Dolphy: A Filipino entertainment great!

The country’s irreplaceable Comedy King Dolphy, a.k.a. Rodolfo Vera Quizon, has passed on to eternal life last Tuesday evening. He was 83 years old who died after suffering a multiple organ failure or complications due to pneumonia, kidney failure and eventually a heart failure. He was undoubtedly a great Filipino entertainment icon whom many of us in our generation will never forget.

My readers know that I come from a family of theater owners in Cebu and often we assist many producers who come to Cebu who shoot movie scenes here. We knew about Dolphy when he was featured in “Buhay Artista” with fellow comedian Panchito which was still in black and white. Later it evolved into “John and Marsha.” But I will never forget the time Dolphy went to our house in Capitol Hills to do a scene for his movie “Magtago ka na binata” where he co-starred with then famous Hong Kong artist Nancy Kwan, who starred in that famous American flick “The World of Suzie Wong” and “Flower Drum Song.” It was a whole day shoot with Dolphy with my family.

I never got to see that movie because in those days in the early sixties when I was still in high school, Tagalog movies were not shown in mainstream moviehouses in Cebu City where only American films are shown. I guess it was the same in Manila, where the mainstream theaters like Avenue, Odeon, Ever and State only show American films, while the Tagalog films were shown in theaters featuring double run films. They were old, filthy, dirty and rundown theaters, unlike the first run moviehouses.

Eventually, the movies of Dolphy were the first Tagalog films that broke into the mainstream moviehouses, when his films were shown at the President Theater in Cebu. When my father Atty. Jesus Avila realized that Tagalog movies was now accepted by all Cebuanos, he had the movies of Fernando Poe Jr. (FPJ) booked and shown in our moviehouses.

Today, there is no distinction anymore. Tagalog movies are shown together in the same theaters with American movies. Often, Tagalog movies fare better in the box office than ordinary American films. All this because Dolphy made Filipinos laugh… and it didn’t matter if you were a Tagalog, Bisaya, Tausug or Ilokano. He was indeed a giant in Filipino movies and it is sad that we have lost Dolphy… sadder still that he wasn’t bestowed the honor and distinction of being a National Artist. If they award this to him posthumously, it loses its prestige because it would only be a matter of fact. Shame on the NCCA that they could not see a great Filipino artist in Dolphy!

Perhaps Dolphy’s greatest contribution to Filipino films is that his movies, television series did not only make the Filipino nation laugh, he made us proud that Filipino movies could compete head-to-head with American films. In short, Dolphy was greatly responsible for removing the colonial mentality that most Filipinos had in those days. More importantly, he never used his popularity to run for public office… unlike the other movie stars we know. He left the politics to the politicians. May God grant him peace!

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There’s a report about that New York Times Sunday magazine story entitled “The Drone Zone,” written by Mark Mazzetti who reported that back in 2006, the US military conducted a Drone Strike in the jungles of Mindanao, which was quite interesting. This was headlined in The Philippine STAR last Monday and honestly it didn’t surprise me at all. I remember many of my friends in Zamboanga texting me that they saw a Predator unmanned aircraft stationed at the Edwin Andrews Base about that time.

If at all there was something odd about that report, it is that it was reported as a Philippine military operation. The target of the drone was supposedly Umar Patek, though the high-tech robot plane failed to hit him. Anyway, the STAR report says “Defense officials has offered to provide drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles, to help the Philippines monitor its territorial waters amid a dispute with China in the West Philippine Sea.” Okay, that’s a good way for us to monitor our west coast.

But what good would it do if we got positive information of Chinese naval vessels in the disputed waters? Now unless those Drones would be armed with Hellfire missiles, only then it can be a real threat to the Chinese ships. But then… doing so will escalate this conflict with China and I don’t think we have the capability to go to war with them.

Incidentally that purported request from Malacañang to the US government to use spy planes for reconnaissance purposes was denied by Malacañang spokesmen. Notwithstanding this official denial, Last Tuesday, P3 Orion electronic spy plane flew out of Mactan. Now pray tell me that its American crew was only in Cebu for a rest and recreation? Nope, they were not on an R&R, they were doing routine patrols in the South China Sea.

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