The movie industry is mourning the deaths of two film icons.
Actor-director Tony Mabesa died at 10:20 p.m. last Friday night while veteran actress died around 4 a.m. Saturday.
In a report by new.abs-cb.com, Niño Muhlach, Fuentes’ nephew, told radio DZMM that the 79-year-old actress succumbed to multiple organ failure in a hospital where she had been brought several days ago.
Muhlach revealed that Fuentes had been “paralyzed” and “bedridden for the past 4 years” following a heart attack.
At the height of her decorated career, Fuentes would do 10 or more films a year and worked with the most sought-after leading men at the time, including Fernando Poe Jr., Joseph Estrada, Eddie Gutierrez and Romeo Vasquez.
Fondly called “Nena,”Fuentes collaborated with actors Susan Roces, Gloria Romero, Vilma Santos, Christopher de Leon, Lorna Tolentino, Rudy Fernandez, and Eddie Garcia, among others, in her nearly 6-decade career.
Fuentes married her love team partner Vasquez in 1965, but they separated after 4 years. Their only daughter, actress Liezl Martinez, died after a long battle with cancer in March 2015. Liezl has 3 children with her husband, actor Albert Martinez.
Mabesa, on the other hand, was 84.
“We, the family of Antonio Mabesa, are saddened to announce his passing, Sir Tony joined his creator at 10:20 this evening. He was surrounded by family and friends,” said a statement from the actor’s family that screenwriter Floy Quintos posted on Facebook.
The award-winning artist was known as one of Philippine theater’s most treasured icons, with hundreds of plays under his belt. He was also the mentor of some of the renowned theater professionals in the country such as Shamaine Centenera, Irma Adlawan, among others.
A report by CNN Philippines stated that Mabesa, a Laguna native, founded the country’s premier university theater organization Dulaang Unibersidad ng Philippines (UP) back in 1976.
His last film was “Rainbow’s Sunset,” an LGBT-themed film by Joel Lamangan, where he won the Best Supporting Actor plum, playing the role of an ailing elderly lover of late Eddie Garcia’s character, the report added. (CC)
