Michelle Marquez Dee: Fighting For Family
For Michelle Marquez Dee, beauty isn’t about crowns or cameras—it’s about creating a better world for her brothers and the autism community they represent.
Michelle Marquez Dee is glowing, but she’s not posing in front of a camera, nor is she on a stage wearing a crown. She’s glowing as she talks animatedly about two of her brothers, Mazen Luis Marquez and Adam Marquez Lawyer, both of whom are on the autism spectrum.
Josh Tolentino
“I have an older brother, Mazen. He’s on the lower-functioning end of the spectrum, “ she begins, smiling. “He’s very, very talented, though.” Dee’s amusement grows, and you can hear the fondness in her voice as she explains, “He can solve a 5,000-piece puzzle in less than a day, and then tear it all up and do it all over again. And even though you can’t really converse with him, he’s the most kind-hearted, loving, and helpful person around.”
Adam is younger than her, and is on the higher-functioning end. “He’ll meet you and say, ‘What’s your name? When’s your birthday?’ and he’ll never forget,” Dee says with a touch of awe, before chuckling, ”So every day he’s telling me about another person, and that person’s birthday and zodiac sign. He’s just so smart.”
Adam, Dee shares, has his own dreams. “He wants to be a pilot, marry a woman named Linda, and have six kids. He has all of that planned out. And it just makes me wonder how I can help him achieve those goals.”
Josh Tolentino
When you’re Michelle Marquez Dee, actress, beauty queen and music artist, with a showbiz pedigree as the daughter of Melanie Marquez and Derek Dee, and a following of over 3.5 million across social media, those aren’t just empty words.
Those words have deep roots in a lifelong mission to create awareness about autism, in work putting up schools in remote areas in the country with Center for Possibilities, in a partnership since 2016 with Autism Society Philippines that has resulted in various projects, such as Autism Works, a program that prepares individuals on the spectrum for full-time employment in major partner corporations, and lobbying for the Spectrum Sanctuary, which would be a daycare center for individuals on the spectrum.
Dee could be resting prettily on her laurels, or devoting all her time and energy to her career, but instead, she chooses to use her voice for others who have none. “They can’t fight for themselves, so they need people to fight for them to have opportunities to live a full life.”
If you’re ready to praise her for helping them, Dee will correct you. “They’ve actually helped me more than I’ve helped them, because it was through this advocacy that I’ve been able to go through some of the hardest experiences in my life,” says the woman who had to be an ate to her kuya, while they were growing up in Utah in the United States.
Pageantry, she explains, is a field so far to the left of what she describes as her athletic, tomboyish personality. “I really saw it as superficial. I couldn’t understand why girls would just walk back and forth on a runway.” Yet it’s deeply embedded in Philippine culture, not to mention a lasting legacy of her mother. In her pageant days, Dee was going through a particularly rough spot, competing for a crown and doing a teleserye simultaneously, with both parents in the hospital. Eventually, she got sick herself. “I needed to find a reason bigger than myself to go back into competition, win it, and then go through being bashed. That was my siblings and the thousands of individuals on the autism spectrum.”
Josh Tolentino
Her advocacy of autism awareness carried her through three local pageants and two international ones, and she’s never stopped lending it her voice, and to other advocacies such as mental health, and the LGBTQIA+ community. Her greatest hope and wish is that special care for autistic individuals becomes embedded into the healthcare system. And it’s a goal that she continues to work tirelessly towards, so that her own brothers can achieve theirs as well.
Makeup: Justin Louise Soriano, assisted by Khino Ocenar. Hair: Nelly Seboy, assisted by Joshua Pandato. Styling: Geno Espidol and Jermainne Lagura of Qurator. Special thanks to Sparkle GMA Artist Center and Hermès.
