“Pepito, my friend!”

This now near-iconic line should be familiar to Kapuso fans who regularly watch the sitcom Pepito Manaloto on GMA every Saturday. It is uttered by the character Tomas “Tommy” Diones, the neighborhood hustler you can’t even trust with your grandmother’s old toothbrush.

Tommy is totally deceitful — actually, a small-time scammer. Every time he greets the character Pepito Manaloto (played by Michael V.) with, “Pepito, my friend,” it means he needs to borrow money. Of course, Pepito will never see that money again. There is a bigger chance of the Philippine government being able to pay back all its foreign loans than of collecting money borrowed by Tommy.

There was an episode when the neighborhood experienced a water service interruption. It so happened that Tommy was the only one with a deep well. Sure, he shared the water with the neighbors — but at a price more expensive than gasoline!

Tommy Diones is played by Ronnie Henares. I am writing about Ronnie because he was recently in the news. Leading newspapers, including the DAILY TRIBUNE, reported last week on how he and his brothers won a court case against the Henares sisters. I am no longer going into the details of the legal issue, but it has something to do with the family corporation. One of the major sources of conflict was what to do with the family house in Dasmariñas Village in Makati.

I also find it necessary to do a feature on Ronnie since today’s generation hardly knows his background. Ronnie is very effective in his role as the scheming Tommy. He is very believable as a fraud. With conviction, I can say that he is one of the funniest cast members of Pepito Manaloto.

The trouble is that some young fans of the program are starting to believe that he really is a scumbag. Of course, that is a testament to his being a very talented comedian. Why, he even had me fooled. Until he became part of the cast of Pepito Manaloto, I never thought he was such a great comic.

In time, the young viewers of Pepito Manaloto will mature and realize that Henares was only playing an unscrupulous character all along. However, now is a good occasion to unmask who Tommy Diones — or rather, Ronnie Henares — really is. I bet people in their 40s or even 50s are aware of Ronnie’s accomplishments. In general, most fans of the show do not know where or how he started in the entertainment profession.

His father was the brilliant journalist and economist Larry Henares, who served as special economic adviser to two presidents: Fidel Ramos and Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. At 25, Larry had already become dean of the graduate schools of the Lyceum of the Philippines and FEATI University. Larry died two years ago. He was 100.

Atom Henares, the first husband of Dr. Vicki Belo, is Ronnie’s brother. A sister, Juno, also acted for a while, playing Sonia Walsk opposite Christopher de Leon’s Vernon Gersch in the Manila Hotel presentation of the musical They’re Playing Our Song. Former Bureau of Internal Revenue Commissioner Kim Henares is Ronnie’s sister-in-law.

Now 71, Ronnie started performing early. Prior to joining mainstream entertainment, he did theater as a student. During a staging of West Side Story at the St. Paul College auditorium, he played Tony to June Keithley’s Maria. More than a decade later, June celebrated her birthday on her talk show June and Johnny (with Johnny Litton) by having herself “roasted” on the program.

When it was music composer Ed Gatchalian’s turn (remotely related to the Gatchalian politicians) to roast June, he belatedly suggested that the West Side Story musical starring June and Ronnie should have been called Oedipus Rex in Jazz, noting that June was eight years older than Ronnie. Of course, only those familiar with the Greek tragedy and the Oedipus complex got the joke.

Professionally, Ronnie began singing as a duo with his former classmate at La Salle, Jojit Paredes, the cousin of Jim Paredes. Ronnie and Jojit were known as The Two of Us.

Jojit became a full-fledged actor ahead of Ronnie. He was Nora Aunor’s leading man in Super Gee and also played Gina Alajar’s romantic interest in Cofradia. He didn’t stay long in show business. Jojit eventually migrated to the United States, where he died of a brain aneurysm in Los Angeles in 2019 at the age of 68.

In contrast, Ronnie conquered practically every aspect of show business. After his singing career, he became known to the public as an excellent dancer. In 1975, Channel 7 aired a dance show called Penthouse Seven every Sunday night. Among the regular dancers on the program was Ronnie. There is a clip of him and Mike Monserrat on YouTube comically doing a soft shoe (a relaxed type of tap dance) to the tune of “Rubber Duckie.”

Apart from singing and dancing, Ronnie also hosted various variety shows on television. He also tried acting on the big screen, but only in small roles. His medium was obviously TV, where he even did a Colgate commercial. Ronnie was one of the matinee idols of his time.

In the 1970s, Ronnie was also romantically linked to Vilma Santos. Vilma never kept her love life a secret. She once related to me how she and Ronnie used to double-date with Atom and Vicki. They would meet up at the Deaf and Dumb Restaurant in Rizal Park. Yes, there was a restaurant by that name, which — had it opened today — would have been called out for being politically incorrect. Its official name was the Philippine Association of the Deaf Canteen, but since its servers had hearing impairments, with some of them unable to speak, the coffee shop became more popularly known by its nickname, the Deaf and Dumb Restaurant.

Vilma also volunteered that they used to call Dr. Belo “frisky” because she couldn’t keep still. Vicki, incidentally, was once Vilma’s backup dancer. That was one secret Vicki kept from her classmates at Assumption College because the convent-bred girls there used to look down on popular entertainment. Vicki became a backup dancer to Vilma because today’s doctor to the stars simply wanted to dance.

While Atom and Vicki ended up at the altar (but eventually separated), Ronnie and Vilma didn’t really date each other for that long. But they will always have fond words for each other.

By the 1980s, Ronnie had retreated to the background. He became an executive producer and mounted Penthouse Live, the variety show where the romance between Martin Nievera and Pops Fernandez blossomed. Ronnie also started managing talents. He began polishing Regine Velasquez into a “classy” singer, which was why “Asia’s Songbird” became an “Inglesera” (English-speaking) while she was being built up. The other talents Ronnie managed who made it big in show business were Nanette Inventor and Lani Misalucha.

When not shooting for Pepito Manaloto, Ronnie performs with the Midlife Crisis Band. He and his bandmates perform what else? — music from the 1970s, his era.

Ronnie has so much energy that he has to stay constantly active. From my last conversation with his wife, the former Ida Ramos, they were staying in Alabang, which has prevented us from becoming truly close friends. They probably still live there, while I am at the other end of their world — in good old Quezon City. Ida Henares, by the way, used to head the GMA Artists’ Center, now called Sparkle. Ida was also one of the dancers on Penthouse Seven.

Ronnie has been in show business for decades. His audience, though, had always been the upper crust. But thanks to Pepito Manaloto, he finally found his way into the hearts of the masses, who are still amused by his difficulty speaking Tagalog. His struggles with speaking Filipino add to his charm as a comedian, though.

Ronnie, my friend, I am so proud of you.