“I used to think the worst thing in life was to end up all alone. It’s not. The worst thing in life is ending up with people who make you feel all alone.”
Lance Clayton, played by Robin Williams: World’s Greatest Dad (2009)
Not to be melodramatic but this year has been kind of shitty, news-wise. It seems like the news cycle is a never ending stream of bombs, death, destruction and selfishness. It’s no wonder that in times like these, more and more people choose the route of escape: films, books, music, online second lives. All of these things distract us, help us, remove us from the world around that can cause so much pain.
For me, a large part of my childhood is wrapped up in the films of Robin Williams. Some will dismiss this era as his “schmaltzy, sell out” era (Hook, Aladdin, Mrs Doubtfire etc) – but I have to say that it’s these films that gave me comfort, and introduced me to Williams’ wider (more critically acclaimed) canon: Good Morning Vietnam, Dead Poet’s Society and later the creepiness of One Hour Photo to name but a few. Although I may have been drawn to watch The Birdcage by my slight obsession with Dan Futterman (Shooting Fish did have its redeeming qualities, ladies), it was Robin Williams and Nathan Lane that stole the show, as this wonderful scene demonstrates: Mustard Spreading.
It is an immense tribute to Williams’ talent and ability that he was able to bring so much joy and happiness to so many people while being in the middle of so much sadness himself. Many people who become dependent on alcohol and drugs do so to mask and deal with a different kind of pain. A kind of pain which is difficult, perhaps, to speak about and one from which drink and drugs can offer the kind of dissociation and escapism that others may be able to find in the childlike world of Hook or Mrs Doubtfire and in films, movies, music in general.
I started writing this without really knowing what I wanted to say. I don’t often comment on “celebrity” deaths, partly because I feel it’s not my place to mourn somebody I didn’t know but also because it doesn’t usually matter to me that much. You can see it’s sad for their family and friends, and take a moment to consider that person and what they meant to you: but it’s not my grief. They were not my brother, sister, father, mother. It’s so personal and feels wrong, to me.
I feel different about this, though. Partly I think because of the circumstances in which it appears Robin Williams died. Here was a man who was so funny, so vibrant, so full of energy and light whenever I saw him perform. It is so difficult to think of that energy as being gone. It’s so sad to think that this energy, which meant so much to his legions of fans, was not enough to make the man himself happy.
This is what is so hard to understand about depression. You look at a man like Robin Williams and think: what do you have to be sad about? You’re rich, successful, funny. You have family around you – you clearly want for nothing. And yet, that’s not enough. That’s not even the point. More often than not, in my experience, it’s not that you’re depressed about something. One just is. Depressed.
I am so fortunate not to have experienced depression personally, but from speaking to those that have my heart breaks. It is a disease that is so misunderstood and so dismissed by those that should know better. It is why the quote above seems so apt today.
We live in a world with billions of people in it. Many of us live in close proximity to hundreds of people – in flats and houses in densely populated areas. And yet we do not know many of them. We do not take time to know them – in fact mostly the opposite. Most often, we actively take time to not know these people. We put our headphones on, block out everything and stare straight ahead. Do not make eye contact, do not smile, do not engage. I do this. Knowingly. It makes my life easier if I can get to work/into the supermarket/home without having to acknowledge those around me. The tourist who looks lost at the tube station. The mother struggling with her buggy on the bus. The guy who sells the Big Issue outside Budgens. The quicker I get past these people, the quicker I can get on with my day and get home, safe, back into my own little world. I choose the route of escape.
Today I am taking a moment to consider my life: how I am, how I act, the way I am with others. I would like to think of myself as a friendly person, one who cares about other people and will try to make life easier rather than harder. But I’m not sure that’s enough. The most difficult thing in life is to get involved with somebody else’s pain. To think about something outside of yourself and what’s best for you – to actively make your life more difficult to try and help somebody else. To let somebody know that they are not alone.
I don’t want to be somebody who makes somebody else feel more alone. That is devastatingly sad, and something that I am going to strive not to be.
When I was younger, Robin Williams’s films at first made me feel comforted, happy. When I watched more of his films, they broadened my world and made me think about issues that I had no direct experience of but were important. They made me consider the world around me and think outside of my own personal experience. It is with this in mind that I will be remembering Robin Williams.
I think that what I want to say is this: I hope that Robin Williams knew how much he meant to those that were inspired by him. I hope that although his apparent suicide points to a deep seated and severe depression, he had moments of comfort from this knowledge. I hope he was not entirely a person who felt alone.
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