Beyond the past, Before the future. @iainryoung - Tumblr Blog

Context is everything.

“My wife passed away last January. We’d been married for 62 years. You caught me at a time when I’ve been thinking a lot about love because I’m reading Shakespeare’s sonnets. The definition of love is elusive, which is why we write about it endlessly. Even Shakespeare couldn’t touch it. All the greatest love stories just seem to be about physical attraction. Romeo and Juliet didn’t know ifthey liked the same books or movies. It was just physical. After 62 years, it becomes something different entirely. My wife used to say: ‘We are one.’ And believe me, she was not the type of person to overstate something. Now that she’s gone, I realize how right she was. So much of our lives were linked. We were very physical and affectionate. But we also shared every ritual of our life. I miss her every time I leave a movie and can’t ask for her opinion. Or every time I go to a restaurant and can’t give her a taste of my chicken. I miss her most at night. We got in bed together at the same time every night.”

https://soundcloud.com/iainyoung/ill-come-running-back-to-you

13thwitness

rainyday-recess

As a kid, I used to have a book of all of the seat maps of broadway theaters. I don't know why, but something about the layout of a theatre was intriguing to me. In middle school my computer wallpaper was a view similar to this at radio city. Entering into our last week here I went out to the front of the stage to take it in, an empty theatre. What a view I have had for the past two years.

theimpossiblecool

Robin.

scottycrowe

Somewhere around my 27th or 28th viewing of Mrs. Doubtfire one summer, I remember my dad telling me an anecdote about Robin Williams: that he was able to walk into a room and make a joke about any object he saw. It was this super-sharp, observational humor that set him apart from other comedians and made him a success.

I’ve never been able to confirm if the story was true, but it stuck with me. I wanted to have that skill. It’s probably the reason I’ve subjected my friends to many a C+ joke, but it’s also probably the reason I take in as much as I do at any given time or in any given place. It’s definitely the reason I had any confidence in writing anything for public consumption while I was on tour. Accurate story or not, he shaped my sense of humor and the way I pay attention.

A few weeks ago, I found a To-Do list I made when I first moved to Los Angeles. I had lofty ambitions in late-night comedy (end of joke?), so the list had a bunch of things like classes to take, things to write, things to read. But at the bottom, in all caps, was:

ROBIN WILLIAMS EXERCISE

And it’s the one thing on the list that still feels relevant.

Robin Williams has a string of movies that I’ll always hold as favorites (some of which are responsible for my biggest aspirations), but I think his greatest impact was in his legend. Salute.