The final days of iconic actor Robin Williams were “horrible,” and filled with “sobbing” and sadness, according to a new biography by Dave Itzkoff.
The legendary actor committed suicide in 2014 at the age of 63, and was struggling to remember his lines on the set of Night of the Museum: Secret of the Tomb.
“He was sobbing in my arms at the end of every day. It was horrible. Horrible,” makeup artist Cheri Minns recalled in the book. “I said to his people, ‘I’m a makeup artist. I don’t have the capacity to deal with what’s happening to him.'”
She said that he felt like he’d lost touch with his deepest joy in life: comedy. “He just cried and said, ‘I can’t, Cheri. I don’t know how anymore. I don’t know how to be funny.’ ”
Williams was suffering from Lewy Body Dementia, a type of brain disease that affected his control over his movement and thoughts. He had been incorrectly diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease.
“I put myself in his place. Think of it this way: The speed at which the comedy came is the speed at which the terrors came,” Minns recalled in the book. “And all that they described that can happen with this psychosis, if that’s the right word — the hallucinations, the images, the terror — coming at the speed his comedy came at, maybe even faster, I can’t imagine living like that.”
Robin goes on sale May 15.