Robin Williams (1951-2014) was the "saddest person" Sam Neill (75) has ever met. This is what the New Zealander writes in his recently published autobiography "Did I Ever Tell You This". The two actors met while filming the 1999 film The 200 Years Man.

During filming, Sam Neill and Robin Williams regularly visited each other in their trailers and chatted about the world. Neill describes Williams as "irresistible, outrageous, irrepressible, gigantic funny". But the "Jurassic Park" star also felt a deep sadness in the gifted comedian. Neill calls Williams "the saddest person I've ever met".

The "Mrs. Doubtfire" mime had everything you could wish for. "He was famous, he was rich, people loved him, great kids - he had the world at his feet," writes Sam Neill. Still, he felt more sorry for the comedian than he could express. "He was the loneliest man on a lonely planet."

Neill describes Williams as "heartbrokenly lonely and deeply depressed" - for whom humor was a form of self-therapy. He was only happy when he could make other people laugh.

Robin Williams took his own life on August 11, 2014 at the age of 63. He suffered from depression all his life and repeatedly struggled with alcohol and drug addiction. Shortly before his death, he was said to have been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and the neurodegenerative disease Lewy body dementia.

Help with depression and suicidal thoughts is available from the telephone counseling service on the free number: 0800/111 0 111