In Memory

I did not know you, and yet you were an incredibly important influence on my life. By college I had assembled quite the collection of your movies. During psychology class one day I told my professor about your little-known psychological thriller "The Final Cut," and she borrowed and enjoyed it and we were able to discuss it academically. Your uncredited appearance in Kenneth Branagh's "Dead Again" was brilliant, as well as your hilariously awkward Osric in his version of "Hamlet." You could be serious, funny, intellectual and thought-provoking. You helped me love film and the arts. Your work helped me think critically and deeply.

I first fell in love with you in the magical "Hook," which was watched yearly as a New Year's Eve tradition for several seasons during my childhood. Your thoughtful journey in "Bicentennial Man" brings me to tears. Your manic joy doing voice work in "Aladdin" and countless others is infectious. And your quieter performances - like the ones in "Dead Poet's Society" and "Good Will Hunting"  - just makes me want to give you a hug.

You had your misses. You had work that was too crude for me to enjoy; your stand-up was avoided at all costs. But I always loved the moments when I felt I could see your heart; when the mania slowed and the jokes took a step back and the man beneath the laughter shone through. When "The Crazy Ones" premiered in 2013 I watched the first few episodes, but something felt wrong to me. I'm not at all trying to say it was prophetic. I'm not at all trying to say I saw it coming. But as I commented to my husband and my mom and others, the comedy in that show felt painful. It felt unhappy. It felt like something else was trying to be said, but was lost.

I ache to think how much of your life was spent trying to say something that was never heard. It's almost a physical pain to me, thinking of your sadness, thinking of your hidden hurts and battles. I don't know how I can feel so deeply for someone I never knew. But I do. And I miss you.

Robin Williams

July 21, 1951 - August 11, 2015