The Official
Robin Williams is a Sympathy Getter Website

Please Note:
This page is created in absolute good humor and high spirits.  The author is well aware of his biased opinions and realizes that he is only considering a small portion of Mr. Williams' filmography and actually has the utmost respect for Mr. Williams as one of the most talented actors and comedians in Hollywood.

But aren't you just a tad bit annoyed with the fact that Robin Williams' characters always create sympathy for themselves?  He always plays the kindest, most likeable person on the face of the earth, the true embodiment of a "good guy," but his characters always end up taking the fall for the worst reasons.

And yes, this site is  as pointless as it looks....

Let's take the film Patch Adams  for example.  Williams plays Patch Adams, an unlicensed doctor who wishes to help the world as a "comic physician" of sorts, and believes that laughter really is the best medicine.  He helps lots of little children who aren't happy because they are going through chemo and he is eventually kicked out of med school for his outstanding beliefs and actions.  Shortly afterward his lovely girlfriend is killed by a homicidal maniac who she was only trying to help at the time.  It may be a true story, but guess who stars?




Welcome to What Dreams May Come.  This time, Williams plays a child neurologist whose own children died in a car accident years before.  He wants nothing more than to help people get better, and while he is helping the victims of a car crash he comes across on his way home from work, he too is killed by an out-of-control driver.  Williams loves his wife so much, he's willing to leave Heaven and go to Hell to save her soul.




Here, Williams shows his true comic side, cursing up a storm on the "Late Show with David Letterman."









In Dead Poets Society, Williams plays an English teacher at a boarding school who challenges his students to constantly look at things in a different way, to always try to break their own personal boundaries.  One of his students is driven to suicide by his overly-strict father, William's character is made the scapegoat by the school's administration, and he is fired at the end.







Williams' most popular sympathy getting role is probably Mrs. Doubtfire.  Williams plays a loving father who loves his kids so much, his wife divorces him and gains full custody.  He goes to his raspy-voiced brother (Harvey Fierstein :-) ) in a desperate attempt to make himself look like an old woman so that he can pose as a nanny, infiltrate his own house, and see his kids again.  Williams' antics are eventually found out and he is severely reprimanded by the court, despite a heart-warming monologue delivered by Williams before the judge.





Williams plays a psychologist who is basically down on his luck in Good Will Hunting.   He struggles through the whole movie to help an already independent soul better himself, and narrowly succeeds in the end.  This character is by no means the perfect human being, like his others.   Williams won his first and only Academy Award for this rare role as a real person.



Well, that's it.  I hope you find whatever it is at least slightly funny, if not interesting.  By the way, Williams will be playing a man who brings hope to a Nazi concentration camp in Jakob the Liar, opening in September 1999 :-)

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This page was created on August 10, 1999.  Please direct all comments (and complaints) to <oswald@conspirators.net>. Bear in mind that I do understand that my page is biased, and I have seen and liked all of the movies mentioned on this page.