A  SIGN  FROM  MIKO  SOTTO

MANILA, February 17, 2005 (STAR) STARBYTES By Butch Francisco  -  When young actor Miko Sotto met his untimely death in the early hours of Dec. 29, 2003, he left behind a girlfriend inconsolable in her grief. That girl – as most showbiz insiders and observers would remember – has become the most popular actress of her generation and she is none other than Angel Locsin.

Until Miko died, I didn’t know Angel personally, but I got to like her a lot – especially after I observed how she had so decently conducted herself all throughout during the wake and even on other occasions when the Sottos would gather together in honor of the late actor.

In time, I was happy to see her bounce back and rise to great heights in showbusiness with new screen partner Richard Gutierrez.

But I know that in her heart, she has not totally forgotten Miko and has maintained close links with the actor’s mother, Ali Sotto.

I’d also like to think – and somehow I feel – that Miko has been guiding Angel through her success.

Why do I say this? Actually, I’ve observed some subtle manifestations – some of which you may just dismiss as pure coincidental, but not necessarily so to the people close to Miko.

In November 2003, for instance, I wrote about how the caretaker of Miko’s grave has complained about having difficulty maintaining the actor’s tomb in Loyola, Parañaque because it always gets stained with extracts from fruits of the molave tree.

The strange thing is that there is no molave tree near Miko’s grave. His tomb lies under a tree, all right, but it is narra and the caretaker swears that the fruits (berries) come from the molave trees that are planted quite far from where Miko is buried.

The caretaker’s explanation is that the birds carry the fruits from the molave tree all the way to Miko’s tomb – staining the marble top in the process. Molave, of course, is also known as mulawin, which is the title of Angel’s TV show on Channel 7. Maybe this is just coincidence – I don’t know. But why is that it is only Miko’s tomb that gets stained with extracts from the fruits of the mulawin tree? He is buried right next to his grandmother, yet the Sotto matriarch’s tomb is always clean.

From Ali Sotto’s end, she had always wanted to get a sign – any sign – from her departed son. Since the time of his death, she had always associated the butterfly with Miko.

It all started after Miko was laid to rest. As a sign that Miko was indeed in a better place, Ali asked for a butterfly and – upon returning home from the funeral – a butterfly in animation was what she first saw when she turned on the TV set to watch her son’s afternoon soap opera.

In her radio program a few days before All Saints’ Day last year, she and Arnold Clavio had as guests a group of people who deal with the paranormal. One of the questions she asked them was why some departed souls make contact with the living while others don’t. (Up to that point, Miko had never made his presence felt to her – no, not even in a dream.) During a break in the program, she went to the bathroom and saw a butterfly on the washstand’s splashboard.

Last week, when I was watching Let the Love Begin during the Cinema Evaluation Board screening (the film got a well-deserved B rating), there was something in the end that turned out to be a pleasant surprise for me. (I guess I can now reveal the ending since a lot of people have already seen the movie anyway).

When Angel Locsin and Richard Gutierrez were reunited in the end and would obviously live a life happily ever after together in the film, about a thousand butterflies filled up the screen. I immediately remembered Miko and became glassy-eyed.

I know that this is a very personal thing that only Ali Sotto, her family and people close to them (like this writer) would appreciate, but I felt like that whole scene also proved to be a tribute to Miko. There was Angel with her new screen partner Richard Gutierrez, but deep in my heart, Miko was also there – as manifested by those thousand butterflies.

For a while there, I thought it was Angel Locsin who suggested to put butterflies in the movie as her personal homage to Miko. But I realized that she is basically a shy and unassuming girl who wouldn’t meddle with production matters.

When I asked the film’s director Mac Alejandre about it, he said that it was the idea of line producer Manny Valera, who has no personal ties with Ali Sotto and family and absolutely had no idea what the butterfly symbolized for them. According to Manny, he merely suggested to put butterflies at the end because he wanted a nice "effect" to tie up the butterfly theme all over the film. Yeah, come to think of it, there were butterflies in a lot of scenes in the movie – particularly butterfly prints in the scarves worn by Angel. Manny said that they used the butterfly motif without even knowing that it was associated by Ali Sotto and family to Miko.

I don’t really know what to make of such coincidence but personally, I’d like to think that Miko still continues to guide Angel to this day and perhaps continues to manifest his presence in the strangest ways.

I hope I’m not carrying this a bit too far, but I’d like to think that Miko probably approves of Angel’s team-up with Richard Gutierrez. Maybe in the life beyond, he prays for her success – their success. This is probably the reason why Let the Love Begin has become such a big box office hit (it’s about to reach the P100-M mark). And then, there’s also their TV series Mulawin that continues to be a top winner in the race for the ratings.

Wherever he may be, I can imagine Miko Sotto to be very happy with the success of Angel Locsin and most likely must be giving his full blessings to her new pairing with Richard Gutierrez.