Producers From The United States

"When people project and understand that in an instant and as they grow older they face Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, MS, strokes, all the diseases of the brain and central nervous system, which will effect the entire population as we get older. People begin to realize hey I'm lucky, I'm just temporarily not disabled. So, the point is we're beginning to see equality, we're beginning to see new opportunities and that brings me to the other part we've already talked about, acceptance and the other part is denial. And what I mean by that, and everybody has to work it out for themselves, my point of view may not be your point of view, so please hold onto your belief and let me hold onto my belief. But my belief is that there is nothing we can't accomplish if we set our minds to it."

"[I]t seems to me that this past century has accomplished two Civil Rights movements. First, the right for blacks and Hispanics and people from all different nationalities to take their place in the middle of society and that has been achieved at great cost. It is a tremendous struggle in America, but now we think nothing of walking into an office and finding that a black person is the president of the company instead of a janitor cleaning the hallways. And then we learned that the talent that blacks and Hispanics have, always had, their intelligence, dedication and willingness to work is no less than anybody else. They have been able to persevere and finally I think we have really overcome tremendous amounts of prejudice, not only in the United States, but throughout the world. The second great Civil Rights movement was equality for women. It started at the end of the last century. Women finally got to vote. We've gotten all the way to the point now where women aren't expected to stay home and just be mothers and it's okay to be a single parent and it's okay to go out and pursue your ambition and your dreams. And that's been a very important breakthrough because there are so many areas where women are more talented and have more to offer than men do. And now we are beginning to see everybody working side by side in society and in the workplace. But, there remains one HUGE minority that is still terribly discriminated against. And that population is the disabled population. And that comprises 1/5 of the world's population. In the United States, for example, we have 54 million disabled people and the thing that's very difficult is when blacks and Hispanics and women were fighting for equal rights there was a level of discomfort. But nothing approaching what happens when "normal" people look at the disabled and are uncomfortable. That is a prejudice that they MUST overcome because we're not in a position to always look our very best or to feel our very best, or to be pleasing to the eye because we have suffered terrible debilitating diseases and injuries. But what's happening now is the kind of discrimination that is so bad and I want to tell you that it exceeds any prejudice that ever occurred before in the previous civil rights movements."

"Now fortunately, even a couple of years before my injury, we were in the dark ages about spinal cord and the common wisdom was that the cord could not regenerate. But I want to say that one of the great heros and really the father of regeneration is a distinguished Canadian who will go down in history as the father of spinal cord recovery. And that is Professor Alberto Aguierro at McGill University. He is the one who discovered that there are two protein molecules at the base of the brain stem. The positive function of these molecules is to stop the brain from overdeveloping during gestation. But then in the adult these protein molecules perform a negative function, they stop the regeneration of nerves in the spinal cord. Now you can chop off your hand then a surgeon can sew it back on again and you can go out and throw a baseball, because of the plasticity and ease with which the peripheral nervous system is able to make appropriate connections. And the good news now for us is that they have discovered nerves regenerate in the spinal cord they seek to find appropriate connections across the injury, across the lesion. And when these appropriate connections are made there will be improvement in sensation and in motor function and depending on the severity of the injury, there are endless possibilities to how much recovery can occur. If someone has been very damaged there may be limitations, if someone is less damaged there may be a better outcome. But the point is, through regeneration the use of human embryonic cells, the use of gene therapy, the spinal cord can and will regenerate and so it is only a question of time before these techniques make their way into humans. One of the most exciting discoveries was made by a Dr. Viscovi in Milan who found that there are cells called epitomal cells which were thought to only exist in again, in the child during gestation, because these cells are undifferentiated and they can become anything. Well, very recently, just two months ago these cells were found to exist in the adult in the ventricles of the brain, in the spinal cord and even in the skin. And this is tremendously exciting because the hope, the best hope for recovery now, is to biopsy these cells from your skin, from your hand for example, they could grow hundreds of thousands of cells in a petri dish and genetically instruct them to become neurons and axons. They would then be injected inside of the injury and they would become the nerves necessary to carry messages from the brain to the rest of the body. Now that would have been science fiction a few years ago, but it's here and it's happening and it doesn't matter whether it's an acute injury or a chronic injury. So I offer you the specific detail, not to give you a boring science lecture but to tell you there is very real tangible hope, very real hope...And one of the great advantages of this technique is that there is no danger of toxicity to the body or rejection by the immune system. And what I love about it is the body is healing itself. Taking cells from one part and using them in another area and I think that's some-how a beautiful design, rather than loading up the body with more chemicals and more drugs and more artificial agents."

"The insurance companies see this legislation as a tax. My question is: why is that unreasonable, particularly when the insurance companies would save so much money in the long run. Research will keep the American people healthier, resulting in fewer insurance claims. We tax oil companies and use the money to build and maintain highways. In New York state, if you win the lottery, you pay a significant tax which goes to a state fund for education. Most states have sales taxes which are a major source of revenue for a wide variety of programs and services that benefit the public. Why shouldn't insurance companies be asked to help solve the health care crisis in this country? Because of the advances to date, we can save millions of lives. Our challenge for the future is not just improving the quality of life of those we save, but finding the cures to prevent that suf-fering in the first place. Our scientists are on the threshold of major breakthroughs in almost every disease or condition that now cause so much hardship for people across the country and around the world. The insurance companies owe it to our families and our society to make a small sacrifice which can do so much good. I hope that this excellent piece of legislation which already has tremendous grassroots support will be enacted during this legislative session."

"[R]ecent experience has shown that even the most formidable lobbyists cannot derail legislation that has bipartisan and public support. The NRA was not successful in repealing the ban on assault weapons. The American public watched in disbelief as a dozen tobacco company executives testified at a Senate hearing that nicotine is not addictive and denied allegations that nicotine levels were being raised in cigarettes in order to increase addiction. Now we are witnessing the demise of the "Marlboro Man" and "Joe Camel". There are lawsuits in virtually every state by individuals demanding punitive damages against the tobacco companies. Just this week, thousands of government workers petitioned the President to ban smoking in government buildings. I sincerely doubt that the tobacco lobby will be able to stop this initiative. The religious right led by Pat Robertson, Pat Buchanan and the Christian Coalition tried twice unsuccessfully (in 1992 and 1996) to hijack the Republican Party and failed in both attempts. Here again, was a case when a supposedly powerful lobby did not succeed in promoting their agenda."

"We must not stop this progress because we are unwilling to commit enough money to get the job done. It is imperative that the public--and more importantly our elected representatives understand that research today is not speculative. It is not a waste of money. It is the only way to relieve suffering while helping to save the American economy at the same time. Making this a reality demands an investment of real dollars--funds that just don't fit within the constraints of the Budget Agreement passed by Congress this week, which proposes to reduce overall health spending by $100 million next year and by more than $2 billion over the next 5 years."

"When I met with the President in May of 1996, he stated that the ratio of research to clinical results is greater in this country than anywhere else in the world. Money spent on research brings practical results that absolutely justify the investment. Let's look at a few examples. NIH-sponsored research has resulted in the identification of genetic mutations that cause osteoporosis, Lou Gehrig's Disease, cystic fibrosis and Huntington's disease. Effective treatment for Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL) has been developed and today nearly 80 percent of children diagnosed with ALL are alive and disease-free after 5 years. Because of research, the nature of medicine is changing. We are approaching disease at the cellular level. We are targeting problems earlier, more specifically, less intrusively, with greater success and fewer side effects. Advances in genetics will soon let us intervene in disease before symptoms appear."

"What I do is based on powers we all have inside us; the ability to endure; the ability to love, to carry on, to make the best of what we have — and you don’t have to be a ‘Superman’ to do it."

"Perhaps it is my job to offend some scientists. I'm not asking them to be reckless or unprofessional, but I do want to reinforce a sense of urgency."

"It gives me a moral compass. I often refer to Abe Lincoln, who said, "When I do good, I feel good. When I do bad, I feel bad. And that is my religion." I think we all have a little voice inside us that will guide us. It may be God, I don't know. But I think that if we shut out all the noise and clutter from our lives and listen to that voice, it will tell us the right thing to do. The Unitarian believes that God is good, and believes that God believes that man is good. Inherently. The Unitarian God is not a God of vengeance. And that is something I can appreciate."

"In the early '80s, the public discourse about AIDS was divisive and ugly. Some elected officials said the disease was God's revenge on people who lived a certain lifestyle. The federal government wouldn't fund research for a cure. But, today, the NIH spends $1.8 billion on AIDS research annually, and the virus is no longer an epidemic in this country. So, how did we get from that climate of fear and animosity in the early '80s to where we are today? Well, it's by the extraordinary efforts of ordinary individuals, then change occurred, as it has time and time again throughout our history."

"The budget of the National Institute of Health in 1998 was 12 billion dollars. However, due to Congress and also got pressure applied by a number of disease groups, the budget for fiscal 2003 will be 27.2 billion dollars. And human ... HHS Secretary Thompson has said there is plenty of money available for the kind of research. Doubling the budget of the NIH and more within five years has been an extraordinary accomplishment. So to say that there isn't ... I mean, more money would be nice, but to say there's not enough money to do research into therapeutic cloning is a false statement."

"Specific to spinal cord injured patients, immuno-suppressive drugs are not an option in a stem cell transplant procedure because of the increased risk of side effects. Spinal cord injuries cause many individuals to be more susceptible to respiratory infection due to an inability to clear secretions, limited chest movement, and a need for ventilation assistance. In addition, there is a greater risk of bladder infection and sepsis due to chronic catheterization. Some spinal cord patients who incur an infection are further compromised by the infection seeding around the heart. Urinary tract infections and skin breakdowns due to immobility are common causes of dsyreflexia, an event which often triggers heart attacks and strokes. I have been told by Dr. John McDonald of Washington University in St. Louis, that because this immune system of a spinal cord patient is already so compromised, it would be irresponsible to transplant stem cells into an individual that did not match his or her own DNA. Although there is still a risk of rejection, no reputable doctor would prescribe Cyclosporin, the leading immuno-suppressive drug therapy, to a spinal cord injured patient because the risk of death is too great. Somatic cell nuclear transfer could dramatically improve the treatment efficacy of any stem cell transplant because it uses one's own genetic makeup. In addition, there is the potential of eliminating the risks and side effects associated with highly toxic immuno-suppressive agents."

"With the life expectancy of average Americans heading as high as 85 to 90 years, it is our responsibility to do everything possible to protect the quality of life of the present and future generations. A critical factor will be what we do with human embryonic stem cells. These cells have the potential to cure diseases and conditions ranging from Parkinson's and multiple sclerosis to diabetes and heart disease, Alzheimer's, Lou Gehrig's disease, even spinal-cord injuries like my own. They have been called the body's self-repair kit. Their extraordinary potential is a recent discovery. And much basic research needs to be done before they can be sent to the front lines in the battle against disease. But no obstacle should stand in the way of responsible investigation of their possibilities. To that end, the work should be funded and supervised by the Federal Government through the National Institutes of Health (NIH). That will avoid abuses by for-profit corporations, avoid secrecy and destructive competition between laboratories and ensure the widest possible dissemination of scientific breakthroughs. Human trials should be conducted either on the NIH campus or in carefully monitored clinical facilities. Fortunately, stem cells are readily available and easily harvested. In fertility clinics, women are given a choice of what to do with unused fertilized embryos: they can be discarded, donated to research or frozen for future use. Under NIH supervision, scientists should be allowed to take cells only from women who freely consent to their use for research. This process would not be open ended; within one to two years a sufficient number could be gathered and made available to investigators. For those reasons, the ban on federally funded human embryonic stem cell research should be lifted as quickly as possible. But why has the use of discarded embryos for research suddenly become such an issue? Is it more ethical for a woman to donate unused embryos that will never become human beings, or to let them be tossed away as so much garbage when they could help save thousands of lives?"

""Neglect - even misstatement - of recent scientific data was also evident in last year's testimony before this subcommittee by the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation. Mr. Reeve, on behalf of the Foundation, testified that adult stem cells are no substitute for embryonic cells because they cannot be "pluripotent" but are confined to a narrow range of specialization. Yet a few weeks after that hearing, researchers funded by the NIH and the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation published a study indicating that adult bone marrow stem cells "may constitute an abundant and accessible cellular reservoir for the treatment of a variety of neurologic diseases." The first sentence of the published study states: "Pluripotent stem cells have been detected in multiple tissues in the adult, participating in normal replacement and repair, while undergoing self-renewal. The authors cite eleven other studies in support of this observation. Their article, prepared under the aegis of Mr. Reeve's foundation, was received for publication in March 2000, before Mr. Reeve testified in April that adult stem cells cannot be pluripotent."

"In 1984, the government spent zero dollars on AIDS research, because AIDS was thought to be a death sentence, and the virus was far too complicated to deal with. Today, the government spends annually $1.8 billion a year on research, and people who would have been dead four or five years ago now have the virus virtually undetectable in their bloodstream, and they're living normal lives. That was something thought impossible until we put money and talent together and aimed it toward a problem."

"What makes Superman a hero is not that he has power, but that he has the wisdom and the maturity to use the power wisely."

"When the first Superman movie came out, I gave dozens of interviews to promote it. The most frequent question was: What is a hero? My answer was that a hero is someone who commits a courageous action without considering the consequences. Now my definition is completely different. I think a hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles. They are the real heroes, and so are the families and friends who have stood by them."

"We live in a time when the words impossible and unsolvable are no longer part of the scientific community's vocabulary. Each day we move closer to trials that will not just minimize the symptoms of disease and injury but eliminate them."

"I'm starting a new chapter in my life, and you have no idea how much that means."

"So many of our dreams at first seem impossible, then they seem improbable, and then, when we summon the will, they soon become inevitable."

"Superman is nothing more than a popular retelling of the Christ story, or Greek mythology. It's an archetype, watered down and made in vivid colors for twelve-year-old's mentality. It's pop mythology, which extends to the actor, then seeps over to a demand that that actor reflect the needs of the worshipers. The worship doesn't only go on in the temples — it goes on in the streets, and restaurants, in magazines. But, you know, I'm from New Jersey, I'm not from Olympus or Krypton, so back off 'cause I can't take the responsibility."

"Somewhere in Time, while it errs on the side of pretentiousness, is an absolutely honest attempt to create an old-fashioned romance. It's based on love rather than on sex or X-rated bedroom scenes. I don't know how to talk about a love story without getting all gooey about it, but the script excited me because of the situation of the leading character... His problem struck me as that of many people. They've got everything going for them, or so they say, except for a real commitment, a real love."

"On Monday night, as fans around the world began to grieve Robin Williams’s death, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences — best known, in many circles, as the people behind the Oscars — sent out what may be the iconic social media image of Williams’s death. …[Genie, you're free.] … More than 270,000 people have shared the tweet, which means that, per the analytics site Topsy, as many as 69 million people have seen it. The problem? It violates well-established public health standards for how we talk about suicide. “If it doesn’t cross the line, it comes very, very close to it,” said Christine Moutier, chief medical officer at the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. “Suicide should never be presented as an option. That’s a formula for potential contagion.”"

"When he auditioned for the role of Mork from Ork on Happy Days (1974), producer Garry Marshall told him to sit down. Williams immediately sat on his head on the chair. Marshall hired him, saying that he was the only alien who auditioned. During the making of Mork & Mindy (1978), Williams departed from the scripts and ad libbed so many times and so well, that the producers stopped trying to make him stick to the script and deliberately left gaps in the later scripts leaving only, "Mork can go off here" in those places so Robin could improvise. … Asked by James Lipton about what he would like God to say when he arrives in heaven, Williams answered that "There is a seat in the front" in the concert of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Elvis Presley."

"He was always warm, even in his darkest moments. While I’ll never, ever understand how he could be loved so deeply and not find it in his heart to stay, there’s minor comfort in knowing our grief and loss, in some small way, is shared with millions. It doesn’t help the pain, but at least it’s a burden countless others now know we carry, and so many have offered to help lighten the load. Thank you for that. To those he touched who are sending kind words, know that one of his favorite things in the world was to make you all laugh. As for those who are sending negativity, know that some small, giggling part of him is sending a flock of pigeons to your house to poop on your car. Right after you’ve had it washed. After all, he loved to laugh too… Dad was, is and always will be one of the kindest, most generous, gentlest souls I’ve ever known, and while there are few things I know for certain right now, one of them is that not just my world, but the entire world is forever a little darker, less colorful and less full of laughter in his absence. We’ll just have to work twice as hard to fill it back up again."

"Yesterday, I lost my father and a best friend and the world got a little grayer. I will carry his heart with me every day. I would ask those that loved him to remember him by being as gentle, kind, and generous as he would be. Seek to bring joy to the world as he sought."

"The death of Robin Williams this week was a shock, the kind of event that makes people stop, even in the crush of other terrible news from all corners of the globe, and feel a stinging sense of loss for someone they never met. That there was the ritual rush of response on Twitter, Facebook, and in online comments, was to be expected. Though Williams had had issues with substance abuse, and made trips to rehab, this wasn't someone who seemed in danger of going over the edge. The idea that a performer who was synonymous with rapid-fire wit and boundless energy would take his own life was at first hard to believe, and then deeply sad. But even as Williams is mourned, the scope of reactions illustrates how wide-ranging his appeal was. … this performer known for his anarchic merriment was sometimes at his best when he was most subtle. And Williams' best was something special, and rare, and worth remembering."

"Robin Williams was beloved by the U.S. military, perhaps even more so than by the American public. He carried Bob Hope’s mantle as a funny man far from home, often in inhospitable places. Throughout his career, Williams made six USO tours to Iraq, Afghanistan, and 11 other countries and performed for 90,000 troops by the time of his final tour in 2010."

"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. On behalf of Robin's family, we are asking for privacy during our time of profound grief. As he is remembered, it is our hope the focus will not be on Robin's death, but on the countless moments of joy and laughter he gave to millions."

"In the wake of Williams' death at his home here Monday, fans around the world have struggled to understand what could have led a man whose thousand-megawatt comic persona had brought so much joy to millions to such depths of despair. But Williams' closest friends and colleagues knew well that the beneath his manic, Technicolor exterior, the actor had battled depression for years. In recent months — as Williams wrestled with the cancellation of his CBS TV series The Crazy Ones and fought to maintain a sobriety that had at times proved fragile — those friends could see that he was losing that fight. … In early July, Williams checked himself into the Hazelden addiction treatment center in Center City, Minn. He had not fallen off the wagon, his publicist said at the time, but was instead struggling to hold himself together as he crumbled under the weight of depression."

"My friendship with Robin Williams is one of the real joys of my life … Robin is a person who gives to people 24 hours a day. The gift of joy, the gift of laughter. Just to be in a room with Robin Williams is a privilege. He’s a gift to the world."

"Robin Williams was an airman, a doctor, a genie, a nanny, a president, a professor, a bangarang Peter Pan, and everything in between. But 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. He made us laugh. He made us cry. He gave his immeasurable talent freely and generously to those who needed it most – from our troops stationed abroad to the marginalized on our own streets. The Obama family offers our condolences to Robin’s family, his friends, and everyone who found their voice and their verse thanks to Robin Williams."

"[Insomnia]’s a film that I look back on with great fondness. Working with Al Pacino, Robin Williams and Hilary Swank was an incredible experience. Sometimes, when people look for connections in your work, they look more at things like budget level than at the filmmaking itself. If you compare it to Oppenheimer, for example, there’s a similar attempt to try and convey the subjective experience of the protagonist. In the case of Pacino’s character, he’s suffering from a distortion of perception due to lack of sleep, and it’s not a million miles away from what I’m trying to do with showing Oppenheimer’s internal process, particularly at the beginning of the film."

"Though a terrifically engaging screen presence at his most gregarious and joke-focused, he had to chops to be just as mesmerizing when muted, which would only draw out tension for the moment when he could turn on the jets and shift to full bombast. I’m not sure I can think of another actor with Williams’ combined dominant traits: instantly recognizable for his warmth and energy, fiercely multitalented, flying between understated and exuberant emotional extremes in comedy and drama, and yet maligned whenever the unpredictable balance he struck in a given performance didn’t match the critical ideal. In that way his Academy Award for Good Will Hunting in 1997 is both the peak of his control and the most patronizing harness of his career. Here is your reward for taking the raging combustion, powerful as a radiant star, and tamping it down to understated levels while remaining perforated, so that emotional peaks still have a chance to flare out. It was an unhelpful and unjust expectation on an actor who did nothing but give of himself to his performance. … it’s too limiting right now to call Robin Williams simply a comedian, despite the tremendous outpouring from the comedy community that continues today. He was an actor, one of the most gifted and adventurous performers of his generation, and it’s a shame that it took something like his tragic death to take stock of the possibility that the outsized expectations of an audience could have prevented more people from simply enjoying the effort Williams made in so many films, no matter the critical adjudication."

"In the late 1980’s, film producer Joel Silver set his sights on developing Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ massively successful graphic novel Watchmen into a feature film with director Terry Gilliam. Rumors swirled at the time, and the 2005 Entertainment Weekly oral history of the project confirmed that Arnold Schwarzenegger was in line for Dr. Manhattan, Richard Gere showed interest, and Robin Williams, fresh off his role as a delusional but sprightly vagabond in Gilliam’s The Fisher King, could be tapped as Rorschach. During the hellish development, which would bounce between studios and producers for decades until Zach Snyder’s film hit theaters five years ago, casting attention switched from Williams to Brad Dourif, allegedly due to wariness over fan perception that Williams was unsuitable for the part. Going in a direction away from a captivating comedic performer with overtones of chained darkness looked foolish when Michael Keaton proved an excellent Batman as that comic franchise dominated the box office. And that criticism seems even more baseless decades later, after Good Will Hunting, Insomnia, One Hour Photo, and many other films that proved Williams’ heft. Rorschach, a deeply haunted man with an ever-changing mask that doesn’t hide an unmistakable voice, now seems like it would have been a perfect fit. There’s little point in rueing a missed opportunity from 25 years ago. But in the aftermath of Williams’ death at his Bay Area home yesterday, many people were quick to point to a moment in Watchmen when Rorschach sneeringly recites a grim joke about a depressed man who seeks help from a doctor, which now rings frighteningly true:"

"His style, when it came on the scene, looked completely new to people, and in many ways it was. He was fast and furious, and I think there’s something else that’s behind there that you can’t really quantify or define, but you could just tell there was a humanity in Robin Williams. He seems like a genuinely nice guy, like a good person who cares and tries to give back to the community. Some people, you get the impression that they’re putting on an act all the time. I didn’t get that impression with Robin Williams. I didn’t know him well, but I always thought, there’s a very decent person there."

"Robin and I had a nice friendly relationship. I can’t claim I knew him well, but honestly, I don’t know how many people did. He seemed like the kind of guy who didn’t open up to a lot of people. … The thing about Robin that I loved the most — and again, with limited experience — is that when he did my show, he was so great at it, because he was able to achieve something that eludes a lot of comedians who have tried to do Real Time. It’s not an easy show to do because you have to be very smart about politics. We don’t use a lot of show business people on the panel. I can name the show business people who can do it on a couple of hands — Ben Affleck, George Clooney, Alec Baldwin, Kerry Washington — people who are very politically aware and involved, and that is their passion.… But Robin did the panel, and he was able to both modulate his normal manic persona down to what was appropriate for the show he was doing, and also, completely still be Robin Williams. That is not an easy trajectory to find, and he did, and I always loved him for it. First of all, it means you’re humble — that you understand that you have to shape-shift a little to the show you’re doing. Some people don’t do that. Some people just refuse to do that. They wanna be exactly who they are, on whatever show they’re doing. I don’t agree with that. I think when you’re the guest, you have to bend a little. He did that. He was still Robin Williams, but he was exactly right for the show he was doing."

"So many times you meet people they don't impact you. You meet them and they're gracious and they're nice, and then there are sometimes when you meet somebody and they say one thing and for the rest of your life you carry that one thing and they don't even know that they impacted your life. So here's Robin Williams fully decked out in elephantiasis makeup, like he was the Elephant Man, and we were talking and I'm being super quiet, and he just kind of turns to me and he said, “What's your name?” And I said, “I'm Mila.” And he said, “Yeah? You're on 70s?” And then he said, “Remember this moment. Remember this because things like this don't happen very often. Remember this time.” Having somebody of Robin Williams' stature tell me to just acknowledge something meant so much. He didn't mentor me. He just said, “Step back and appreciate this. You're having an amazing time.” I was so nervous. And he said, “Relax. And don't forget to enjoy yourself because things like this don't happen to everyone.” … All he did was say, "Enjoy yourself and don't forget this." Like: "Just take a breath and acknowledge that you have an amazing opportunity.”"

"Robin was a gifted actor and comedian, but he was also a true friend and supporter of our troops. From entertaining thousands of service men and women in war zones, to his philanthropy that helped veterans struggling with hidden wounds of war, he was a loyal and compassionate advocate for all who serve this nation in uniform. He will be dearly missed by the men and women of DoD - so many of whom were personally touched by his humor and generosity."

"When the gods gift you with the type of talent Robin had, there's a price to pay, there always is — it doesn’t come from nothing, It comes from … probably deep problems inside, a concern, all sorts of fears, and yet he could always channel those things and turn them into something gold … I think that just comes with the territory, frankly."

"It's just this incredible talent was there that kept him really bright and bouncy… I'm sure on his own, and a lot of times on his own, that wasn't there. I think being around people … I don’t even think it was even performing at times … I think it was just some wondrous moment, as this stuff poured out of him, he was exhilarated by it as much as we were, and I think that was so important to Robin. And at the same time, he was one of the sweetest people ever walking the planet. He really cared about people. That's what I found amazing to be able to see an incredibly huge and complex vision of the world, and yet always, all the individual around him, he was in touch with all the time."

"I don't think I've met anyone as exceptional as Robin was … every moment … could be explosive any which-way, you didn’t know where it was going to go — you didn’t know even where it came from — he seemed to be able to channel the Cosmos, and at the same time he was always totally involved with the people around him, he really had a close touch with everybody he touched. He was absolutely extraordinary. … He seemed to be able to be … a kind of receptor of all knowledge, whatever it was, whether it was in the news, something from an encyclopedia, or from a book, he seemed to know all of this stuff, and he could then reassemble it, in the most incredible combinations — which was always surprising, funny and … outrageous, really, and I don't know how he did it. … That was always the miracle of Robin, it was something I've never bean able to explain."

"To the generation of kids who grew up on his movies, Williams was a revelation, a teacher and a lifeline. It might seem ridiculous for a generation to claim a universally loved celebrity as their own, but if there was ever a Millennial hero, it was Robin Williams. The news that Williams had died, at the age of 63, hit the world like a shockwave yesterday. For many older Millennials, like me, who grew up in the ’80s and ’90s, the loss strikes as a particularly hard blow. … Williams’ Dr. Sean Maguire, a counselor who becomes a father-figure to the troubled title character in Good Will Hunting, punctured even my teenage gloom. He wasn’t jokey, he wasn’t zany, he wasn’t any of the things I had come to associate with Robin Williams, but his warmth was wholly recognizable and I was in awe. And then there’s Dead Poets Society, one of the ultimate teenage movies … The movie’s plot, which centers on a conservative boys school where a radical teacher works against the system to inspire his students, is hardly original and I knew that even back then. But the zeal and honesty that Williams’ poured into John Keating almost single-handedly elevated the movie from a cliché to an actual inspiration. Like any teenager, I was a bit disillusioned by school in general, but books and learning and truth were still things that could lure me and Williams’ Keating made a great case for them. To this day, I still can’t resist Williams’ line, “But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.” Yet even with the years of cinematic evidence, I didn’t quite realize how much of an influence Williams had on my generation until today. … Everyone seemed to have their own personal memory about watching his films growing up. He was the teacher we always wanted, the baby-sitter we would have loved, the best friend who knew exactly how to make us laugh. It feels like I have always known that Robin Williams was an amazing actor, but I never understood just how amazing. Because looking back on it, I realize that his best roles didn’t define him — they helped define us."

"Williams gave tremendous performances in a handful of movies, but it was Williams bottled and, in most cases, domesticated. It didn’t have that free-form, unfettered genius. That said, his nattering sailor in Robert Altman’s messy Popeye was musically dazzling. Even more musical was his performance in Paul Mazursky’s Moscow on the Hudson, in which the sadness of not being able to perform was right there in his eyes. … The combination of mania and melancholy tapped something beautiful in him. In The Fisher King, Williams was also at the height of his powers. He knew how to play a man dangerously in touch with unseen forces, a holy fool, and for once he played opposite actors who were, each in their own way, worthy of him: Jeff Bridges, Mercedes Ruehl, and, most memorably, Amanda Plummer, who should have partnered with him again. We do need to talk about those “domesticated” parts, because they were the ones that won him a huge mainstream audience and, in the case of his avuncular, bearded psychiatrist in Good Will Hunting, an Oscar. This was Williams the crinkle-eyed humanist. … The saddest thing is that Williams never found a collaborator who could give him the combination of structure and freedom in which he could thrive … But you know what? You could put together a highlight reel of Williams’s work … and see that the measure of the man was vast. Even when his talent was cruelly constricted, his soul was limitless."

"What hurts most about the apparent suicide of Robin Williams is that as much as he achieved, he died in his own mind unfulfilled. And to an extent, he was unfulfilled — he never found a form that would capture the genius of his stand-up act or his early appearances on The Tonight Show, when his mind worked faster than anyone alive and very possibly dead, when he seemed to be channeling a fleet of circling UFOs containing the galaxy’s best comedy writers. The man didn’t need to play a sitcom alien to seem as if he had his own extraterrestrial energy field."

"Playing one character at a time, for months on end, didn’t properly exploit Williams’ unique gift of being everyone at once. His true model and mentor was not an Olivier or Brando but freeform comic Jonathan Winters, who also battled to call a truce with the manifold Genie geniuses in his head. … Why does a clown want to play Hamlet? Maybe because he thinks he is that melancholy soul whom others find amusingly odd. Williams dropped Mork’s na-nu na-nu and entered dramatic film with the lead in The World According to Garp. … Williams infused weird wonder in voice roles for animated features — not only Aladdin but Robots and Happy Feet. He was a cartoon, with all the characters, in a man’s body. … He could play anyone, but not just one: not “just” Robin Williams. All those voices in the head of this comic Hamlet must have told him it was time to be quiet. The rest is silence."

"Robin and I agreed once that it’s galling to hear — when you’re “in it” — the question: “What have you got to be depressed about?” The great British actor and comedian, Stephen Fry, a fellow-sufferer, replies “And what have you got to have asthma about?” Robin, like his idol Jonathan Winters, must have had one of the world’s hardest talents with which to live and retain personal balance. Sitting next to him on my old PBS show was like sitting in the Macy’s barge next to the fireworks going off. He was at full, manic, comic frenzy for an hour without let-up. (We even improvised a short Shakespeare play together, with and without rhymed couplets.) I caught his manic energy. It was exhilarating. And exhausting. When it ended, I was wet and spent. It took him a while to come (partially) down, and I thought, “Can this be good for anyone? Can you be able to do all these rapid-fire personality changes and emerge knowing who you yourself are?… Some day, will some chemical link be found between great, great performing talent and susceptibility to that awful conqueror of the talented performer? Are the gods jealous? Do they cruelly envy the greatly gifted and, in the classic Greek manner, smite them low? The somewhat grim answer: We’d better enjoy them while we can."

"I guarantee you that thousands, hearing of Robin’s death, asked how he could do it when he had everything: fame, wealth, adulation, family love. And another supposed insulator against the worst of the blues, plenty of work. No combination of those adds up to insurance. And the hectic, nerve-wracking ups and downs of fortune in show business are, of course, a major factor for emotional disequilibrium. … I know Robin knew this. His death recalled a moment with him years ago in a small club. He came off stage after bringing a cheering audience to its feet. “Isn’t it funny how I can bring great happiness to all these people,” he said. “But not to myself.” The non-actor has a major advantage because it’s harder to hide the symptoms. The actor knows how to act."

"He was the patriarch of our little clan of comedians in San Francisco. All of us looked at him, in a way, as a father figure. … He was just very supportive. He was very shy, and possibly a little embarrassed by his fame. Inside, he really was a comic. Naturally, all comics just wanna hang around other comics, so he would come to these little clubs and open mics, and you’d get bumped, and he would go on and you’d have to follow him, which was always really terrifying because he’s so great, and people were so excited to just be in his presence. … I feel like he was a conduit — that everything he was feeding off of his brilliance was really something he was just channeling. But maybe what allowed him to be so humble and what endeared people to him was that humility, and that he would just turn on that brilliance for you. It was the ultimate form of being present, to channel it. I think that he was very spiritual in a lot of ways. I think it’s so unique you can’t emulate it. If you look at the way comedy is, and look at its history, you don’t find anybody like him at all, except for maybe Jonathan Winters is the closest, and he also was a very dreamlike figure."