Popular

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — He was the funniest guy in the room, something that made it all the harder for friends and fans to accept that beneath that reservoir of frenetic energy and seemingly endless good humor resided demons so dark they could push Robin Williams to suicide.

Oscar-winning actor and comedian Robin Williams was found dead at age 63 on Monday from an apparent suicide at his home in Northern California, authorities said. Hollywood celebrities and many others who knew him paid tribute to Williams: His wife Susan Schneider said in a statement: “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.” President Barack Obama, in a statement making reference to the actor’s many roles said: “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. … 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.” Director Steven Spielberg said in a statement: “Robin was a lightning storm of comic genius and our laughter was the thunder that sustained him.

By Sarah McBride TIBURON Calif. (Reuters) – Robin Williams, the versatile actor whose madcap comic style made him one of television and film’s biggest stars, was found dead on Monday from an apparent suicide at his home in Northern California. Williams’ appeal stretched across generations and genres, from family fare as the voice of Disney’s blue Genie in “Aladdin” to his portrayal of a fatherly therapist in the 1997 drama “Good Will Hunting,” for which he earned his sole Oscar. I am utterly heartbroken,” Williams’ wife Susan Schneider said in a statement. Williams had been recently suffering from severe depression, his publicist Mara Buxbaum said in a statement, and the actor had repeatedly talked about his past struggles with alcohol.

NEW YORK (AP) — The question from a fan in a Sirius XM interview last year was innocent — what do you think you’d be doing if you didn’t become a comedian? — and within seconds Robin Williams was impersonating physicist Stephen Hawking getting a lap dance at a strip club.

Citing lost box office sales that are “impossible to calculate,” a California federal judge has issued an order to stop the operators of several websites from distributing stolen copies of the upcoming film “The Expendables 3.” The movie, distributed by Lions Gate Films, is scheduled to be released on Friday, but a pirated DVD-quality copy already had been downloaded more than 2.2 million times as of Aug. 1, according to court filings. In granting a preliminary injunction to Lions Gate, U.S. District Court Judge Margaret Morrow said in a ruling in Los Angeles last Friday that the defendants “deprived both Lions Gate and many others of revenue that will be impossible to calculate because there is no way of knowing how many people would have paid to see the film” if it weren’t for the copyright infringement. Lions Gate sued the operators of six websites that did not respond to requests to remove the film from their content. They feature Hollywood action stars including Sylvester Stallone, Mel Gibson and Arnold Schwarzenegger.