Recently, Sally Field revealed to Vanity Fair that when her father passed away while shooting “Mrs. Doubtfire,” Robin Williams arranged for her to depart the set. Although Field had not intended to impede the filming because of a personal matter, Williams sensed something wasn’t quite right with his co-star and convinced the director Chris Columbus to reschedule the shots so that Field could spend a day in the spotlight.
“I never shared this story before,” Field stated. “I was in the camper outside of the courtroom where we were shooting the divorce scene. My father had a stroke a couple of years before, and was in a nursing facility. I got a phone call from the doctor saying my father had passed, a massive stroke. He asked if I wanted them to put him on the resuscitator. I said, ‘No, he did not want that. Just let him go. And please lean down and say, “Sally says goodbye.”‘
“I was of course beside myself,” Field added. “I came on the set trying with all my might to act. I wasn’t crying. Robin came over, pulled me out of the set, and asked, ‘Are you okay?’”
Field recalled Williams’ reaction, “Oh my God, we need to get you out here right now,” after she ultimately informed Williams about her father’s death.
“And he made it happen—they shot around me the rest of the day,” Field stated. “I could go back to my house, call my brother, and make arrangements. It’s a side of Robin that people rarely knew: He was very sensitive and intuitive.”
Throughout the filming of “Mrs. Doubtfire,” Williams had an impact on the lives of numerous co-stars. When they performed together on “Mrs. Doubtfire,” Lisa Jakub—who was a young teenager at the time and portrayed the eldest daughter of Williams’ role in the movie—told Fox News Digital earlier this year that Williams was the initial individual to openly talk to her regarding mental health issues.
“He would talk to me about his struggles and the things that he went through,” Jakub said. “And it was the first time that I felt like, ‘Oh, I’m not a freak. I don’t have to hide this about myself. This is just something that some of us have to deal with.’”
Williams played a father in the film “Mrs. Doubtfire” who chooses to disguise himself as a woman housekeeper to find employment for his divorced wife and visit his kids. With $441 million in global receipts, the film ranked as the second highest-grossing picture of 1993.