On a recent morning in Manila, Dolly de Leon is being strangled -- softly, affectionately -- by Mariko the cat’s tail. It’s the kind of work interruption that she doesn’t mind. She just laughs, hoists the feline into frame, and says over Zoom, “Sorry, 'yung pusa ko.” Then she returns to what she was saying, as if cats appearing mid-interview were just a regular part of the press junket circuit. For someone as down-to-earth as she is, they are.
This is Dolly now -- mid-flight, mid-thought, mid-conversation. She’s somewhere between planning meetings in Manila and packing again for Jersey and Vancouver, filming a movie, then Season 3 of "Avatar: The Last Airbender." She’s also fresh off playing Sister Agnes in "Nine Perfect Strangers," a nun with a secret, opposite Nicole Kidman. She’s also — though the humble artist wouldn’t say it — one of the most quietly revolutionary actors working today. And working she is.
For decades, Dolly was a secret known only to Manila’s theater diehards and those who watched the credits all the way through. Now she’s a Golden Globe and BAFTA nominee who steals scenes from Nicole Kidman with nothing more than a glance and a quietly delivered line.
But what’s remarkable about Dolly isn’t that she finally “made it.” It’s the matter-of-fact way she’s showing us what it looks like to arrive at success with no need to impress anyone anymore.
'Wala na. I’m not there anymore.'
I first met the actress at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival minutes after coming out of a "Triangle of Sadness" screening. Like many, I fell completely and instantly under the spell of her undeniable (but at the time, largely unknown) talent and her character’s story, so much so that I frantically enlisted my Manila desk editor’s help in tracking her down in Cannes. With just the camera on my phone, I ran to meet her after she agreed to an impromptu chat. Later, she would tell a reception crowd that that was her first-ever on-cam interview.
She warmly ushered me into her hotel room. In the small balcony, she shared that she still has no agent nor publicist. We bonded over our Cannes first-timer status and how miraculous it was to be there considering our humble backgrounds. Of course, we talked about Pinoy pride and her performance that was sure to put Filipino talents on the map.
Months later, after her many award nominations and rise in status, at a Hollywood event celebrating her performance, two separate groups of guild members and critics stopped me to say how much they loved ‘my’ performance in "Triangle of Sadness." They had mistaken me for Dolly. It was flattering, but also stark proof of how rare Filipina faces were in Hollywood
Three years after Cannes, I find myself telling her how natural it feels to see her shining opposite Kidman, Christine Baranski, and the rest of the cast of "Nine Perfect Strangers." Through steady work in projects like "Ghostlight," 'Jackpot!' and "Between the Temples," she had normalized seeing and hearing a Filipina in Hollywood projects.
She beams upon hearing this. “Kaya love kita eh, kasi napansin mo 'yon. Now I’m about upping my game, making sure I'm doing the right job, that I'm representing each character that I play,” she says, lamenting that other journalists tend to ask her mostly about how she feels about representing her country. “If they want to put me in that place where I’m representing the country, that’s fine,” she says. “But for me, I’m having fun. I’m here to make a living.”
She says “a living” lightheartedly, but behind it is something serious, even sacred. After all, for most of her life, acting was a calling with no guarantees. For years she lived hand-to-mouth, waiting for roles that never came. “Before 'Triangle of Sadness,' most of my days were waiting for a call,” she tells me. “Now my problems are different. Now I have to make sure I’m doing the right job.”
There’s a kind of working-class dignity to that. Her voice fits every line: low, exacting, always true. When she says, “I’m a working actor,” she’s not talking about fame. She’s talking about labor.
'I’m finally not doing this alone.'
Hulu "Nine Perfect Strangers"
There’s no team without trust, and Dolly names hers like a family roll call. “Adam and Jen, my agents. Jeff, my lawyer.” Her gratitude for them isn’t showbiz lip-service. It’s the gratitude of someone who spent most of her career with no backup, no agent, no cushion -- just the freelance grind and a fierce belief in craft.
And that’s where her story starts: Not at Cannes, not at the Globes, but in dim recording studios dubbing Latin American telenovelas for a living. “I could create up to nine voices,” she proudly says. For about three years when other acting jobs were scarce, it was voiceover or nothing. “That was my bread and butter,” she says. “Enjoy ako.” Even now, when she’s called back for ADR on a film, she nails it in one take.
It’s in those anonymous booths and in low-paid theater roles that she learned timing, breath control, how to hear herself truthfully. “Everything we go through as actors has a reason,” she says. “There’s always something you learn.” Her craft was forged in survival, not spotlight.
'She’s not your cookie-cutter nun.'
Sister Agnes, her character in "Nine Perfect Strangers," doesn’t announce herself. She simmers. She listens. She withholds. And then she breaks open.
To get to her, Dolly called a psychiatrist friend from high school and consulted her constantly during filming. “I needed to understand why she behaves the way she does,” she explains. “She’s not the usual nun. She’s very complicated.” It’s this research, this emotional precision, that makes Dolly such a singular presence. She never pushes. Every choice lands exactly where it should.
Working with Kidman didn’t faze her for long. “She made me feel comfortable right away,” Dolly says. “We’d talk between takes about family, about how long we were going to be there, about how many kids we have.” They shot their pivotal scene lying down. Dolly jokes this helped mask the height difference. And just like that, a quiet Filipino actress became the scene partner of a Hollywood icon. No big deal.
“She’s grounded,” Dolly says of Kidman, but she might as well be describing herself.
'My dream role in Avatar was Hama.'
In "Avatar: The Last Airbender," Dolly plays the twin firebending mentors Lo and Li -- villainous, regal, deliciously wicked. It’s a role that came to her without audition. She didn’t even ask to read the script. “Let’s do it,” she said. “Come on.”
She did share that originally she really wanted to play the Hama role. Then her eyes light up. “I don’t know if they have announced who’s playing her, but she’s perfect. I’m so happy for her.” That’s Dolly: quietly competitive, always generous, and ultimately more excited by good casting than her own casting.
And when she speaks about the Avatar world, she’s a fan first. “I watched the series. I already knew who they were. It was a no-brainer.”
'You know what’s perfect? My cats.'
There are five. Mariko, who’s made Zoom cameos. And four others, each with their own personality. “They bring me joy,” she says. “Just looking at them makes me happy.”
She counts her blessings and literally holds up her fingers to name nine things close to perfect in her life. Her mental health. Her children. Her team. Her projects. Her cats. Her friends. The fact that she can now afford checkups. That she’s not alone. That she’s here, right now, talking with someone who listens.
You can’t write about Dolly without writing about love. Not the swoony, cinematic kind, but the grounded, practical kind that feeds you when you’re tired, that shows up when no one else does. The kind you give to your kids, even when you’re broke. The kind you offer to a character. The kind you extend to a viewer you’ll never meet. She calls this work, but there’s a reason people get emotional when they watch her.
In Manila, she still shops at malls and eats out largely unbothered. But oftentimes, she gets the double-take and the stare. They know they’ve seen her somewhere. Then finally they ask: “Artista po ba kayo?”She nods. They ask for her name. She deadpans: “Annette Bening.”
Dolly de Leon may not be a star in the traditional sense. She’s something rarer: a grown woman who has built a life, endured its collapses, and now -- with bone-dry wit and deep affection -- invites us to look at her art and see the world more clearly.
Or maybe, more simply, to see a woman at work — and who sometimes has a cat calmly curled around her neck.
Dolly de Leon, Jon Jon Briones join 'Avatar: The Last Airbender'
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