Matthew Lawrence doesn’t believe the Mrs. Doubtfire film can be rebooted without his co-star, the late Robin Williams.
Williams, who died at age 63 by suicide in 2014, famously portrayed a newly-divorced father who disguises himself as a nanny in an attempt to spend more time with his children in the iconic film.
The Brotherly Love star told TMZ he didn’t think a reboot of the original 1993 was ‘possible’ without Williams.
‘Without Robin I don’t think that movie is possible,’ Lawrence, 44, told TMZ before recalling past efforts to revive the story prior to Williams’ death.
‘I mean they were. In 2014 they were talking about it and everybody was kind of buzzing about it. And then obviously, you know, he passed away. I wouldn’t want to do it without him personally.’
Matthew Lawrence doesn’t believe a Mrs. Doubtfire reboot is possible without his co-star, the late Robin Williams
Williams, who died at age 63 by suicide in 2014, famously portrayed a newly-divorced father who disguises himself as a nanny in an attempt to spend more time with his children in the iconic film
The Boy Meets World alum doesn’t believe there are any actors who can take on the role: ‘I don’t think so,’ he said. ‘Different time too.’
However, he believes a documentary about the film is feasible: ‘You know I never thought about that, but documentaries are pretty cool, you know. So I don’t know, maybe. Yeah we could do that!’
It comes less than a year after Mrs. Doubtfire director Chris Columbus revealed he met with Williams to discuss a potential sequel to the film prior to his death in 2014.
Williams committed suicide in August 2014 by hanging himself with a belt after struggling with bipolar disorder and addiction for decades. He was 63.
Speaking to Business Insider in November 2023, Columbus recalled his final meeting with the late actor and how they looked over a ‘really strong’ script together.
‘He and I didn’t talk about a sequel until the year he passed away,’ Columbus told the outlet.
‘We had a script that was written and it was the last time I saw Robin. I went to his house and we sat down and talked about it and the script was really strong.’
Released theatrically in 1993, Mrs. Doubtfire follows newly-divorced Daniel Hillard (Williams) who, in the hopes of spending more time with his children, disguises himself as a Scottish nanny and convinces his ex-wife Miranda (Sally Field) to hire him.
Lawrence played Williams’ on-screen son in the film
The movie also starred Sally Field, Lisa Jakub, and Mara Wilson
Williams had to spend approximately four hours in hair and makeup to transform into the titular character.
So after looking over the sequel script, Williams asked if he ‘had to be in the suit as much this time.’
He said that the transformation was very ‘physically demanding’ for him and compared it to ‘running a marathon’ every day.
‘So we talked about it and I think he was hoping in the rewrite we would cut back on the Doubtfire character,’ Columbus said.
‘But then Robin passed away so there will never be a sequel to Mrs. Doubtfire.’
But he believes a documentary about the film is feasible: ‘You know I never thought about that, but documentaries are pretty cool, you know. So I don’t know, maybe. Yeah we could do that!’
Columbus also revealed why it took 21 years for Williams to finally come around to the idea of a sequel.
‘Back then, there was an attitude that sequels were looked down upon by the artists. So Robin was against doing a sequel immediately after,’ he explained.
Now Columbus isn’t sure about the future of Mrs. Doubtfire.
He believes that ‘Fox/Disney owns the rights’ to the character so they ‘can do whatever they want’ — whether it be a sequel or a TV series.
But Columbus is staunchly against it.
‘Should they? God no. I will certainly be very vocal about it if they decide to do it.’
