Unless you read her recent piece on why she never became a famous child star, you might not quite remember the name Mara Wilson. But delve back into the recesses of your childhood and you’ll remember her as that girl from _Matild_a, Mrs Doubtfire and Miracle on 34th Street. Having worked with Robin Williams on Mrs Doubtfire, she has some really interesting things to say about his death in a blog post, Remembering Robin.
‘I wish we had talked more. I wish I had reached out more. Being a Worst Case Scenario kind of person, I’ve worried so many times about losing so many people I care about, but I never could imagine losing Robin.’
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The ex-actress, who prefers not to be famous, explained why she declined to be involved with the making of Mrs Doubtfire 2, the production of which was announced a few months ago (which stopped following Robin’s death): ‘For the record, no, I do not have anything to do with the Mrs. Doubtfire sequel, nor will I,’ she tweeted.
However, she took her blog post tribute to Robin as an opportunity to explain why she never wanted to act in it: ‘I had loved working with him but didn’t feel like we could do it again, and… being in major studio films again meant a level of scrutiny I didn’t think I could deal with. I wanted to apologize and know he understood. It hurts to know I can’t.’
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Mara, who, just like Robin, has suffered with mental illness – OCD, anxiety and depression – had this to say about all of those obituaries and tributes to Robin painting him as a mad genius whose comedy came from a place of deep anguish, like the two things were related: ‘I am afraid people will romanticize what Robin went through.
'Please don’t romanticize mental anguish’
She continued: ‘I know many people who think to be an artist means you have to suffer, or at least wallow in old miseries. It’s not only an incorrect assumption – there are comedians who had happy upbringings, I swear – but it will only hurt them and the people who care about them.’
Pretty sound thinking there, Mara. The only shame is, not being a celebrity or anything, we’re not going to hear many more of her wise words on some promo tour somewhere along the line.
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Follow Sophie on Twitter @sophwilkinson
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.