He could, and he probably will. It's wonderful that he's so successful; it's tragic that he's such a disappointment.

Williams is one of a rare breed, both a brilliant, quicksilver comic and a wonderful actor. When he reins himself in, his sense of humor informs his dramatic performances without overwhelming them. But the roles he's best known for (particularly the Oscar-winning one in "Good Will Hunting," merely a crustier reworking of the ultra-admirable role-model professor he played in "Dead Poets Society") aren't necessarily his most astonishing. His work in movies like "The Best of Times" (1986) and "Cadillac Man" (1990) has been all but overlooked. And the two pictures in which he really shines, without turning on that phony 100-watt beaming -- "Moscow on the Hudson" and the 1991 "The Fisher King" -- are written off by many viewers simply because they got mixed reviews or did poorly at the box office.

"Moscow on the Hudson" was released in 1984, after Williams had had just a handful of starring roles (including Robert Altman's disastrous 1980 "Popeye," a movie that squandered the talents of everyone involved, including Williams, Altman and Shelley Duvall). As Vladimir, a Russian musician who decides to defect to the United States during a brief visit (in the middle of Bloomingdale's, no less), Williams seemed to tap deep reserves of feeling, rather than just glib approximations of it: It's a wary, cautious performance, but also, paradoxically, a jubilant one.

Part of what makes it work is that Williams relies so little on shtick. His thick Russian accent is the only element reminiscent of a comedy bit; otherwise, he sinks himself physically and emotionally into the character, with very little gimmickry. His confusion and vulnerability, his bewilderment at finding himself in the role of stranger in a new land, are mostly telegraphed through the way his eyes soften, or by the bemused glint that flickers there now and then. His body language alone is something to behold: As befuddling as the whole American experience is to Vladimir, he seems to be fending it off with every muscle. He swaggers, walks with a little bounce in his step. And with his stubby, vaguely simian build, Williams exudes an unquestionable sexual confidence with the object of his affection, Maria Conchita Alonso. Vladimir may be a stranger in this new country, but Williams shows how perfectly at home he is in his own skin.

Williams is terrific in almost every scene, but he has one moment that's worthy of Buster Keaton. He's just defected, barely, and as he watches the bus carry off his colleagues and compatriots, as well as his tenor sax (he's a circus musician who's come with his troupe to perform in New York), reporters cluster around him to ask him what he's feeling. He knows he'll never see his friends -- or his horn -- again. With a dazed grin frozen on his face, and his eyes closed up almost tight enough to hide the sorrow there, he says in his rough English, "I'm saying good-bye to my saxophone. I'm very happy to be here."

"Moscow on the Hudson" got some decent reviews, but audiences didn't take to it. People decried it as Reagan propaganda, a way of making life in the Soviet Union look far worse than it actually was. (In retrospect especially, those criticisms seem ludicrous.) Maybe that's why, in any serious discussion of Williams as an actor, "Moscow on the Hudson" tends to fall off people's radar, giving way to higher-profile, super-uplifting (as well as deeply conventional and deadly dull) performances like the ones Williams gave in "Dead Poets Society" and "Good Will Hunting." The 1987 "Good Morning Vietnam" is often cited as the movie that finally put Williams' skills to best use -- but it isn't so much acting as an excuse for Williams to do his stand-up routine.

Williams is always at his best when he doesn't use humor to whack us over the head. In Terry Gilliam's flawed masterpiece "The Fisher King" -- if a movie could have a heart of gold, this one surely would -- Williams plays Parry, a former professor who comes undone after witnessing his wife's murder; he ends up homeless and mentally unstable. Williams is funny in all the obvious Williams ways: leading a group of mental-ward patients in an enthusiastic reading of "How About You?"; or frolicking naked in Central Park (his hairy torso so repellently compelling you can barely take your eyes off it), exhorting his pal, played by Jeff Bridges, to do the same and "Free up the little guy! Let him flap in the breeze!" He's just restrained enough to make these bits work; he seems to know intuitively that he doesn't have to push hard. And in his moments with Amanda Plummer (as the shy, gawky girl he's fallen in love with from afar), he radiates a quiet tenderness that's bound tight with his fragility. He's blissfully in love with her, and it shows, but when he confesses how he feels for her, you also understand how dangerous the admission is for him. The emotional turbulence you see just behind the soft light in Parry's eyes is enough to send him right off the rails, and for a time, it does.

Recent Stories