Mindy reveals: Robin Williams groped me constantly and I didn’t mind

It’s a story that follows the usual script, and then doesn’t. 

The Daily Mail has published an excerpt of a new biography of Robin Williams, with a focus on the late comic great’s relationship with co-star Pam Dawber during their stint on the hit 1970s sitcom Mork & Mindy. And in the book by journalist David Itzkoff, Dawber recalls that Williams “flashed, humped, bumped [and] grabbed” her incessantly while they were working.

So far, so #MeToo. Many actresses have spoken about the inappropriate sexual advances and attacks they suffered on film and TV sets not just in the ’70s but until a few months ago, when big-shot Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein was outed as a serial sex abuser and action started being taken by entertainment companies to stamp out the behaviour. For example, Lynda Carter, who famously played Wonder Woman in the ’70s, recently told the Daily Beast that she’d been subject to harassment so severe on the set of the iconic series that she had considered taking legal action against her abuser.

But the big difference in this case is that Dawber didn’t mind.

According to the book excerpt in the Daily Mail, the actress admits that on paper, Williams’ actions sound appalling. “But somehow he had this guileless little thing that he would do – those sparkly eyes. He’d look at you, really playful, like a puppy, all of a sudden. And then he’d grab your t*ts and then run away,” she recalled. “And somehow he could get away with it. It was the Seventies, after all.”

Dawber, who played Mindy opposite Williams’ Mork from 1978 to 1982, certainly wasn’t the only one who noticed the comedian’s behaviour. Garry Marshall, who produced Mork & Mindy, told biography author Itzkoff that Williams would frequently strip naked on set as Dawber said her lines in an attempt to make her laugh or put her off her stride. 

“His aim in life was to make Pam Dawber blush,” Marshall said.

In fact, not only did Dawber not mind, she and Williams grew to love each other like brother and sister, she remembered, saying that he ha a “gigantic heart”.

Williams, who committed suicide in 2014, had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, and also had a nerve condition called Lewy body disease that causes dementia. His struggle with addiction and depression throughout his life was well known, and this flipside of Williams’ funny public persona is something Itzkoff explores in the book.

“Williams’s comic brilliance masked a deep well of conflicting emotions and self-doubt,” the promotional blurb by UK publisher Pan MacMillan says. The book, called Robin, is due for release in the US in May. 

Were you a Mork & Mindy fan? Did you enjoy Robin Williams’ movies?