Robin Williams Trivia
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50 free Robin Williams trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
42 free Robin Williams trivia questions with answers. Robin Williams went from a San Francisco comedy club called the Holy City Zoo to an alien on Happy Days, and from there to an Oscar, five Grammys and some of the most-loved films of the 1990s. He improvised roughly 30 hours of tape as the Genie, took scale pay to do it, and got a Picasso he hated as an apology when Disney broke the deal. This quiz covers 50 questions across his whole career: the early stand-up and Mork & Mindy, the breakthrough of Good Morning, Vietnam, Dead Poets Society, Awakenings, The Fisher King, Hook, Aladdin, Mrs. Doubtfire, Jumanji, The Birdcage, Good Will Hunting, the dark turn of One Hour Photo and Insomnia, Night at the Museum, and the charity work with Comic Relief and the USO. Easy questions ask which film won him the Academy Award; hard ones ask which classmate shared his Juilliard programme and where he had his heart surgery. Every answer has been checked against an encyclopaedia entry on the film or the man, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which city was Robin Williams born on July 21, 1951?
Chicago
Chicago's St. Luke's Hospital was his birthplace; the family later moved to Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, and then Tiburon, California.
Q 02Williams's father, Robert, was a senior executive at which car company?
Ford
Ford employed Robert Williams as a senior executive in its Lincoln-Mercury Division; the family lived in a 40-room farmhouse in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.
Q 03Which future Superman actor was admitted to Juilliard's Advanced Program alongside Robin Williams by John Houseman?
Christopher Reeve
Christopher Reeve and Williams were the only two students Houseman took into the Advanced Program in 1973; they remained close until Reeve's death in 2004.
Q 04Williams's first stand-up performance, in 1976, was at a comedy club in which city?
San Francisco
The club was the Holy City Zoo; he later moved to Los Angeles and worked rooms including the Comedy Store.
Q 05Williams was cast as the alien Mork in a 1978 episode of which sitcom, before getting his own spin-off?
Happy Days
Happy Days' episode 'My Favorite Orkan', aired in February 1978, introduced Mork, whom Garry Marshall cast after an audition; the spin-off premiered that September.
Q 06Mork & Mindy is set in which Colorado city?
Boulder
Boulder is the setting; Mork arrives in an egg-shaped spacecraft, Pam Dawber played Mindy, and the show ran on ABC from 1978 to 1982.
Q 07Which veteran comedian joined Mork & Mindy's final season as Mearth, the couple's child born looking elderly?
Jonathan Winters
Jonathan Winters, Williams's comedy idol, played Mearth from 1981; Orkans age backwards, so the baby hatched looking elderly.
Q 08Williams's first starring film role was as which comic-strip character, in a 1980 Robert Altman musical?
Popeye
Popeye (1980) cast Williams as the sailor opposite Shelley Duvall's Olive Oyl, with songs by Harry Nilsson.
Q 09The Sweethaven set for Williams's 1980 musical was built on which Mediterranean island?
Malta
Malta's Anchor Bay, near Mellieħa, holds the village of Sweethaven, built in 1979 for the Altman film and kept as a theme park.
Q 10Williams earned his first Oscar nomination as a real-life Armed Forces Radio DJ in which 1987 film?
Good Morning, Vietnam
Good Morning, Vietnam, directed by Barry Levinson, let Williams improvise most of the radio-broadcast scenes and earned him a Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy.
Q 11Which real Saigon DJ's experiences loosely inspired Williams's 1987 breakthrough film?
Adrian Cronauer
Adrian Cronauer hosted the Dawn Buster show on Armed Forces Radio Saigon in 1965-66; the film, set in 1965, was shot in Thailand.
Q 12In Dead Poets Society (1989), John Keating's fictional academy is in which state?
Vermont
Vermont is home to the fictional Welton Academy, set in 1959; Peter Weir directed, and Tom Schulman won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.
Q 13In Awakenings (1990), Williams's Dr Malcolm Sayer is modelled on which neurologist and author?
Oliver Sacks
Penny Marshall directed, and Robert De Niro was Oscar-nominated as Leonard Lowe, a patient revived by the drug L-DOPA.
Q 21In Jumanji (1995), Alan Parrish is trapped inside the board game for how many years?
26
26 years pass between Alan being sucked into the game in 1969 and his release in 1995; the film is set in a fictional New Hampshire town from Chris Van Allsburg's 1981 book.
Q 22The Birdcage (1996) is an American remake of which French-Italian film?
La Cage aux Folles
La Cage aux Folles (1978), itself from Jean Poiret's play, was remade by Mike Nichols; Nathan Lane played Albert and the cast won the SAG ensemble award.
Q 23Williams won his only Oscar for playing therapist Sean Maguire in which film?
Good Will Hunting
Good Will Hunting brought Williams the Best Supporting Actor Oscar in March 1998; Matt Damon and Ben Affleck won Best Original Screenplay the same night, and Gus Van Sant directed.
Q 14Which Monty Python member directed The Fisher King (1991), with Robin Williams as homeless Parry?
Terry Gilliam
Terry Gilliam directed, with Jeff Bridges as shock jock Jack Lucas; Mercedes Ruehl won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar.
Q 15In Steven Spielberg's Hook (1991), Williams plays a grown-up Peter Pan who has become what?
A lawyer
A lawyer specialising in mergers, Peter Banning has forgotten Neverland entirely; Dustin Hoffman played Hook and Julia Roberts was Tinker Bell.
Q 16Williams voiced Aladdin's Genie for about $75,000 instead of his usual fee of roughly how much?
$8 million
$8 million was his going rate by 1992, but he took scale on condition that his name and image not be used to sell merchandise, a deal Disney then broke.
Q 17To apologise over Aladdin marketing, Disney sent Williams a painting by which artist?
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso's painting was the peace offering; after Joe Roth's public apology in 1994, Williams returned as the Genie in Aladdin and the King of Thieves (1996).
Q 18Roughly how many hours of tape did Williams record improvising as the Genie?
30
The Golden Globes gave him a Special Achievement Award for the performance, since animated voice work had no category.
Q 19Which 1997 remake of The Absent-Minded Professor starred Williams as Professor Philip Brainard?
Flubber
Flubber (1997) remade Disney's 1961 The Absent-Minded Professor, with Williams's Professor Brainard inventing the bouncing green goo of the title.
Q 20Mrs. Doubtfire was based on a 1987 novel by which British children's author?
Anne Fine
Chris Columbus directed and Sally Field played the ex-wife, Miranda.
Q 24In the film that won Williams his Oscar, his character teaches psychology at which institution?
Bunker Hill Community College
Bunker Hill Community College in Charlestown is where Sean teaches; the bench scene between Sean and Will was filmed in the Boston Public Garden.
Q 25In which 1998 film does Williams play a real-life doctor who treats patients with humour and compassion?
Patch Adams
Patch Adams dramatised Hunter 'Patch' Adams, founder of the Gesundheit! Institute; Tom Shadyac directed, and the same year Williams starred in What Dreams May Come.
Q 26Bicentennial Man (1999) is based on a story by which science-fiction author?
Isaac Asimov
Chris Columbus directed, and Greg Cannom's makeup was Oscar-nominated.
Q 27In Insomnia (2002), Williams's murderer is pursued through Alaska by a sleep-deprived detective played by whom?
Al Pacino
Al Pacino played detective Will Dormer in Christopher Nolan's remake of a 1997 Norwegian film; the same year Williams played a disturbed photo technician in One Hour Photo.
Q 28In One Hour Photo (2002), Williams's Sy Parrish works the photo counter of which fictional big-box store?
SavMart
SavMart is the store; Mark Romanek wrote and directed, and Williams won the Saturn Award for Best Actor.
Q 29In the Night at the Museum films, Williams plays a wax figure of which US president?
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt's wax figure wears a Rough Rider uniform; Ben Stiller plays night guard Larry Daley at the American Museum of Natural History.
Q 30In 1986 Williams co-founded Comic Relief USA with Whoopi Goldberg and which other comedian?
Billy Crystal
Billy Crystal co-hosted the HBO benefits for the homeless with Williams and Goldberg; the two friends also made an unplanned cameo together on Friends in 1997.