03/07/2026
Lyca Benitez Brown
1952–2026
Lydia Francisca “Lyca” Liboro Benitez Brown was born to Tomas Tirona Benitez and Conchita Liboro Benitez in 1952 in Manila, the Philippines, where she grew up one of nine siblings—she was number four—in the shadow of the large home of her illustrious paternal grandparents, Conrado Francia Benitez and Francisca Tirona Benitez. Their influence weighed heavily. Lyca attended kindergarten and elementary school at Jose Abad Santos Memorial School (JASMS) in Quezon City and high school at the Philippine Women’s University—both schools they had founded. As a girl, she imbibed the rich cultural and social life of the family big house, MiraNila, and entertained guests with her witty Tagalog wordplay and rhymes. Language and storytelling became her strong suits.
At the University of the Philippines, following an exchange year in Australia, Lyca entered the new Institute of Mass Communication, aspiring for a career in broadcast journalism. Afterwards, she learned her tradecraft at ABS-CBN and made her mark early as a scriptwriter and director for variety shows and TV specials. In the constrained media climate of Martial Law, she worked in game shows and beauty pageants and talk shows and musical specials, collaborating with young talents such as Celeste Legaspi, June Keithley, Nora Aunor, Tats Rejante Manahan, and Bibeth Orteza. She became a go-to scriptwriter for performers such as Kuh Ledesma and Mitch Valdez.
In 1975, as Martial Law deepened, Lyca shifted to New York, where she studied TV production and editing at the New School for Social Research and gravitated into the world of public television. There she was introduced to Children’s Television Workshop (CTW), producer of Sesame Street. This association led, through Lyca’s dogged initiative, to the Philippines Sesame Street in 1983 and, subsequently, in 1984, to Batibot, a wholly Filipino children’s program. As founder and executive producer, Lyca assembled a team of brilliant writers, performers, and educators who transformed early childhood education into a theater of delight. Through songs and stories and puppet characters of distinctly Filipino origin, Batibot drew young TV watchers into a world that was at once magical and recognizably their own. It won several prizes including the Prix Jeunesse International Award in 1980 and illuminated the imaginations of generations of Filipino children.
In 1986, Lyca played a behind-the-scenes role in the People Power Revolution as producer/director for Radyo Bandido, the besieged clandestine radio station that rallied peaceful protestors in Manila in support of the successful overthrow of dictatorship.
While in New York, in 1980, Lyca married Nicholas Keller Brown, the love of her life. In 1983 she moved with him and their firstborn (Christopher) to Manila to commence, in partnership with the Children’s Television Network, the Philippines Sesame Street. Soon thereafter, she gave birth to two more children (Alix and Mark) and set up the Batibot program, which was to become the signature success of her many-faceted and multi-awarded achievements.
In 1993, she moved to Tanzania, where Nick was assigned with the United Nations Development Programme. In Africa, Lyca worked, at first, for Zanzibar Television and, thereafter, in 1994, was one of the first persons to help set up the Independent Television broadcasting station in Dar es Salaam. During her time in Tanzania, she produced documentaries. Her films for UNICEF and the ILO explored inter alia the hard lives of children mineworkers. The documentary she produced for the Fourth World Conference on Women focused on Gertrude Mongella, the Tanzanian politician and civil society leader who became the first president of the Pan-African Parliament and was appointed, in 1992 by the United Nations Secretary-General, as the Secretary-General of the Fourth World Conference on Women. Altogether, Lyca made more than sixteen documentary films. Her last was “Dance of my Life,” a joyous tribute to her longtime friend Bessie Badilla.
In the United States again from 1995 to 2009, Lyca applied her communication skills at the Winthrop A. Atkins Institute for Life Coping Skills in Stamford, Connecticut. Meanwhile, she served on the board and energetically supported the New York–based Ma-Yi Theater Company, an award-winning Filipino-led theater company committed to producing new works by Filipino and Asian American playwrights.
Home again in 2009, Lyca dedicated her later years to the Philippine Women’s University. As director of media, and in multiple other roles during a period of crisis, she assisted the university president Francisco Bantug Benitez in addressing the severe challenges facing higher education in the contemporary Philippines—enabling the university to instruct and nurture a new generation of Filipino young people in the spirit of her grandparents Conrado and Francisca, its visionary founders.
Lyca became a TOWNS (Ten Outstanding Women in the Nation’s Service) Awardee in 1989 for her work on Batibot. She was a member of Sigma Delta Phi, a sorority she joined at the University of the Philippines and that became a life-long source of loving friendship and gleeful company. She was a delightful raconteur herself, an exquisite cook, and a gracious host. A loving and devoted wife and mother. A woman of the world but always a fiercely proud Filipino.
J.R.R.
