Robin Williams - When the Laughter Stops 1951-2014 (6 page)

So there was some professional jealousy going on but, eventually, so much so that he began insisting on standing outside a club before he went on to perform so that no one could ever accuse him of stealing their jokes. ‘It’s something I do now as a conscious effort, so no one can fucking accuse me. I’m not into necrophilia,’ he told
Rolling Stone.
‘I don’t need to go back and take “Oh, God, don’t you just hate it about those medic-alert badges.” Yeah, thanks. I’m taking that. That’ll really work. And there [are] lots of people who took entire mannerisms from me. It’s not something I can get mad about. It’s flattery. It’s great. When it happens the other way around, you’re just supposed to smile.’ It was true – he himself was to inspire a whole generation of comics. But this was to be a recurring theme and one that did not make life any easier.

However, on one front, things were looking up. In 1976 Robin was working in a bar in San Francisco when he met Valerie Velardi, who was a student at Mills College and working as a waitress to fund her way through her degree. The daughter of an Italian contractor, she came from New Haven, Connecticut, on the East Coast, and was the eldest of four. Her parents divorced when she was just twelve and Valerie assumed the role of mother after her real mother moved away. That might have contributed to her appeal for Robin. She was studying to become a dance teacher,
having left it too late to become a dancer herself. ‘A good, tough lady,’ is how Robin described her to an interviewer and soon the two became an item. A month later they moved in together. She was to become Williams’ first wife in 1978, and the pair enjoyed a very stormy relationship.

But Robin wasn’t going to be working in a bar for long. The couple moved to Los Angeles, where he continued to work the comedy-club circuit, in 1977 performing at the Comedy Club, an appearance that changed his life. The television producer George Schlatter, a highly experienced and successful business pro, was in the audience. Born in Birmingham, Alabama, and raised in Webster Groves, Missouri, as a teenager Schlatter sang at the St Louis Municipal Opera, where his mother, a violinist, also performed. He went on to Pepperdine University in Los Angeles before joining MCA Records as an agent; after a few years he became the general manager of Ciro’s Nightclub on the Sunset Strip.

It was while at Ciro’s that he saw Dan Rowan and Dick Martin performing; coincidentally, he also started producing variety shows and specials for television. And it didn’t take long for him to realise the two should mix. In 1967 he produced something that was meant to be a one-off special:
Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In
(the title was a reference to the various sit-ins and love-ins happening in fashionable society at the time). It was so successful that a regular series was commissioned, running from 1968 to 1973, and replacing
The Man From U.N.C.L.E.
on Monday
nights at 8pm. Based on vaudeville, with a sprinkling of satire (the satire boom was then in full swing), there were gags, sketches and a great deal more. It was the first show to feature music videos on television and it was also, among much else, responsible for launching the career of actress Goldie Hawn.

The show had been one of the huge successes in television history and Schlatter was thinking about reviving it, so he was on the lookout for new talent. And boy, did he find it that night. ‘He [Williams] extended the mic over the audience and said, “I’m fishing for assholes,”’ Schlatter recalled. He was also looking to revive the
Laugh-In
show and so he booked Robin to appear on the NBC special
The Great American Laugh-Off
in late 1977. Schlatter was impressed, as so many were, by Williams’ breadth of knowledge: ‘He’s one of the most well-educated comedians we’ve ever had,’ Schlatter told
Variety
. ‘Part of that came from the wealth of knowledge and expertise he developed at Juilliard.’

Robin was supposed to have a five-minute slot but this was extended to fifteen. And he was the unqualified success of the show: from the moment he first appeared, shaking hands with a bemused lady and squealing, ‘She touched me like she knows me! I’m selling my clothes and going to Heaven!’ it was evident a rarefied talent had arrived. The cast were required to open something that resembled stable doors, poke their heads out and introduce themselves: in Robin’s case, the relevant door was actually in the floor but
when he bobbed up to say his name, even in that instant alone, he exuded an extraordinary energy. Williams was also responsible for the one quote from the show to make it onto the IMDb website: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, tonight I’m here to talk to you about the very serious problem of schizophrenia. – No he doesn’t! – SHUT UP, LET HIM SPEAK!’ He was the undisputed star of the evening, a major new talent now appearing on national TV.

Comedienne and TV host Joan Rivers met him during the making of the show but she was not quite so won over as everyone else. She felt that, in some ways, he was still auditioning – so determined to be noticed that he simply never stopped. ‘You know how it is: You’re struggling, you want to be noticed, and the only way is to be the funny boy,’ she told
New York Magazine
in 1993. ‘We took a picture together – and he never stopped mugging. You wanted to tie him down and say, “Stop.”’

Everyone else, however, was totally won over. But Robin had been working up to this point for some years now. He had been honing his act in stand-up and his dedication at rehearsals was equal to his ability to improvise – far more preparation went into the act than most people realised. By now he was also developing a trademark look, one that he would stay with for a while: brightly coloured braces (‘suspenders’, as they were known in the States). No one could ever have described him as a snappy dresser but he knew the importance of presentation and creating an individual look that people could associate with him.

In the event, the show didn’t exactly match the success of the original but it was obvious to everyone that a huge new talent had emerged on the scene. Schlatter signed him up to be part of his regular cast for the
Laugh-In
series of revivals he was planning. ‘You didn’t really need to bother writing for him,’ said the humorist Merrill Markoe. ‘When the camera was on, he blew through what he did and seized the show.’ (Rowan & Martin themselves, incidentally, were not amused: they were not involved in the revival but owned the format to the show and so they went on to sue. They won $4.6 million in 1980.)

The speed of Williams’ ascent was dizzying but it was to contribute to his problems too. It takes anyone some time to come to terms with being famous but, when it happens virtually overnight, the pressure can be almost too much to bear. Reality, for Robin, was changing very quickly –
too
quickly. Yet another reason to self-medicate began to manifest itself. Fame brings pressure and constant attention and he was having a hard time dealing with both.

There was also an appearance on
The Richard Pryor Show
but something much bigger was on the cards; something that meant he had to go to court to get out of his
Laugh-In
contract. It emerged that he was earning $1,500 an hour on
Laugh-In
and stood to earn $15,000 per episode if the new deal came off. In the event, he was successful in managing to get out of his contract, married Valerie and looked forward to a bright future. The wedding was a pretty major affair: the couple tied the knot at The Farms Country Club on 4 June
1978 in Wallingford, Connecticut, a country club where Valerie’s father Leonard was a member. Both were certainly initially excited about the marriage, but the timing was not good because the sudden and dizzying change in Robin’s status meant that he was about to experience a wild stage of his life. Through just one television appearance, he had made a huge impact and it had come to the attention of some very important people indeed.

One of the greatest comedians of the day was about to become a household name.

Garry Marshall had a problem: the writer, director and producer had a long-running hit on his hands –
Happy Days
– about a happy family growing up in the 1950s and 1960s. It had started in 1974 and was to finish in 1984 but, halfway through the run, Marshall was trying to broaden its appeal. He turned to his son to ask what he wanted to watch and got a slightly unexpected reply.

‘My 7-year-old son Scott was reluctant to watch
Laverne & Shirley
or
Happy Days
or any show I did,’ he told
New York Magazine
in 1993. ‘So I asked him, “What do you like?” He said, “I only like space.” I told him, “I don’t do space.” “Well, you could do it.” So I asked him, “How would
you do space in
Happy Days
?” And he said, “It could be a dream.” Now, this was the fourth year of the show, and we were trying to find worthy adversaries for Fonzie. So we wrote a guest role for Mork, the extraterrestrial. And my sister the casting agent brought Robin in from my sister Penny’s acting class.’

As Marshall was later to observe, ‘Williams was the only alien to audition for the role. He came into the room, Garry asked him to take a seat and Robin promptly put his head on the chair. It was immediately obvious that he was exactly right for the role: anarchic and a little bit crazy, you could easily believe he was actually an alien.’

‘My job stopped being about remembering lines or moves, but to keep from laughing,’ says Henry Winkler, the actor who played The Fonz, and who remembered it well. ‘And yet Robin was so shy it was hard for him to speak. He did ask me, “After a day of this, how do you perform at the Comedy Store?” I told him, “After this, you really don’t have the energy to perform at night.”’

The Season Five episode ‘My Favorite Orkan’ (a reference to another TV series,
My Favorite Martian
) was broadcast in February 1978 and the viewers loved it. Admittedly, it was a little far-fetched: it involved an alien, Mork from the planet Ork, coming down to earth and trying to kidnap Richie Cunningham (Ron Howard) as a human specimen. The Fonz steps in and saves Richie and it is then revealed that Richie has been dreaming… to begin with, at least. When everyone involved absolutely loved it,
the ending was changed so that, instead, it showed Mork wiping everyone’s memories. Marshall was delighted: ‘We said, “No, it’s not a dream; it’s real. It’s another series!”’

It certainly was. And so
Mork & Mindy
, the show that would almost overnight turn Robin Williams into a household name, was born. The premise was that Mork (who has been grown in a test tube and drinks by using his finger) has been sent to Earth by Orson in a small, egg-shaped spaceship to observe humans. Orson wanted to get rid of him because humour is not permitted on Ork. Once down on Earth – he ends up in Boulder, Colorado, a place later to become the site of tributes to Robin – he dresses in a suit but puts it on backwards. He then encounters Mindy (Pam Dawber), who has just split from her boyfriend and takes him to be a priest, until he reveals who he actually is. She promises to keep his secret and to help him to study Earth. There is a flashback in which Mork tells her about when he came to Earth previously and The Fonz arranges for him to date Laverne De Fazio (from
Laverne & Shirley
, one of many crossovers between
Mork & Mindy
and other television series – Henry Winkler and Penny Marshall appeared).

Mork moves in with Mindy, much to her father Fred’s chagrin (although her grandmother Cora, with whom she works in Fred’s music store, likes him) but the local sheriff, Deputy Tilwick, who thinks Mork is unhinged, attempts to oust him. In the second episode, Mork agrees to leave but his plans are disrupted when he gets bezurb
(drunk) on ginger beer and also reveals to Fred that he is actually an alien. The moving-out theme continues in the third episode when Mork has an attack of conscience after losing Mindy a date and, while looking for somewhere to stay, he encounters the eccentric Exidor, of which more below. In the next episode, Mindy tells Mork he must experience love to know what it is to be human – although this is clearly going to result in a ‘will they?/won’t they?’ situation. Mork takes her at her word and falls in love with a mannequin named Dolly. By now it was clear why Robin was so right for the role: a child-like innocence was needed to pull this one off. But this is the episode in which Mork and Mindy kiss and the future is pretty clear.

The next episode, which sees a second kiss between the two of them, introduces the character of Susan (of which more below), who tries to make off with Mork in revenge for Mindy stealing her boyfriend in high school. But she doesn’t succeed. Matters improve with Fred, who saves Mork’s life after a newspaper reporter turns up looking for proof of alien life. Mork next pretends that he can predict the weather, prompting Mindy to tell him never to lie (‘splinking’), after which he resuscitates the despicable landlord Arnold (of which more below.) The next episode sees Mork in jail with Exidor after falling for a sob story – somewhat uncomfortably for the modern viewer, Exidor worships O.J. Simpson. Mindy is briefly reunited with her ex-fiancé and Mork reduces himself to the age of three, using his Orkan age machine (this device was perfect for
Williams’ talents and also enabled various other plot twists). Mork then rescues Mindy from an unwanted admirer, who is irate and with whom he must deal, following which he once again uses his age machine to become an older friend of Cora’s, to whom he also reveals his true nature.

Next up, Mork learns the true nature of Christmas and teaches everyone else about it too, after he invites the unspeakable Susan to spend it with them as she has no one else (touches of Robin’s future sentimental roles there), after which he mistakes a Russian immigrant for being an alien. An irritating new neighbour, Franklin, moves in, after which Mork performs a wedding ceremony for two friends. Exidor is back, planning to become Emperor of Earth, and lets the couple use his summer home but chaos ensues. Mork is threatened with a transfer, Sally returns with a newborn son, who Mork loves so much that he buys a baby of his own, and then, in an episode that won considerable acclaim, Mork shuts his emotions down after a nightmare. Mindy kisses him to release those emotions, which Mork cannot control. Again, it was the perfect comedic vehicle for Williams.

Mindy goes away and Mork and Mr Bickley visit a singles bar: there they meet ladies who turn out to be thieves. Mr Bickley then becomes a thief too and steals Mork’s age machine, changing his age from a baby to middle age. Mork tries to find a job but his ‘birthday’ causes a potentially fatal condition (he must recharge himself with an egg-like ‘gleek’) and he then loses Mindy a job. When he finds out, he tells Orson that he wishes he’d never come to Earth but Orson
shows him what would have happened had he not done so: Mindy would have married gambling addict Cliff, Fred would have gone off on his travels and had a short-term relationship, Cora would have been living with Mindy and the music shop would have been sold. The episode was called ‘It’s A Wonderful Mork’, in reference to the heartwarming 1946 Christmas fantasy film
It’s A Wonderful Life.
The final episode of the season – the twenty-fifth – has Exidor back as a reincarnation of Julius Caesar and Mork makes a pet of a caterpillar called Bob. And so the series drew to a close.

There could scarcely have been a finer vehicle for Williams’ talents. He improvised a great deal of his role and became extremely famous almost overnight. Indeed, he improvised so much that there would be gaps in the script, left there to allow him to create his own monologue. It was difficult for his co-star Pam Dawber, simply because she had to stop herself from laughing as she watched. The audience certainly found the whole thing totally hilarious: the show was a massive hit, with 60 million viewers regularly tuning in. Paramount hastily signed Robin up to a five-year $3 million contract. Williams came from a wealthy background anyway but, for the first time, it looked as if he would now be seriously rich.

The
Mork & Mindy
TV series soon entered popular culture. People began greeting each other with the phrase ‘Nanu nanu’, accompanied by a Mr Spock-esque Vulcan salute. The word ‘shazbot’, an Orkan profanity, entered the language, as did ‘KO’, Mork’s version of OK. Eventually,
the series overtook
Happy Days
in the ratings. Those were heady times. Robin and Valerie moved to a canyon home and Robin bought a silver BMW; they started to have a few animals. But he was also beginning to party hard and after a day on set he was either out socialising or doing stand-up, which is not a recipe for domestic bliss. And it didn’t help that Valerie wasn’t enjoying the partying, with the unfortunate result that Robin was often out on his own. He still wore his Hawaiian shirts and baggy trousers but he’d had to give up the multi-coloured braces because they made him too recognisable. Fame was beginning to encroach on his life. He was linked to the model Molly Madden; Valerie was seen on her own in Italy. On the plus side, he also started doing charity work for, among others, the Human Dolphin Foundation: something he would continue for the rest of his life.

Things changed in the show’s second season, however, and arguably suffered as a result. The emphasis moved from Mork’s attempts to understand Earth to his relationship with Mindy and, in an attempt to address social issues rather than just delight in the comedy, a younger audience was targeted, with Fred and Cora leaving their regular roles, although they did return in later episodes. Various new characters were introduced. Somewhat unwisely, the show was shifted into a number of different time slots and the audience began falling away.

‘That was kind of depressing at first because I took it on myself personally, thinking, “Oh, God! I’m not funny
anymore”,’ Williams told
New York Magazine
in a 1981 interview. ‘At last I realized that it was a combination of other things. They were screwing around with the schedule, changing the time slot every other night. And parents got angry when we started doing all those sexploitation shows – written specifically to get little girls running around in tight outfits and me dressing in drag. That lost a lot of people who used to watch with their kids. Also, some people thought we were heavy-handed talking about things like euthanasia; we had that one show about the robot being unplugged.’ It was certainly a far cry from the merry mayhem at the start.

There were also increasing rumours about Robin’s personal life, with his name now openly linked to a selection of other women. He was forced to make a conscious effort to calm down. ‘It’s not the work but the social life that drained me,’ he told
People Magazine
in 1979. ‘I was bordering on exhaustion. I got so frenetic I scared myself. There was no time to recover, no time to go home and say, “Screw you” to a wall. I was starting to go through the roof. You have to say “No” or else you go slowly bozo.’

Meanwhile, Valerie was making more of an effort too: she had accepted that she was now married to a famous actor and attempted to play the game, attending industry events with him and being an industry wife, as well as working, on an ad hoc basis, as a dance teacher.

But the show was flailing. There were more attempts to jig up the ratings and, in the fourth season, Mork and
Mindy were married. Mork laid an egg and they had a child – Mearth, played by Jonathan Winters (it was explained that Orkans age backwards). But the magic had gone and, in 1982, the show was duly cancelled. In total, ninety-one episodes had been filmed. The experience taught Williams a lesson he never forgot: namely, don’t be complacent. ‘I found out the show was cancelled by reading it in
Variety
,’ he told
People
in a 2009 interview. ‘In Hollywood that’s like reading your own obituary: “You’re dead, good luck!”’ For a man given to such personal insecurity, it was all a little unfortunate.

The series spawned a great many much-loved characters, apart from Mork and Mindy themselves. Tetchy old Fred (Conrad Janis) and freethinking Cora (Elizabeth Kerr) both had big fan bases and, in retrospect, it was a huge mistake to downgrade their characters. Franklin Delano Bickley (Tom Poston) was a next-door neighbour; Mearth (Jonathan Winters) their giant, elderly child. Siblings Remo and Jean Davinci (Jay Thomas and Gina Hecht) were co-owners of The New York Delicatessen. Nelson Flavor (Jim Staahl) was Mindy’s conservative, ambitious cousin. Then there was the long-suffering Orson (voiced by Ralph James), Mork’s superior.

There were other recurring characters with their own roles on the show. Susan Taylor (Morgan Fairchild) is a snooty friend of Mindy’s from high school. Exidor (Robert Donner) is a prophet who recognises Mork for what he is and the leader of a cult that no one else can see. Mr Sternhagen (Foster Brooks) becomes Mindy’s boss
at the local TV station; Todd Norman Taylor (TNT) (Bill Kirchenbauer) is a womanising jock who teaches Mork how to drive. Eugene (Jeffrey Jacquet) is a ten-year-old boy who befriends Mork in the first series; Billy (Corey Feldman) is a daycare-centre child. The somewhat unfortunately named (to a British audience at least!) Arnold Wanker (Logan Ramsey) is the landlord of Fred’s music store.

Oddly, for something that started out as such a frothy piece of fun,
Mork & Mindy
hinted at various elements that were to affect Williams’ life. He was an extremely talented actor, and recognised as such by even the most churlish reviewers, but what he excelled at above and beyond anything else was comedy, especially improvisational comedy. However, one criticism often levelled at him was that he was at times just too sentimental and he neglected his real gift for something that could be a little cloying. And that is exactly what happened to
Mork & Mindy
: the series started out as wildly comedic but ended up being a programme that tried to comment on the issues of the day. This didn’t work and audiences didn’t like it. And, although it would be easy to lay the blame at the door of the producers, Robin was also himself involved in the decision-making process.