A homeless man who believes he is on a quest for the Holy Grail, and a broken radio host who tries to help him — Robin Williams turns fantasy into a story about guilt and redemption.
Released in 1991, The Fisher King stars Williams as Parry, a former professor living on the streets of New York after a tragedy, who imagines himself as a knight searching for the Grail. Jeff Bridges plays Jack Lucas, the shock jock whose careless words helped set the tragedy in motion.
Williams plays Parry with a mixture of delusion, humour and deep sadness, and the film never mocks him. Its fantasy sequences — most famously a waltz in Grand Central Station — feel like glimpses of the world as Parry sees it, beautiful and fragile.
It is a signature role because it lets Williams be both the comic centre and the emotional heart of a film, and because it shows his gift for making an outsider’s inner life feel completely real.