just too too painful to watch- but guess that is very VERY cheap therapy. How is that that not funny?)
Aladdin - Friend Like me
There is so so much wonderful Mr Williams on the internet to cheer up everyone. But I forgot Terry Gilliam’s The Fisher King. If Robin Williams had only ever made one movie he would always be remembered for this: its love, sincerity, lack of judgment, bravery. And you can’t help thinking that if someone had only asked Robin to come to the park that tomorrow morning this week, given him $100 and asked if we could film him. Spending it, giving it to the bums, or to the birds, the plants: simply saying hello to the world. He may have just said YES. He loved to work. To see. To listen. What dreams may come…
The Fisher King (1991)
