Robin Williams

In 1986, he teamed up with Whoopi Goldberg and Billy Crystal to found Comic Relief USA, an annual HBO television benefit devoted to the homeless, which has raised $80 million as of 2014. Bob Zmuda, creator of Comic Relief, explains that Williams felt blessed because he came from a wealthy home, but wanted to do something to help those less fortunate. Williams made benefit appearances to support literacy and women's rights, along with appearing at benefits for veterans. He was a regular on the USOcircuit, where he traveled to thirteen countries and performed to approximately 100,000 troops. The USO, after his death, thanked him "for all he did for the men and women of our armed forces."

Williams and his second wife, Marsha, founded the Windfall Foundation, a philanthropic organization to raise money for many charities. In December 1999, he sang in French on the BBC-inspired music video of international celebrities doing a cover of The Rolling Stones' "It's Only Rock 'n Roll (But I Like It)" for the charity Children's Promise.

In response to the 2010 Canterbury earthquake, Williams donated all proceeds of his "Weapons of Self Destruction" Christchurch performance to help rebuild the New Zealand city. Half the proceeds were donated to the Red Cross and half to the mayoral building fund. Williams performed with the USO for U.S. troops stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Williams supported St. Jude Children's Research Hospital for several years.

Addiction and health problems

During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Williams had an addiction to cocaine. Williams was a casual friend of comedian John Belushi, and the sudden death of Belushi, with the birth of his son Zak, prompted him to quit drugs and alcohol: "Was it a wake-up call? Oh yeah, on a huge level. The grand jury helped too."Will iams turned to exercise and cycling to help alleviate his depression shortly after Belushi's death, according to bicycle shop owner Tony Tom, Williams stated, "cycling saved my life".

Williams started drinking alcohol again in 2003, while working on a film in Alaska. In 2006 he checked himself in to a substance-abuse rehabilitation center in Newberg, Oregon, saying he was an alcoholic.

Years afterward, he acknowledged his failure to maintain sobriety but said he never returned to using cocaine, declaring in a 2010 interview:

No. Cocaine – paranoid and impotent, what fun. There was no bit of me thinking, ooh, let's go back to that. Useless conversations until midnight, waking up at dawn feeling like a vampire on a day pass. No.

Williams was hospitalized in March 2009 due to heart problems. He postponed his one-man tour for surgery to replace his aortic valve. The surgery was completed on March 13, 2009, at the Cleveland Clinic.

In mid-2014, Williams admitted himself into the Hazelden Foundation Addiction Treatment Center in Lindstrom, Minnesota, for treatment related to his alcoholism.

Williams's publicist Mara Buxbaum commented that the actor was suffering from severe depression prior to his death.^[124] Williams's wife Susan stated that in the period before his death, he had been sober but was diagnosed with early stage Parkinson's diseasewhich was something he was "not yet ready to share publicly".

Death

Williams died on the morning of August 11, 2014, at his home in Paradise Cay, California. In the initial report released on August 12, the Marin County Sheriff's Office deputy coroner stated Williams had hanged himself with a belt and died from asphyxiation. His body was cremated and his ashes scattered in San Francisco Bay on August 12.

Tributes

News of Williams's death spread quickly worldwide. The entertainment world, friends, and fans responded to his sudden death through social media and other media outlets. His wife, Susan Schneider, said: "I lost my husband and my best friend, while the world lost one of its most beloved artists and beautiful human beings. I am utterly heartbroken." Williams's daughter Zelda responded to her father's death by stating that the "world is forever a little darker, less colorful and less full of laughter in his absence". U.S. President Barack Obama said of Williams: "He was one of a kind. He arrived in our lives as an alien but he ended up touching every element of the human spirit."

Broadway theaters in New York dimmed their lights for one minute in his honor. Broadway'sAladdin cast honored Williams by having the audience join them in a sing-along of "Friend Like Me", an Oscar-nominated song originally sung by Williams in the 1992 film. Fans of Williams created makeshift memorials at his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and at locations from his television and film career, such as the bench in Boston's Public Garden featured in Good Will Hunting; thePacific Heights, San Francisco, home used in Mrs. Doubtfire; and the Boulder, Colorado, home used for Mork & Mindy.

On television, during the 66th Primetime Emmy Awards on August 25, 2014, comedian Billy Crystal presented a tribute to Williams, referring to him as "the brightest star in our comedy galaxy". On September 9, 2014, PBS aired a one-hour special devoted to Williams's career.

Legacy and influence

Although recognized as a comedian, Williams became known for taking mostly roles of substance and serious drama. Williams was considered a "national treasure" by many in the entertainment industry and by the public.

His on-stage energy and improvisational skill became a model for a new generation of stand-up comedians. Many comedians valued the way he worked highly personal issues into his comedy routines, especially his honesty about drug and alcohol addiction, along with depression. According to media scholar Derek A. Burrill, because of the openness with which Williams spoke about his own life, "probably the most important contribution he made to pop culture, across so many different media, was as Robin Williams the person."

His unusual free-form style of comedy became so identified with him that new comedians imitated him. Jim Carrey impersonated his Mork character early in his own career. Williams's high-spirited style has been credited with paving the way for the growing comedy scene which developed in San Francisco. Young comedians felt more liberated on stage by seeing Williams's spontaneous style: "one moment acting as a bright, mischievous child, then as a wise philosopher or alien from outer space."

As a film actor, Williams's roles often influenced others, both in and out of the film industry. Director Chris Columbus, who directed Williams in the 1993 film Mrs. Doubtfire, says that watching him work "was a magical and special privilege. His performances were unlike anything any of us had ever seen, they came from some spiritual and otherworldly place."

Looking over most of Williams's films, Alyssa Rosenberg at The Washington Post was "struck by the breadth of Williams' roles", and how radically different most were, writing that "Williams helped us grow up."

Portrayal

Williams was portrayed by Chris Diamantopoulos in the made-for-TV biographical film Behind the Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Mork & Mindy (2005), documenting the actor's arrival in Hollywood as a struggling comedian.