Comic virtuoso Robin Williams dead at 63 from apparent suicide

Wednesday, 13 August 2014 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Reuters: Robin Williams, the versatile actor whose madcap comic style made him one of television and film’s biggest stars, was found dead on Monday from an apparent suicide at his home in Northern California. He was 63. The comedian’s appeal stretched across generations and genres, from family fare as the voice of Disney’s blue Genie in ‘Aladdin’ to his portrayal of a fatherly therapist in the 1997 drama ‘Good Will Hunting’, for which he earned his sole Oscar.

But many remembered the master of impressions on Monday for his tender portrayal in ‘Mrs. Doubtfire’, when he played the part of a British nanny whose identity he assumed as a divorced father to be with his children. Williams had been recently suffering from severe depression, his publicist Mara Buxbaum said in a statement, and the actor had repeatedly talked about his past struggles with alcohol. “This morning, 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’ wife Susan Schneider said in a statement. The Marin County Sheriff’s coroner’s division said it suspected Williams committed suicide by asphyxia, but the cause of death is still under investigation and an autopsy will be conducted Tuesday. The Sheriff’s office said it received an emergency call about noon local time on Monday, saying Williams was unconscious and not breathing at his home near Tiburon, north of San Francisco. US President Barack Obama called Williams a ‘one of a kind’ actor who could make people laugh and cry in his array of characters. “He arrived in our lives as an alien – but he ended up touching every element of the human spirit,” Obama said in a statement. Williams will appear in upcoming film ‘Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb’, playing the statue of Teddy Roosevelt who comes to life at night, and holiday comedy ‘Merry Friggin’ Christmas’. He was also attached to a sequel to 1993 hit ‘Mrs. Doubtfire’. In his final posting on Twitter on July 31, Williams had wished his daughter Zelda a happy 25th birthday. Late on Monday, Zelda wrote on Twitter: “I love you. I miss you. I’ll try to keep looking up.”