That was a really sad read.
For a man who very much lived inside his own head, could rattle off vast amounts of memorized material that he had sponged from everywhere, thought very fast and was quite obviously highly intelligent, LBD would have been devastating.
It seems he didn't want the world to watch him deteriorate, to the point where he didn't even want his own family and doctors to know about the hallucination symptom. This is besides the fact that LBD-induced paranoia and anxiety symptoms were eating at him on top of his lifelong struggles with depression.
The fact that his ability to perform at all would soon end, given he could no longer remember lines by the time he did Night at the Museum 3, probably was a tipping point. Was that his last filmed role? Films are usually filmed a year in advance and that's actually rather close to the holiday release date for such an effects-heavy film. In tribute videos I've seen, "Smile, my boy, it's sunrise." has already risen to become one of his saddest movie lines and it seems this is his posthumously released film that has most stuck as his last memorable performance. It also couldn't have helped that his last attempt at television went so poorly. I happen to be a big fan of both Robin from my childhood and SMG since her Buffy days, so that was sad to see (I haven't watched The Crazy Ones, but I was pulling for both of them in their career slumps). That career blow had horrible timing. The discovery of his illness was happening while making that show.
One thing that also pops out at me is that he aged pretty rapidly in his last years after having an appearance that was pretty consistent for a long time (IMO, he started off looking older than he was--certainly not looking only 27 as Mork!). He didn't radically change in appearance from the '80s to early '00s (or maybe we all got used to him looking roughly 40 and his hirsuteness aged him in earlier roles), so that sort made his rapid catch-up at the end stand out. He looked older than 63 at the end. And people have noted he looks thinner/not well as Teddy in retrospect.
And if he hadn't killed himself, the disease would have and it was going to be a miserable end where the real person would have barely existed. And it seems his case was a severe and rapid one given that the Lewy Bodies were so diffuse in his brain after only beginning symptoms in October 2013.
It's a shame he was misdiagnosed and some of the wrong treatments could have done more damage than good. There was no cure, though.
My dad, then a pilot captain for USAir, had Robin on his plane once in the early '90s right after Aladdin was released (I was 5 years old when Aladdin came out). He had wanted to welcome him aboard his magic carpet, but Robin seemed tired and introverted/quiet, so he left him alone. It seems my dad got to see a rare side of Robin where he wasn't performing for the public and extroverted. Of all the celebrities (of which there were many--my mom was also a stewardess who had such encounters), that's the one my dad was most excited about.
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