ROBIN WILLIAMS, July 21, 1951-August 11, 2014

[Chris Knipp]

http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/640x480q90/904/wL5sZJ.jpg
ROBIN WILLIAMS
July 21, 1951-
August 11, 2014

Legendary comic and actor Robn Williams is dead at 63, an apparent suicide at his home in Tiburon, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. His publicist reported that he had been suffering from "severe depression." He had also at times battled addiction. He leaves behind three children, two ex-wives, and one current wife, Susan Schneider. He became famous in the TV show "Mork and Mindy" which ran from 1978-82, His over a hundred screen credits include Dead Poets Society, Good Morning, Vietnam, Patch Adams and Bicentennial Man. His many awards include an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in Gus Van Sant's Good Will Hunting (for which Matt Damon and Ben Affleck received the Oscar for their screenplay) and he received Best Actor nominations three times. He also received numerous Emmy, Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild, and Grammy awards. Other well-remembered roles in films include Popeye, The World According to Garp, Moscow on the Hudson, Awakenings, The Fisher King, Mrs. Doubtfire, One Hour Photo, and Death to Smochy. He had been in many small roles and voice roles recently, less high profile since the Nineties. Twitter and other social media yesterday were flooded with references to Williams.

The NY Times obituary (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/12/movies/robin-williams-oscar-winning-comedian-dies-at-63.html?_r=0)mentions that Robin Williams "evolved into the surprisingly nuanced, Academy Award-winning actor, imbuing his performances with wild inventiveness and a kind of manic energy." This inventiveness and wild energy could best be seen in some of his talk show or standup comedy appearances. In a perceptive appreciation (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/12/movies/robin-williams-an-improvisational-genius-forever-present-in-the-moment.html?action=click&contentCollection=Movies&module=RelatedCoverage&region=Marginalia&pgtype=article) that begins with this aspect, the NY Times chief film critic A.O. Scott describes Williams' talent:
Mr. Williams was one of the most explosively, exhaustingly, prodigiously verbal comedians who ever lived. The only thing faster than his mouth was his mind, which was capable of breathtaking leaps of free-associative absurdity. Janet Maslin, reviewing his standup act in 1979, cataloged a tumble of riffs that ranged from an impression of Jacques Cousteau to “an evangelist at the Disco Temple of Comedy,” to Truman Capote Jr. at “the Kindergarten of the Stars” (whatever that was). “He acts out the Reader’s Digest condensed version of ‘Roots,’ ” Ms. Maslin wrote, “which lasts 15 seconds in its entirety. He improvises a Shakespearean-sounding epic about the Three Mile Island nuclear disaster, playing all the parts himself, including Einstein’s ghost.” (That, or something like it, was a role he would reprise more than 20 years later in Steven Spielberg’s “A.I.”) Scott adds that "But if Mr. Williams was often self-aware, commenting on what he was doing as he was doing it, he was rarely arch or insincere. He could, as an actor, succumb to treacliness sometimes — maybe more than sometimes — but his essential persona as an entertainer combined neediness and generosity, intelligence and kindness, in ways that were charming and often unexpectedly moving as well." Scotts observes that when Williams held back his exuberance it added energy and tension to his more straightforward performances; that he was "an excellent and disciplined character actor" who could play straight man with calm and skill when needed. For me personally the balance of these qualities was best displayed in the passion of the prep-school teacher he plays in Peter Weir's Dead Poets Society, a movie that on second viewing at home a long time ago touched me as intensely as any screen experience I can remember, with its tragic ending, the death, by suicide, by the way, of a sensitive young aspiring actor played by Robert Sean Leondard. This film also included the memorable first appearance of Ethan Hawke, in an intense scene where Williams, as the inspiring teacher, goads Hawke's character into overcoming his reserve. Robin Williams was an inspirer as well as an entertainer: he amused and delighted and touched many hearts.

[Johann]

This sad news was on the front page of the Ottawa Sun today. I was hoping it was natural causes.
Now I'm really sad.
What can you say about it? Suicide? It sucks. It really really sucks.

Three weeks after his 63rd birthday. Very sad.

[Chris Knipp]

I learned about it first on Twitter -- where you get news as it happens and discussion with the global community. Please join me on Twitter and let's follow each other! I'm at
https://twitter.com/IKIRU2

[Chris Knipp]

When I said Williams has been "less high profile since the Nineties" I was just speaking out of ignorance. He toured Australia doing standup --focusing a lot on about alcoholism and recovery -- for the first time in 2011 ("Weapons of Self Instructioni" can be watched in the HBO production here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiCxqbT2Ru8)). And that year also starred in what appears to have been a very good play on Broadway, THE BENGAL TIGER IN THE BAGDAD ZOO (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/01/theater/reviews/bengal-tiger-with-robin-williams-review.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0) (Williams played the tiger). But maybe not that good a play -- see the review by the very smart and articulate John Lahr (Burt's son) in The New Yorker. (http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/04/11/tooth-and-claw-2) Still, Robin Williams was good for the role, and it was a rather bold endeavor for him to take on. He was always present, and going to see GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (why? I don't know; because kids love it and it's sweet and in parts beautiful) there was a trailer with Robin Williams in the MUSEUM series playing Teddy Rooseveldt. And he looked like he was having fun. There are four movies coming out shortly with him in them. That's profile. Nobody had forgotten Robin Williams, as you can see from the general reaction to his passing.

Just watched the "O Captain!" and "Carpe diem" scenes from DEAD POETS SOCIETY on YouTube. Also Siskel and Ebert's review of that movie. Did you know they both said it was just a mass of cliches, a disappointment? Ebert panned it, quite glibly, with stock phrases more cliched by far than anything in the film, and would not recommend it. Both said the ending was cheap and cliched. Well, it this is true I don't know, but this movie is powerful and true. The "O Captain!" scene Williams said in an Australian interview made an engineer on set cry when they were shooting it. Its symbolism and theatrical power are so great you don't have to know any of the context. You just see it and you are moved.

Some of Williams' standup routines are foul-spoken and cruel. He was nasty in his mockery of Michael Jackson, and easy target and a cheap shot. But then again, he's hilarious and incredibly brilliant.

[Johann]

I've never been on Twitter. It's another distraction to me. Even Facebook has become a bit of a Bane.
I follow you here, on the best website on the Earth ;)

Chez 106 radio here in Ottawa did an entire day dedicated to Robin, with listeners callling in to share their favorite things about Robin.
Hearing Norm MacDonald's tribute was incredible. He described why Robin was so Awesome.
Tragedy aside, I want answers on what happened to him. No one expected this, yet his wife and his manager both knew he was battling a severe depression recently. No signs of a suicide attempt whatsoever? Robin just thought he'd surprsise the world? By hanging himself?
I hope this isn't an "open and shut case" just yet.
The man meant a lot to a lot of people. He deserves the benefit of the doubt, don't you think?

[Chris Knipp]

Robin Williams is easily worth a day of remembrances, or much more. I have found his recent standup "Weapons of Self Destruction" (HBO, 2011) timely, brilliant and very funny. This is what happens: one truly appreciates people only after they're gone. Link to this whole standup performance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkMX-s4khNA

Twitter is history in the making, and puts one in touch with the immediate thought processes sometimes of one's idols and influences. It's through Twitter that I began getting Mike D'Angelo's intelligent and precise ratings/reviews of 30-odd new films at both Cannes and Toronto for three years now. I find Twitter more serious than Facebook and definitely less commercial. You have to choose who you are going to "Follow" though to get their tweets, or look them up too because they don't always come up on my "Home" channel. It's like having your ear to the ground of the global village. But it is hardly random, given that one chooses whom to "Follow", as I say.

I find Twitter more interesting and less a waste of time than Facebook but one can hardly ignore either, both being major elements of social media.

Where I am not yet up to date is Instagram. I just received notice that Film Forum in New York now posts its events on Instagram. Yes, there are too many different platforms. But they reach different audiences and function differently. Twitter is notable for the brevity of its bulletins from the front and how many different people and organizations it gives one direct access too, as one chooses.

It is interesting to me to debate (anywhere online) DEAD POETS SOCIETY. It did seem well made but conventional and mawkish when I first saw it, then when I rewatched it the profound effect the sad ending had on me made it become for me a quite significant film. I found the last sequences aroused deep feelings due to feelings about my own youth I hadn't even been aware of. Unusual. As Siskel and Ebert noted in their unfairly dismissive reviews of DEAD POETS SOCIETY (how many inferior movies did they praise? Lots, trust me) Mr. Keating, Williiams' teacherr in the film, is less important ultimately than the key boys, but he's still their mentor, and Robin plays this role with his own unique conviction.

[oscar jubis]

I must say I am very old-fashioned and have never participated in social media and have largely ignored a lot of new technology. I also don't post any commentary anywhere but on this site (I am very ascetic, in a lot of ways). I think it's amazing that we've known each other on this site for 12 years but we have never met. I was very sad to learn of the death of Robin Williams, and I appreciate the posts above.

[Chris Knipp]

Well, you may be just as well off without all the internet, but once you get involved in it and have a blog and website as I do (and my reviews appear in several other places, but not discussions or comments), it becomes desirable to exploit all the possibilities. I am interested in world politics and that makes Twitter very interesting. It also provides up-to-the-minute information about reviews the minute they are published, and I've mentioned that I like to follow Mike D'Angelo's Twitter thumnail reviews and numerical ratings for all the films he sees at Cannes and Toronto shortly after each screening he watches.

I just read an interview with Woody Allen and he says he is not a voter in the Motion Picture Academy and doesn't watch any TV except news and sports. He suggested giving Best Picture to Crash over Brokeback Mountain might have been wrong but then can't give his own opinion because he has not seen either picture. But he says Fargo ought to have won over The English Patient, and that implies he has seen them, at least.

An "ascetic" life is also a focused life and good for a productive artistic or scholarly career.

[Chris Knipp]

I probably wouldn't have watched Robin Williams' recent standup show "Weapons of Self Destruction" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkMX-s4khNA) had he not died, but it has a lot to say and it is very, very funny. It takes him till an hour in (it's nearly 90 minutes) but he does finally get to the Self Destruction -- his alcoholism. Then the humor turns pretty grim for a while. His picture of being a drunk isn't light and fluffy. He had been to some pretty dark places. And maybe he really stayed there. But afrter that his description of how human sex organs were invented is hilarious again.

http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/640x480q90/539/IXEKiR.jpg
ROBIN WILLIAMS DOING "WEAPONS OF SELF DESTRUCTION"
(HBO 2009). DESCRIBING SEX AT 58, AFTER OPEN HEART
SURGERY.

[Johann]

Now we can call it open and shut. He was battling the onset of Parkinson's disease I learned yesterday. He probably wanted to avoid the pain it would cause him and his loved ones. He needed to do it with no warning. Goodbye Robin. You were a COMET OF COMEDY.
You and Christopher Reeve are having a Grand Old Time right now I imagine.
Amazing Robin has over 100 screen credits!
Popeye is probably my favorite film he was in, followed by A.I.

Re: Twitter. It probably is awesome for instant news from around the world. I haven't been on Facebook for over two months and people are needling me (family and friends!) asking where I am and what I'm doing. It becomes a spy ring! Nosy mofos...LOL

I also have never posted about movies anywhere else but here. Facebook I've made the odd comment, but I am loyal to this site for life.
No one has ever edited me, I've learned mountains of things, we have no douchebags posting mindless items, it's kind of a utopia for me :)
It would be ruined if we had hundreds or thousands of "users".
I also haven't written on the IMBD in years, and it comes down to Peter e-mailing me in 2002 to write here.
No one had ever asked me to write about movies. Anywhere.
So that earned my ironclad Loyalty. Whether or not he wants me here is another story.

[Chris Knipp]

We all want you here. And thanks to Peter for approaching you via IMDb. I still post a review there as a viewer once in a while when that seems like the best way of getting it read. It is so global and widely consulted, more than once the director of a film has contacted me through it.

As I've said I was not a particular fan of Robin Williams, but I recognize the wattage of his brilliant talent. I love A.I. but my favorite of his roles has to be Mr. Keating in Dead Poets Society. I find in her review of it, published in her collection Movie Love from 1988, also on the New Yorker archive if you are a subscriber, Pauline Kael begins with a very admiring and detailed description of his performance -- I may quote it at length later -- starting "Robin Williams' performance is more graceful than anything he's done before." She isn't fully satisfied with Weir's film -- "The picture doesn't rise to the level of tragedy" -- but she is far fairer and takes it far more seriously than the clueless Siskel and Ebert, whose TV roles reduced them to parodies of daily paper critics on this any many other occasions.

[Johann]

I guess I should see Dead Poets. I've never seen it. The time is right, I suppose.
Peter Weir is a name in cinema. I've liked most of his films.

We won't mention Spielberg's Hook. :)

[cinemabon]

Growing up in the Midwest, I carried a torch for Johnny Carson many years. From the time he began in New York, he showcased tons of new talent, especially comedians. He and his staff used to comb the comedy clubs for the best stand up talent.

One of the first comedians he showcased while in New York that had the ability to act out a stream of consciousness was Johnathan Winters. Winters had an incredible ability to take anything or any comment and turn it into humor. Many of us are taught improvisation in acting school. Some understand it and try to own it. With others, it bursts forth like a newly discovered spring and quenches a thirsty audience with its cool fresh wit. Winters had that gift and so did Robin Williams. Like Williams, Winter often fought off bouts of depression with alcohol (which actually exacerbates the problem).

When Williams first appeared on the Tonight Show, he showed a side to him he could not express on his television show. His first film, "Popeye" should have ended his career. Williams said that his agent asked him why he kept one eye closed. Williams shot back, "His name is Popeye!" On the set of "The World According to Garp," his penchant for spontaneity backfired when he improvised a line. George Roy Hill winced and very quietly said, "Just say the words, Robin." I wish I'd been trained at Julliard and had Christopher Reeve as a roommate. I believe his first successful film came along with Paul Mazursky's "Moscow on the Hudson." Forced to play his scenes with the same drama he'd been taught in school, Williams pulled off the film with greater range. I have several scenes I find very gratifying but my favorite one is... "Coffee... coffee... COFFEE!!" When you see the movie, you'll understand.

Another five year gap and he hit a home run with "Dead Poets Society" Meanwhile, Williams performed a great deal of stand up and did perhaps one of the greatest stand up routines ever when he performed at the Met in the early 80's, right around the same time he shot "Moscow on the Hudson." Even now that routine stands alone as a tribute to his genius.

Williams became a more frequent guest on the Tonight Show and twice appeared at the same time with Jonathan Winters - whom Williams considered his idol. Their last time together in Carson's presence is considered one of the finest comedic late television. That night, it was like watching an electrical storm, mesmerizing, fascinating and totally unpredictable. You wondered where the next joke would strike. The two masters went back and forth, sparring as if the rest of the world didn't matter, playing off each other so fast with so much frequency, Tonight Show producer Freddy Cordova said he lost track of time until the director yelled in his ear, "Commercial!"

"No great mind has ever existed without a touch of madness." Aristotle

[Johann]

Henry Rollins has a great article on suicide, in the wake of Robin Williams' death:

www.laweekly.com/westcoastsound/2014/08/21/henry-rollins-fuck-suicide

[Chris Knipp]

Rollins fails to note Williams' children are adults and he left them large trust funds.

A DVD of ROBIN WILLIAMS LIVE AT THE MET (1982?) is available on DVD for $22.99 here. (http://www.santaflix.com/rowiliatmeta.html) If Netflix had it I'd watch it to augment my experience with the 90-minute 2009 HBO (available on YouTube presently here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkMX-s4khNA)) WEAPONS OF SELF DESTRUCTION.

[Johann]

Money or no money, Robin's *Young* adult daughter was traumatized on Twitter as a result of his suicide. It was an insensitive asshole who perpetrated it, yet she was "shaking" and over the incident and vowed to swear off social media forever.

[cinemabon]

Or if you're low on funds, the same concert is on YouTube.

[Chris Knipp]

Did not know that performance was available free on YouTube, cinemabon, thanks:

ROBIN WILLIAMS: LIVE AT THE MET (1986) on YouTube (one-hour complete video). (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ueDu_gZ_1ZA)

This one is HBO too, like the later WEAPONS OF SELF DESTRUCTION (2009).