Robin Williams is dead

@OmSigDAVID,

Hi David. Williams quite famously suffered from deep clinical depression. He had 4 movies in the can. He had crazy money coming in.

For those of us who've stood on the precipice of destructive depression, I'd like to speak for what I think he suffered. He has famously said how horrible it is to be with people, surrounded by adoration and feel completely alone. I used to complain to myself about him that he was always "on." He rarely spoke as R. Williams. He always went into a character or a voice - and I think this was his way of ealing with the fact that he couldn't stand to be in the world as himself.

I think he suffered horribly in this world, and took a measure of solace in "being someone else."

He was a genuine, but painfully sensitive man who could bear his suffering no longer.

2 Replies

@Lash,

Quote:

He had crazy money coming in

says who? He earned $3.6 million for his cancelled series, of which he would have kept about $2 million after taxes and agent fees. Not of his four movies are big productions that are likely to pay talent much, and even if they did the money would be on the back end and only if the movies make money, he did not have it when he died.

His last comic tour was not so good, his series bombed, he had not had a hit movie in years and publically stated that he was not being offered scripts that had much of a payday attached. I think he was broke, was having no fun, and thought that his talent was gone. Family was not enough to keep him here.

1 Reply

I was hit by an 8-week spell of depression out of the blue in 1978 and i've never forgot it, it was as if waves of despair and the hopelessness of human existence kept flooding my brain and the whole world seemed cold and dark, and for the first time in my life I seriously began to consider whether "demons" had got in my head.
I was very down but not quite suicidal, and began reading the Bible more to find something to convince me that life wasn't meaningless, and gradually the depression lifted and hasn't been back.
I kept up the Bible reading and grew stronger and stronger over the years.. Smile

PS- if it's any comfort to Williams fans, the Bible does NOT say suicide is a sin despite what some organised religions try to say.

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@Romeo Fabulini,

I'm very happy you found something to help you.

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@hawkeye10,

Says the pay scale for accomplished, popular actors with 4 movies made. He was still in demand and working.

1 Reply

@Lash,

Quote:

He was still in demand and working.

You are a teacher right? For him it was probably like working for decades in the best districts, but now only being offered jobs in pre-schools. His last job at a so-so school he just recently got fired from. And he had some major expenses to keep up on.

By all accounts the divorces wiped him out of much of his assets and almost all of his liquid assets. In just a few years he went from being able to lay his hands on ten of millions of dollars almost instantly and having to watch each $1K expenditure so that he could pay his taxes on time. And he was depressed before all of this.

Lack of money along with lack of a clear path to ever get enough money to make it all work again must have weighed heavy on him ( doing tv again sure did not work/selling the ranch sure did not work), in spite of his claims that he did not mind downsizing his life due to money problems. He said he did not need that lifestyle, but he had had it for a long time, doing without might well have been a rougher go than he had expected.

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@izzythepush,

izzythepush wrote:

Suicide often invalidates a claim.

Usually just for a period of time...often as short as two years, Izzy.

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@Lash,

Lash wrote:

Hi David. Williams quite famously suffered from deep clinical depression. He had 4 movies in the can. He had crazy money coming in.

For those of us who've stood on the precipice of destructive depression, I'd like to speak for what I think he suffered. He has famously said how horrible it is to be with people, surrounded by adoration and feel completely alone. I used to complain to myself about him that he was always "on." He rarely spoke as R. Williams. He always went into a character or a voice - and I think this was his way of ealing with the fact that he couldn't stand to be in the world as himself.

I think he suffered horribly in this world, and took a measure of solace in "being someone else."

He was a genuine, but painfully sensitive man who could bear his suffering no longer.

Thank you for that, Lash.

Depression is so all-consuming, people who have not suffered it just are not able to appreciate how bad it is.

I think he simply could not bear the suffering any more...and he ended it the only way he could.

My guess is that his family understands that.

1 Reply

A few years ago I was net surfing and went into the 'AOL Depression and Anxiety' chatroom to see if I could help, and although a few of them were happy to listen to me, the majority started freaking out and screaming- "Don't listen to him...he'll try to make you join a cult... **** God and Jesus... he's evil...report him to AOL" blah blah..
The AOL Host had to say to me in an email "I'm sorry but look how you've made them start rocking and rolling, so do you mind if I ask you to leave?"
I replied "no prob", and told them in the room that they'd got my email address if they wanted to contact me anytime, and I left. Some later did contact me and we got on great.

The chatroom was like a Devil's Den under satanic control, they knew I was in there to help their victims which is why they started shaking in their boots.. Smile

"Believe in God,the demons also believe and tremble" (James 2:19)

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@Frank Apisa,

I imagine that everyone who knew him on a close personal level knew that this might happen, and they understand his choice. Nods to Frank.

1 Reply

@Lash,

Lash wrote:

I imagine that everyone who knew him on a close personal level knew that this might happen, and they understand his choice. Nods to Frank.

Thanks, Lash.

I went through a period of INTENSE depression about 40 years ago. It lasted for 6 - 8 years.

I NEVER ever would want to go through anything like that again...and there are few things I treasure more than the fact that I made it through.

But the memory of what that was like...day in, day out is still etched in my memory.

I feel the greatest of sympathy for, and empathy with, anyone who is battling this kind of thing...and to hear some of the callous, unthinking remarks made about what Williams was dealing with...and how he dealt with it...makes fire come out of my ears. (Interesting to see!! )

He's got his closure...he was not a coward...he was not being selfish...he was dealing with something from the depths of Hell...and he dealt with it the best way he could.

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Found a few of his movies on Netflix - and having a Robin-fest. I'm peculiarly sad.

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@Lash,

I'd recorded The Fisher King a couple of weeks ago on our satellite box. It was a fitting tribute to watch it for the first time the night news of his death broke.
Sniff.

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@izzythepush,

izzythepush wrote:

Suicide often invalidates a claim.

As I posted b4,
I dunno the law of California, but where I came from,
the rule of law was that if the assured had paid premium for 2 years,
then his life insurance policy became "incontestable" such that suicide claims were paid.

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@hawkeye10,

Some of the things you said were accurate. His long-term, deep depression, in my opinion, caused the leave-taking. It's not important to me to change your mind.

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@hawkeye10,

There are 4 movies he starred/acted in that are yet to be released. Just fyi.

1 Reply

@Lash,

Lash wrote:

There are 4 movies he starred/acted in that are yet to be released. Just fyi.

Quote:

Mr. Williams hasn’t had a major hit comedy vehicle to his name since the $71 million-grossing RV in 2006.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2014/04/18/mrs-doubtfire-2-should-make-us-sad/

He was creatively dull over the last many years, and had known little other than commercial failure.....I doubt that there were substantial paydays attached to those 4 films. The $2 million for the failed series did little more than pay the tax bill for the ranch for a year, a bill he was not even expecting to need to pay.

8 years without a successful film, in an age when the studios are sucking it in box office and long ago decided to cut the costs of production by cutting the payday to the actors......Williams was mostly done in this business. Looking at BoxOfficoMojo it appears that we need to go all the way back to 1998 to find Williams in the lead of a successful move other than animation (Patch Adams). That was a long long time ago.

1 Reply

Believe what you choose, but he was never creatively dull.

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/robin-williams-death/robin-williams-didnt-have-financial-trouble-publicist-n180116

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Frank. I was there too - very close - for a few months. Glad you're here.

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Quote:

Williams starred as lead character Nolan Mack in the 2014 flick “Boulevard,” which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival. In the film, his character is dealing with his homosexuality later in life. Though the movie, produced by, Camellia Entertainment, received good reviews from critics, it has yet to find a mainstream distributor.

http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2014/08/12/robin-williams-final-films-what-will-happen/?intcmp=obnetwork

AKA was viewed as a commercial dud before Williams killed himself.....he was not going to see any back end money here. Rack up yet another recent commercial failure for Robin Williams.

It had have to been getting to him, suffering from clinical depression or not.

0 Replies

Robin Williams is dead

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