Ok, back for now!

Soooo much has happened this past year!
My mom was diagnosed with cancer in April 2005 :(. We're very happy she survived the 4 hour surgery and she's (almost) back to normal now. She's my Lance, you just can't beat her!
Because of that I didn't go to San Francisco that summer. I stayed home and worked full time. Other than that, I'm still working on the RWF site, of course. But I'm also still working on my move to San Francisco. I really, really wanna live and work there for a couple of years, just to get rid of my SF obsession. But, as some of you know, the US immigration service, jeez! It's not fair. BUT, I'm detemined to go there and everytime I had something to go for I achieved it, so I know some day I'll be able to call San Francisco my real home.
Just looked for schools or courses I can attend to make sure I'll be able to find a job a bit easier.
This september I'll be going to SF again and I hope to meet some great people who can help me. For one month I'll be back home again and I can't wait to feel that great feeling again! :)

Ok, just because it was really bothering me I'll write this down 1 more time. The Big White and Ascendant pictures.
Ow changed my mind, I'm a sane person and will not talk about this again on the internet.

RWF was left in the cold right after the AP incident, but I was able to find the joy of working on it again. So, it's all up-to-date (will never be completely up-to-date thoug) and back running. I hope to be able to keep it running for a long, long time, without any trouble.
Another great thing, RWF is being sponsored by an internet/website host, so that's on thing less to worry about.

Other than that...well, one gret thing happened thoug. Last february I went to Berlin to visit the International Film Festival, because they were screening the Night Listener. The 2nd festival worldwide to screen this. Great thing about it all was that Maupin and Stettner were there. And because Robin wasn't there, the other 2 persons were very accessible, which was a double bill. So it's not that bad when Robin's not there, it gives other people a chance to shine :). All info about that visit can be read on the Site, on the Night Listener's page.

I don't think much more happened this past year really. Oh yes, I received a better contract from my employer, so I don't have to worry about my job. It actually has become a great job, which I did not expect when I started working there, but they're giving me the freedom to grow and learn.

Ok, that's it for now. I hope to be able to keep this blog a bit up-to-date, but there're busy times coming up (with a vacation, The Night Listener, Man of the Year, Happy Feet, Comic Relief, Night at the Museum, License to Wed, August Rush, work, cycling, work, work, cycling etc)

Ta-ta for now

What's going on?!

I finally called Robin's manager to ask about a possible tour and to ask if there's any interest in doing shows in Europe. They told me Robin isn't planning a tour :S How weird is that. A month ago Robin said he was working on a new show and is thinking about doing a new tour by the end of the year. Oh well, maybe we know more than Robin's manager :). Anyway, there's no interest in going to Europe even if there's a tour...
A couple of years ago Robin was invited to do a show in Amsterdam and he asked $400,000 for it! It's insane, how can you ask so much?! There was a "but" though. He'd come with his own plane, so those costs were already included in the price. I still think it's insane and if he keeps asking that much, he'll never come to Europe for a show. Sometimes I wish I could say "hey, Mork guy", just like Rebecca does every once in a while.

Last week I've been working on a new main page, which will be officially online this weekend. A preview is available at www.robin-williams.net/indexhodpromo.htm
I hope you all like it as much as the Robots promo...I received several very enthusiastic e-mails about that one. So I'm glad I did chang the whole lay out, even though it's better for a site to keep everything the same as much as possible. But I can't do that, which is hopefully because I'm too creative :)

Las thing for this time is something personal I'm dealing with right now.
April 15 is THE day. My mom has a tumor, which was discovered on March 29, and it'll be removed the 15th. Till then we won't know if it's a good or bad one, maybe it's cancer...we don't know yet and that's what makes it so hard.
I'm glad my mom isn't feeling sick, she still goes to work, sport, everything is like normal. But in our minds...we're so tired and scared.
After the operation she'll have to recover in the hospital for 2 weeks. But if we get good news on the 15th, the recovery won't be as hard as after receiving bad news. If we get bad news...I don't wanna think about the consequences.

So after the 15th I'll probably leave the site for what it is till my mom is recovered and healthy again. We have good hopes, but you never know.

Fender!!!

Wow, finally I watched the full movie in the theater. I'd seen so many clips and finally it was time to see them all in the correct order. It was so much fun, but it could've been zo much funnier of I hadn't known and seen so much already. I always wanna know and see everything as soon as I can, bad habit.
But Fender is really, really cool and sweet. And especiallt that last line: "it's a combination of Funk and Jazz, called Junk", that one was so good! And the fart joke was hilarious.
Oh well, I don't want to spoil the movie for anyone, so I'll leave it to this. But it was great to finally see a new movie with Robin again, which had been several month ago, when Noel came out. Now I'll have to wait for several months again, because they won't release House of D here, and the Big White opens in September. It's gonna be a long, hard time to get through ;).

Other than that not much happened this week. I did read several post on the forum that were very sweet and I'm so glad to see the forum is coming to life. Ok, it still isn't busy and there're days without any post, but if you've visited the forum about 10 months ago and remember how quiet it was back then...then you'll understand it's alive now.
Several people wrote very sweet messages this past week and I'm very grateful for those. This site keeps me so busy and it give me so much pleasure to hear other people like it so much. So, here goes a big thank you to those people.

I'm not sure if I'm gonna try to get Robin to the Netherlands. I've been in touch with 2 people, nvolved with the same "project", who want him to play here and they both say different things. Nothing is official yet and all I know is that they have 2 weeks available in september. That's it.
I called the manager of the theater and he said nothing has been arranged with Unicef yet...it's jus that they could try to... you know
And as i said before I'm always so nervous and scared when I call Robin's manager and when there's so much lack of info I'll be even more scared. I don't wanna say anything wrong or do something they don't appreciate. And I'm not sure if it's a good thing to just call and ask if Robin can do 3 shows here in the Netherlands in September. That's basically all the info I have right now. So I think I'll just leave it up to the manager of the theater and have him call Robin's manager.

Sometimes I feel so dumb!

Welcome back!

Wow, it's been a while.
I originally created this blog to share my San Fran experiences in the summer of 2004.

Because the site has grown since I returned home, I decided to make this blog a kinda Fansite behind-the-scenes blog. What you see and read on the site is nice, but behind all that there's so much more going on and I think it'd be fun to share that with those who're interested.

Getting the weirdest e-mails, sometimes hatemail, some people think they're writing their e-mail to Robin himself.
I received an e-mail once from a woman who thought she was writing to Robin and she invited herself to visit Robin so she could find out if he's really as interesting as he seems to be.
I didn't have the guts to say: "Ok, you can meet me in New York on that evening". (of course I choose a place far from hers...
But no, I only thought about doing that...instead I e-mailed her writing that the e-mail hadn't reached Robin.

Another nice thing is the independent or first-time directors are not that isolated from the world yet. When The Final Cut premiered in February 2004 in Berlin I already met Omar. Later on he visited the site and send an e-mail and gave all kinds of cool info about the movie. He also send me a letter with several film cells from the movie. Really, really, really cool.
Because of The Final Cut I also got in touch with Brian Tyler, the composer. He aslo send me nice e-mail and even send several pictures from the recording sessions. Not too long ago he e-mailed with the latest news. This too is really, really, really nice :)

Ok, I won't make this too long otherwise I won't have anything to write next week (I'll try to write some every week, even though not THAT much is going on).
But this is something I really need to tell.
Last week I received an e-mail from a guy I met about a year ago and he's really into the stand-up and comedy "world" here in the Netherlands. He's good friends with a manager at the biggest theater in Amsterdam and he said they're very, very interested in getting Robin over here for 2 shows. They wanna make it some beneficial show for UNICEF. Paul van Vliet, also a dutch comedian, is an ambassador for UNICEF and he said if we can pull this off, he'll defenitely coorporate.
Now, the thing is, they want me to get Robin over here. Ok......
How am I gonna do that?! I'll first contact his manager (I've had contact with them before and they wer always willing to help me or forward me to the right person). I know when I call them, they'll tell me to send a fax, which is something I'm not gonna write. I'll only be the contact person, or whatever you want to call it. I think because so many people are already involved I feel very responsible now. And I don't wanna be the one who messes it up, just because I wasn't able to provide the correct info. So I don't have to do that much, but it makes me so nervous just to think about all this. I've always had a hard time calling his manager, just because I got so close to....well, everything. And now this. Oh well, let's hope for the best.

Another story next week :)

Everyone, feel free to e-mail me lindastuurman@yahoo.com

Lance, Robin & Omar

last sunday I volunteered for the Pro Cycling Tour here in San Francisco and I really enjoyed it! I had a good spot, a location where the cyclist had to make their turn, so I could see them twice each lap. My spot wasn't far from the Taylor hill, so I switched with another Marshal from time to time so I could see the cyclist do the Taylor hill. Damn, that's a steep hill.
Fillmore is even steeper and they had to cycle all the way up 9 times during the race. Today I tried to do it once and I couldn't do it. I was able to do 2 1/2 blocks, so I was only 1/2 block away from the top. Not that bad for a beginner :)

Lance was about to do the race but he cancelled because he had an injury. Too bad. Didn't see Robin at the event either.

Another great thing happened last weekend. The director of The Final Cut, Omar Naim, e-mailed me and gave me all kinds of cool info. He told me I could ask him anything I wanted so I threw a whole list with questions at him, and he answered every single one of them! Awesome! Good news about the movie was that Omar won the award for best screenplay in France last week :) + he send me a nice letter and little gift from the movie.

2nd and 3rd rehearsal + more

The 2nd rehearsal was absolutely fantastic! One of the best shows I've ever seen!
Timing was perfect, jokes worked all great and it was just hilarious! I had a hard time staying seated all the time. I was there with 2 friends and they both had tears from laughing so hard (they'd never been to an RW show before).

I was happy to see he used that joke I saw him do in Berlin for the first time. Political one as Rumsfeld with to many cocktails in him:
Here we have the known knowns, those are the things we know we know. Here we have the known unknowns, those are the things we know we don't know. And here we have the unknown unknown and I don't have a fucking clue what that is!

Another piece I like a lot was the indian accent"change your lightbulb" bit. That was hilarious!

The show on friday was not as good as wedensday, but not as bad as monday either. There were parts that just didn't work, but the "in&out" part was really, really good!

Now I'm really curious what we're gonna get in Vegas. If it's as good as wednesday...boy, then it'll become an adventure we'll never forget.

After the friday show I took the greyhound bus to Los Angeles to see a friend there. That same evening, saturday, I attended my first Dave Matthews Band concert. It was so awesome! And they played my favorite song too, Two Step. And it was so great they played The Warehouse, because that song is awesome live.
Anyway, I'm enjoying the heat in LA this week and saturday morning september 4th I'll be heading towards Vegas to see Robin's official show! Wowie!

Miracles DO happen!

I was walking on the street in San Francisco, and walked by a club called Bimbo's. The sign at the club said there was a show coming that night, called "working on material". Now I knew Robin does perform there frequently and I knew I called those try-outs "working on material". So I walked to the box office and asked if this was for Robin Williams and yes. I wasn't able to think straight anymore, all I knew is I had to get a ticket somehow, even though it was sold out already.
I was lucky enough the woman who helped me there wanted me to see the show (especially because she now knew I own this RW fansite). So she helped me to get a ticket anyway and I saw the show that same night. That was too amazing and unbelievable.

I can't say much about the show, all I know is that it's weirdest and heaviest show I've ever seen. Robin was a real lunatic/wacko up there sometime! It scared the **** out of me to be honest. But it was great!

I guess Robin wasn't completely satisfied with this rehearsal because he added another try-out for this wednesday. Lucky me has a ticket for that show as well. Now I can compare the 2 try-outs and see what he'll make of it in the new and real show in Vegas.

I still can't believe it happened...