On the day that Robin Williams passed away, Hollywood lost one of its most endearing smiles and one of its comedians, equally talented for drama, cooler. Beloved and recognized for his acting career, his sympathy and his solidarity, he would have turned 70 on July 21.
Actor Robin Williams, acclaimed for his role in films such as “Good Will Hunting” or “Good Morning Vietnam”, died in 2014.
“For my mother everything is wonderful. My father, on the other hand, had a slightly darker view of the world: ‘It sucks! Get used to it! ‘”The actor said in 1991, according to Rolling Stone magazine.
Williams was the only child in common of the marriage formed by Robert, a traveler for the American automotive company Ford, and Laura McLaurin, a former model and actress, and came into the world in July 1951, in Chicago.
He later found out that he had half-brothers from his parents’ previous marriages.
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After his father’s retirement, when he was 16 years old, they moved to the San Francisco Bay area. In California he finished high school and began studying at Claremont Men’s College.
“Williams studied Political Science, played soccer for coach Steve Davis, and displayed his trademark fast-paced humor to the delight of his classmates.”, you can read on the center page.
After just one year, he enrolled at the College of Marin, where he took acting and improv classes. In 1973 he moved to New York to continue his training at the Juilliard School, where he met Christopher Reeve. And then back to the west coast.
Already in California, Williams performed in nightclubs and shortly after came his first television appearances as “Laugh-In” and “The Richard Pryor.”
His work as a guest artist on the series “Happy Days”, giving life to an alien named Mork, led to the “spin-off” entitled “Mork and Mindy”, which aired from 1978 to 1982.
There was also room for the big screen in the early years of Williams’ career.
His name appeared as the protagonist in the poster for “Popeye”, 1980; from “The World According to Garp”, from 1982, and “The Best of Times”, in 1986, sharing the main role with Kurt Russel.
But, it was his portrayal of the sergeant and radio host sent to Vietnam during the war, Adrian Cronauer, on “Good Morning, Vietnam” that gave the final boost to his career and earned him his first Oscar nomination.
The second was not long in coming. In 1990, the Academy re-nominated him for his work on “Dead Poets Society.”
In it he gave life to mr. Keating, an unorthodox professor by the standards of the private, elite male college where he taught literature.
Two years later, he received the third for “The Fisher King”, directed by Terry Gilliam, in which he got into the skin of a homeless man with psychological problems who saves the life of a suicidal DJ, and then together they start the quest for the Holy Grail.
FINALLY THE OSCAR
In 1998 he finally got a statuette. “This may be the only time I have no words,” he said at the beginning of his acceptance speech causing laughter from the audience.
The Academy recognized on this occasion his work as a supporting actor in “Good Will Hunting,” written by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck and directed by Gus Van Sant.
After thanking Damon and Affleck, Van Sant, the cast and crew, and his wife at the time, Williams referenced his father.
“And above all, I want to thank my father, up there, the man who when I told him I wanted to be an actor told me: ‘Wonderful, just have a profession like plan b, as a welder'”.
This title was preceded and succeeded by others such as “Moscow on the Hudson”, “Aladdin”, in which he lent his voice and interpretive capacity to the Genie, “The Birdcage”, “Insomnia”, “One Hour Photo”, “World’s Greatest Dad ”and“ The Butler ”, among others.
“I was in a small town that is not the edge of the world, but you can see it from there, and then I thought about drinking. I just thought, ‘hey, maybe drinking will help.’
Because I was lonely and scared, ”the actor told The Guardian in 2010 about his relapse with alcohol in 2003.
Williams had had problems with drinking and cocaine before, which she had overcome before the birth of her first child in 1983.
“Cocaine for me was a place to hide. Most people become hyperactive on coke. It slowed me down, ”he told People in 1988.
In the subsequent relapse, he told The Guardian, he did not use this substance again because he knew it would kill him.
Three years later, in 2006, after the intervention of his family, he went to rehabilitation.
Williams has been married three times. The first, with Valerie Velardi, with whom he had his first child, from 1978 to 1983, although his divorce became official in 1988.
A year later he went through the altar again with Marsha Garces, a marriage from which his other two children were born and which lasted until their separation in 2008. The third and last yes I want of the actor he gave to Susan Schneider, in 2011.
On August 10, 2014, the actor committed suicide. In the first days, depression was pointed out as a trigger, but later it was learned that he suffered from Lewy body dementia. “It wasn’t the depression that killed him,” said his widow in 2015, “the depression was one of the 50, let’s call it, symptoms and it was a small one.”
This type of dementia causes a progressive decline in mental abilities and those who suffer from it may experience hallucinations, mood swings, changes in alertness or alterations in motor ability.
“I spent this last year trying to figure out what killed Robin, trying to understand … what we were fighting and one of the doctors said, ‘Robin was very aware that he was losing his mind and there was nothing he could do about it.” Schneider said a year after his death on Good Morning America.
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