TIBURON: Robin Williams, the actor whose madcap comic style made him one of television and film’s biggest stars, was found dead on Monday after an apparent suicide at his home in Northern California. He was 63.

The comedian’s 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.

But many remembered the master of impressions on Tuesday for his tender portrayal in “Mrs Doubtfire”, when he played the part of a British nanny whose identity he assumed as a divorced father to be with his children.

Mr 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.

“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,” Mr Williams’ wife, Susan Schneider, said in a statement.

Social media was alight with appreciation for Mr Williams, who introduced his boyish exuberance and outlandish vaudeville-esque style to audiences as a quirky extraterrestrial in the late 1970s TV comedy “Mork & Mindy”.

President Barack Obama called Mr Williams a “one of a kind” actor who could make people laugh and cry in his array of characters.

“He arrived in our lives as an alien — but he ended up touching every element of the human spirit,” he said in a statement.

Mr Williams, who was most recently in the CBS television comedy “The Crazy Ones” until it was cancelled after one season in May, had entered a rehabilitation centre this summer to help him maintain sobriety.

Published in Dawn, Aug 13th, 2014