Laila Hakim, renowned Lebanese actress, dead

Beirut: Laila Hakim, who starred in Nadine Labaki’s Where Do We Go Now in 2011, passed away at the age of 83 on Friday following a prolonged illness.

A popular television actress, she was a regular in the 2007 Bint Al Hayy series, Hikayat Amal in 2003 and Sarit Ma‘i also in 2003, along with many other Lebanese TV drama works.

Laila, a fixture on the local art scene, appeared in the movies Al Fajr (2000) and Amani Taht Kaws Kuzah (1985).

Funeral services were scheduled for Saturday and she is likely to receive a posthumous “State Arts Award” for her numerous contributions to the country’s drama scene, even if the vast majority of actors and actresses in Lebanon struggled to make ends meet.

Apart from pop singers, who displayed themselves to a nation that lusted after their largely remade bodies, most creative artists survived on pittances; awaiting the recognition that was seldom acknowledged during their lives.