Renée Victor, Beloved Star of Coco and Weeds, Dies at 86

The unmistakable voice behind one of Disney Pixar’s most heart-wrenching characters has gone silent.

Renée Victor, the revered actress who embodied the fiery and protective Abuelita in Coco and left a lasting impression as Lupita on Showtime’s Weeds, died last night at her home in Sherman Oaks, California, following a battle with lymphoma. She was 86. Her agency confirmed the devastating news to Deadline, as her daughters stood bravely in the wake of her passing.

The world has lost a radiant spirit, a fighter, a trailblazer. A woman who spent her entire life lifting others, only to be taken by the cruel hands of cancer.

“Renée was loved by so many & had fans all over the world,” read a statement from her daughters, Raquel and Margo Victor. “Her memory will be cherished by all who knew her.”

Their words, though warm, cannot capture the scope of her legacy. That legacy spans continents, generations, and genres, carried by her velvet voice, her sharp wit, and her tireless devotion to her craft. But behind the screen, Renée was a daughter of San Antonio. A sister. A mother. A performer who carried Latin heritage not as a trend but as a heartbeat.

A Star Born to Move Crowds

Renée Victor was born in 1938 in San Antonio, Texas, the eldest of three sisters in a tight-knit household steeped in music and tradition. Her early years were laced with the rhythms of her culture, and it wasn’t long before she left Texas for Los Angeles in pursuit of a dream that would later define her.

In the 1960s, she was already dazzling audiences, not as an actress, but as a singer for Latin bandleaders like Xavier Cugat and Perez Prado. She was magnetic. Charismatic. Alive. She taught dance on the side, salsa, and tango and lived in the glow of the music she loved. There, in that luminous era of swirling skirts and smoky lounges, she met her husband.

Together, the two would travel the world as Ray & Renee, earning the nickname the Latin Sonny & Cher. Their act ran for a decade, from 1963 to 1973, until the spotlight shifted. But Renée’s hunger for performance never dimmed. If anything, she grew brighter.

A Voice for the Voiceless

In the 1970s, Victor pivoted toward activism, hosting Pacesetters on KTLA, a program that championed the Chicano Power movement and highlighted the issues facing Latinx communities in the United States. But her storytelling would soon move to another platform: the screen.

She joined the Screen Actors Guild in 1973 and began landing roles in television throughout the 1980s. She made appearances in shows like Scarecrow and Mrs. King, Matlock, and ER, where she played Florina Lopez. Her cinematic turns were modest but meaningful. The Doctor, The Apostle, and A Night in Old Mexico alongside her close friend Robert Duvall.

But it wasn’t until 2017 that Renée Victor captured the hearts of millions.

“Abuelita” Forever

When Coco premiered in 2017, it wasn’t just a film. It was an emotional reckoning. And at its very center stood Renée Victor’s Abuelita, a fierce matriarch who wielded her chancla and her love with equal force. Her voice performance was unforgettable. She wasn’t just playing a grandmother; she was every abuelita, every voice that held families together, that carried culture through memory.

It was Victor’s work that helped anchor Coco‘s themes of love, loss, and remembrance. She embodied the traditions that hold immigrant families close, even as time threatens to pull them apart. And for that, her voice lives on in households around the world long after the credits roll.

A Career Until the Very End

Renée Victor never stopped. Even as age crept in and health battles emerged, she continued to work. Snowpiercer, Mayans M.C., Dead to Me, A Million Little Things, and With Love all featured her in recent years. She lent her voice to the animated Addams Family series in 1992. She played with fire, wit, and charm in Weeds. She refused to be boxed in. She made room for herself and others in an industry that too often ignored women who looked and sounded like her.

And she did it without apology. Without noise. Just talent.

“We Were All Her Grandchildren”

It is hard to put into words what it is like to lose someone like Renée Victor. She was greater than representation. She was strong. Losing her to lymphoma leaves not only her family’s lives with an empty space but also the hearts of millions of individuals who know she grew up alongside them on TV, learned from her, and laughed with her.

She is abandoned by her daughters, Raquel and Margo, and by the generations of fans who, for at least an instant, thought that they belonged because of her.

The curtains have fallen. The voice has stilled. But in every whisper of Coco, in every quiet moment when memory brings back those we’ve lost, Renée Victor will still be there.

She was Abuelita to all of us.

Rest in power.