Remembering the beloved Cocoy Laurel

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Victor Laurel was a prince. Not just because he was of noble pedigree but also because he looked like one. Just like the way we imagined princes should look like. Tall and handsome with a shy smile, and soft-spoken with a calm and benevolent mien.

Victor (also fondly called Cocoy), a singer, songwriter, actor and painter, passed away last June 14 at the age of 72. He suffered from health issues these past few years and succumbed to cardiac arrest. He was last seen during the wake of his good friend, the late National Artist Nora Aunor, when though obviously not well, he came to pay his respects. 

Victor was the son of former vice-president Salvador Laurel, of the well-known land-owning clan from Batangas also famous for its long involvement with Philippine politics. His mother was Celia Diaz, a star of local theater.

It was no wonder then that from the moment he set foot on stage reciting the balcony scene from “Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet,” Victor, 16 years old, became a prince of Philippine Theater.

The Romeo performance was a promo gimmick to drumbeat interest in the movie, Franco Zeffirelli’s “Romeo and Juliet” starring Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey. A search for the Philippine Romeo and Juliet was conducted and Victor won as Romeo. Lotis Key was the winning Juliet.

I do not recall if Victor ever did the full “Romeo and Juliet” tragedy after that. He did more Shakespeare, Mark Anthony in “Julius Caesar” and then nearly every leading man role you can think of plus memorable featured parts as one of the actors of Repertory Philippines in the ensuing years.

These are Pippin in “Pippin,” Tony in “West Side Story,” Sky Masterson in “Guys and Dolls,” Joseph in “Joseph and his Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat,” Che Guevarra in “Evita,” Charlie in “You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown,” John Merrick in “The Elephant Man” and many others.

Of course, as he got older, he also got into those much-coveted roles like Jean Valjean in “Les Miserables” and as “The Engineer” in the London and Australian companies of “Miss Saigon.”

It was also inevitable that Victor would get into the movies. This he did in a really big way in 1971, as the leading man of the future Filipino National Artist Nora Aunor in “Lollipops and Roses.” 

Victor gladly took on the part of another angle in Aunor’s reel love stories and they ended up co-starring in two more films, “The Impossible Dream” and “Lollipops and Roses at Burong Talangka.”

And because a Nora Aunor set the standard, Victor also got his pick of leading ladies like Hilda Koronel in Ishmael Bernal’s “Till Death Do Us Part,” Tina Revilla in “Love Song,” Margie Moran in “Oh Margie Oh,” “Once Upon a Time” with Spanish actress Maribel Martin, and also three films with Vilma Santos, “Ophelia at Paris: Prinsipe Paris Walang Kaparis,” “Pinay American Style” and “Disco Fever” where Victor made like the dancing John Travolta.

The talented Victor was also a singer and songwriter. His accomplishments as an actor may be huge but I like him best as a singer. He could sing anything. Check out all those albums he recorded from Vicor many years ago and you will find out how he went effortlessly from standards like Warm to current hits of the time like “Somebody Waiting” and “Last Night I Didn’t Get to Sleep at All.”

Most popular among his works was I Love You Nora, composed for Nora Aunor who was a close friend. But there were also the themes for his movies like Love Song or for other films like the beautiful Love Theme from “Imelda,” also the lyrics to the Louie Ocampo composition Point of No Return, which became a hit for Zsa Zsa Padilla.

Loss is always painful but those who grieve can console themselves with the thought that their beloved Cocoy is now happy and healthy and looking like the prince he was again.