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  • 2021-08-12 (xsd:date)
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  • Robin Williams ‘Penpal’ Story – Truth or Fiction? (en)
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  • Robin Williams ‘Penpal’ Story Claim A man named Kyle shared a heartwrenching account of being Robin Williams' penpal, and described a chance encounter at Disney. Rating Decontextualized Like this fact check? Reporting On August 9 2021, a Facebook account shared a screenshot of a comment by a person claiming to have been a penpal to Robin Williams, with a story that included a chance meeting at Disney World (or Disneyland): The text on the screenshot read: As a kid I was one of 10 winners for a sweepstakes to be a pen pal with Robin for a year. I was stoked and I’m like 8 or 9 years old. My brother and sister told me it probably wasnt going to be him, just a publicist or intern. I didn’t care. For months we sent so many letters of silliness, all his letters were long and he really loved talking about Zelda (she’s a little older than me) and all the new projects he was working on. My family went to Disney that summer and I wrote a letter while in the car and I was determined to give it to Genie because I was convinced he was always playing him in the costume and wanted to hand deliver at least one. My brother and sister were again deterring me but I wasn’t breaking my gait. Well of all coincidences in the world Robin actually was there signing autographs. I was ecstatic. Literally jumping for joy as I’m in line. We get to him and I’m rambling like a motherfucker telling him how I was a winner and about the letter and yada yada. He just goes Kyle?! With a massive grin and opens his coat and pulls out my letter from a month prior that was with a few others. Apparently he kept all our letters on him while on the road to help cheer himself up (which devastates me now thinking about what that meant). I almost fainted. I cannot Express the amount of electric energy surging through me knowing Robin Williams actually wrote me, knew me, and I believe truly loved me and those other kids like we were his children. I’ll never ever claim anybody was a bigger fan of his than Zelda. I respect her too much to say that. But I’m definitely his second biggest fan of all time. When he died I cried into my then wife’s arms for a full hour. I felt I really lost a true friend that got me through so much growing up. A man that could get my siblings and I to shut up and just revel in his magic for hours at a time. I miss you Robin. Every day. A version of the image shared to Imgur on August 12 2021 (above) suggested that the story was originally posted in r/MadeMeSmile, and that the submitter was u/TruStoryz. However, u/TruStoryz was not the original submitter — their story was heavily upvoted when shared as a screenshot in r/MadeMeSmile on August 11 2021: Florida is where wokes go to die... Please enable JavaScript Florida is where wokes go to die The world didn’t deserve him from MadeMeSmile Redditors on r/MadeMeSmile by and large accepted the story as accurate, and many responded by sharing their favorable opinions of Robin Williams. That was not the case for the users of the subreddit r/ThatHappened , which was created for the purpose of identifying fabricated claims on social media: NEXT LEVEL FANFIC: OP becomes pen pals with Robin Williams, coincidentally runs into Robin in Disney World and has a letter for him, Robin knows OP by name and pulls OP’s letter from a month earlier out of his pocket and says he carries it to cheer him up. from thatHappened A sidebar for r/ThatHappened described it as existing for true stories that absolutely happened, and the submitter of the post described it as NEXT LEVEL FANFIC. In addition, the submitter considered the part of the story where Kyle had a coincidental meeting with Williams at Disney as stretching the limits of reader credulity. A top comment concurred : With everything that went on behind the scenes between Robin Williams and Disney, there is absolutely no way he would have been at Disney World signing autographs. Another observed : The part that doesnt make sense (aside from the fact that put of all the days and all the celebrities, Robin just so happened to be signing autographs at Disney that day- if that info is released ahead of time maybe his parents planned it that way I guess) is that he specifically said there were several winners of the pen pal contest, so if he went up to Robin and said he was a pen pal contest winner, how on earth would Robin immediately know which one? And another reader surmised the part about Williams signing autographs was implausible: I saw this on instagram and was shocked that none of the comments were questioning this story. It’s a nice story, but almost definitely BS. Other commenters have pointed out they don’t think robin would be at disney after their issues, but even if he was, he wouldn’t be signing autographs. I used to work at disney world. Celebrities are almost always with VIP guides and sometimes body guards. They literally stop crowds from forming around them because it’s a safety hazard. It also takes away from the magic for a celebrity to be almost an attraction. There’s no way. Commenters searched for any proof that Williams had participated in a sweepstakes to select young penpals, turning up an August 1989 news item mentioning him among other celebrities in the context of fan mail. However, the article did not focus on Williams, nor did it describe any ongoing correspondence. The claim itself appeared to stem from a comment (or copy of a comment) made in response to a June 23 2021 r/AskReddit post about which celebrity death hit you the hardest: [Serious] What celebrity death hit you the hardest? from AskReddit In the comments, u/loisalane replied Robin Williams. In a reply, since-suspended u/WatchoutMods wrote : I shared my story in my own comment but just so people can know the magic that was this man. Robin Williams. I’ve told this story on other accounts but I love telling it As a kid I was one of 10 winners for a sweepstakes to be a pen pal with Robin for a year. I was stoked and I’m like 8 or 9 years old. My brother and sister told me it probably wasnt going to be him, just a publicist or intern. I didn’t care. For months we sent so many letters of silliness, all his letters were long and he really loved talking about Zelda (she’s a little older than me) and all the new projects he was working on. My family went to Disney that summer and I wrote a letter while in the car and I was determined to give it to Genie because I was convinced he was always playing him in the costume and wanted to hand deliver at least one. My brother and sister were again deterring me but I wasn’t breaking my gait. Well of all coincidences in the world Robin actually was there signing autographs. I was ecstatic. Literally jumping for joy as I’m in line. We get to him and I’m rambling like a motherfucker telling him how I was a winner and about the letter and yada yada. He just goes Kyle?! With a massive grin and opens his coat and pulls out my letter from a month prior that was with a few others. Apparently he kept all our letters on him while on the road to help cheer himself up (which devastates me now thinking about what that meant). I almost fainted. I cannot Express the amount of electric energy surging through me knowing Robin Williams actually wrote me, knew me, and I believe truly loved me and those other kids like we were his children. I’ll never ever claim anybody was a bigger fan of his than Zelda. I respect her too much to say that. But I’m definitely his second biggest fan of all time. When he died I cried into my then wife’s arms for a full hour. I felt I really lost a true friend that got me through so much growing up. A man that could get my siblings and I to shut up and just revel in his magic for hours at a time. I miss you Robin. Every day. It was unclear when u/WatchoutMods was suspended or why their account was restricted. Screenshot shares often notably left out the part where Kyle said they had told this story on other accounts but I love telling it — suggesting that the claim had been shared previously by different people and providing cover for claims that the story was fabricated. A search for the first portion of the screenshot only returned a single result , via meme aggregator iFunny. Google Trends data indicated searches for Robin Williams penpal or Robin Williams pen pal only began registering on August 8 2021, whereas searches for Robin Williams Kyle began a bit earlier . Related terms included Robin Williams, sweepstake[s], and letter: An enormously popular and heartwarming story about Robin Williams’ penpal Kyle appeared to spread virally after it was shared in the comments of a June 2021 r/AskReddit post about which celebrity death affected readers the most. A comment by Kyle was presented with no proof or indication it was true, and it included the implausible claim that Kyle just happened ran into Robin Williams during his year of being the actor’s penpal during a trip to Disney, and Williams just happened to be carrying around all his letters in a pocket. The story appeared to take off in August 2021, after the anniversary of Williams’ 2014 death. We found no version of it predating the Reddit comment, and no indication the story was anything more than a work of creative writing submitted to accrue karma . Article Sources + Robin Williams pen pal | Imgur Robin Williams pen pal | r/mademesmile Robin Williams penpal | Facebook Robin Williams penpal | r/ThatHappened Robin Williams pen pal | r/ThatHappened REPLIES TO PEN PAL LETTERS LEAVE CAMPERS STAR-STRUCK [Serious] What celebrity death hit you the hardest? Robin Williams penpal | Google Search Robin Williams pen pal | Google Trends Posted in Fact Checks , Viral Content Tagged askreddit , imgur , karma , robin williams , robin williams pen pal , robin williams penpal , viral facebook posts , viral reddit posts (en)
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