Mother Lily: I owe Pitoy a lot

When Regal Matriarch Lily Monteverde and Remy Monteverde got married 58 years ago, they were so cash-strapped that they had to, well, penny-pinch.

“Actually,” Mother Lily loves to recount, “I disobeyed my parents when I married Remy (whom she fondly calls Father Remy). Maybe it was because Father didn’t know how to speak Chinese at that time even if his father, who was from Sariaya, Quezon, was the Copra King. I was then studying at UNO High School in Binondo. I would skip classes and go on dates with him. He would wait for me at the corner so people wouldn’t see us and make sumbong to my parents.”

That account is duly documented in a tell-all conversation included in the third compilation of your Funfarer’s Conversations pieces with several other couples.

So when they got married, Mother Lily approached Pitoy Moreno and requested him to design a “budgeted” gown for her, promising to pay the full amount in one year.

“But Pitoy was very kind,” Mother Lily now recalls. “All we had was P1,500 and Pitoy designed not only my gown but also those of the bridesmaids and the Flower Girls. Our wedding was so simple, made more beautiful and memorable by the gown that won admiration from our guests. That’s why I say that I owe Pitoy a lot.”

Pitoy succumbed to cardiac arrest at a hospital where he was confined for almost five years while suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. He was 89. His wake at the Santuario de San Antonio in Forbes Park, Makati City, was until last night. Today, after the 10 a.m. Mass, his remains will be interred at the Manila Memorial Park in Sucat, Parañaque City.

Asked where that gown is, Mother Lily said, “I keep it in an aparador,” adding, “and I will wear it when I die.”

Of course, more than half a century later, Mother Lily has built the Regal Empire from the P10,000 she borrowed from her brother Jessie as capital for two popcorn machines (one at Good Earth on Avenida Rizal and another at Cherry Foodarama on Shaw Boulevard, Mandaluyong City).

“That was in 1962,” was how Mother Lily related it in the book. “There was a moviehouse, Ideal Theater, near Good Earth and I was making P100 a day. Ang saya-saya ko! I also sold blouses in Zurbaran Market, consigned at the Corazon Dry Goods Store at P24 per dozen. I made only five percent tubo.”

During her reign as (the country’s first 1969) Miss Universe, Gloria Diaz also wore a classic Filipiniana gown by Pitoy.

“Well,” Gloria told Funfare, “during my time, Pitoy was the sosi designer. We were friends but I was not in his inner circle. I think I was too young and besides, I was not really a model. But because of Stella Marquez, I attended a lot of events usually as the finale. But I guess I was not a good model to show clothes.”

Not only beauty queens, first ladies around the world, and A-list celebrities wore a Pitoy Moreno, especially her classic variations on the Maria Clara, but also Hollywood stars, one of whom Rita Moreno who wore a Pitoy gown when she received her Best Supporting Actress (for West Side Story) in 1961 with co-star George Chakiris as Best Supporting Actor.

Here’s how Rita told the story in her autobiography reviewed by this corner: 

Moreno got the news that she was nominated for Best Supporting Actress (for West Side Story), and eventually won, while shooting a B-movie titled Cry of Bataan (“as a girl guerilla, a hybrid double agent/whore/fighter”) with Van Heflin in the Philippines. Yes, it’s true. It was Pitoy Moreno who designed Rita’s gown that she wore when she mounted the stage to receive her trophy at the Oscars night.

“They would release me for only three days,” wrote Rita, “one day to fly over, one day for the Oscar ceremony and one day to fly back to the jungle…I didn’t care. The important thing was that I was going! I ordered a heavily brocaded dress made of special Japanese obi fabric, a gorgeous gown with black bateau top that I still have (and can still get into, happily).”

When she returned triumphant to the jungle location, Rita recalled, “I saw a commotion on the mountain. It was a long procession of people coming down the slope. Every Filipino in the movie was marching down the mountain, singing and calling out congratulations. They all carried signs that said, ‘Mabuhay, Rita! Victory, Rita!’.”

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It’s official: Vice beats Coco at the MMFF

Here’s the official grosses of the eight entries during the two-week (Dec. 25 to Jan. 7) run of the just-concluded Metro Manila Film Festival (MMFF):

Gandarrapido: The Revenger Squad (starring Vice Ganda, left): P540M;

Ang Panday (Coco Martin, right): P204M;

Siargao (Erich Gonzales/Jericho Rosales/Jasmine Curtis Smith): P80M;

Haunted Forest (all-new-star cast): P56M;

Meant To Beh (Vic Sotto/Dawn Zulueta): P51M;

All of You (Derek Ramsay/Jennylyn Mercado): P34M;

Ang Larawan (Rachel Alejandro/Joanna Ampil): P29M; and

Deadma Walking (Edgar Allan Guzman/Joross Gamboa): P26M.

The total gross is P959M which is expected to increase with the extended showing of some of the entries both here and abroad and may surpass the roughly P1.3M-plus gross of the 2015 MMFF. Last year, the MMFF gross was a little less than P500,000.

(E-mail reactions at [email protected]. For more updates, photos and videos, visit www.philstar.com/funfare or follow me on Instagram @therealrickylo.)