Cuban immigrant who guided Florida politicians, and her movie director grandson, dies at 98
Fanita Stone Presman, who settled in Miami Beach from Cuba, befriended and campaigned for some major national and local Florida politicians — including President Bill Clinton and former Sens. Bob Graham and Claude Pepper.
She may also have, in her own way, helped prove responsible for the world seeing film smashes like the “Rush Hour” movies and “X-Men: The Last Stand.”
She didn’t run for major political office. She didn’t wield a film camera.
But she had mighty influence and a charmed personality. She got things done, her family says.
Presman died at age 98 in Beverly Hills, California, on Jan. 16, 2022, her grandson Brett Ratner said.
Born in Cuba
Presman was born in Havana on Jan. 3, 1924, about two years after her parents and her older brother had immigrated to Cuba from Russia in 1922.
Presman’s father, Max Stone, owned and managed various small businesses in Cuba, including the importation of convenience store goods and some small hotels, according to her family’s obituary. Her mother, Berta Cerkaskaya, operated a thread store in the center of Old Havana, where Presman’s family first lived above the store.
Presman was schooled in Cuba, met her future husband, Mario Presman, in Havana when she was 9, but, of course, a wedding would come much later — on the last day of 1946.
She first had to finish her college studies in political science at Southwestern University in Memphis, Tennessee.
The couple were married for 68 years. Mario Presman, a Miami radiologist who worked at the Miami VA Medical Center for more than 30 years, died in 2014 at age 94.
The couple had raised their two children, Marsha and George, in a three-bedroom Miami Beach home that was built in 1939. The Presmans had five grandchildren.
One of her grandchildren, whom she helped raise with her daughter, Marsha, is Hollywood film director Brett Ratner, a 1986 Miami Beach Senior High graduate whose credits include the “Rush Hour” movies.
“Fanita gave me so much love that I felt fearless in accomplishing my dream of becoming a filmmaker which began at 8 years old,” Ratner, 52, told the Miami Herald in an email. “I knew deep in my heart that if I couldn’t become a success that she would still love me no matter what. That gave me the confidence I needed to achieve whatever I set out to do, removing any fear of failure, because I felt that I had absolutely nothing to lose. In my opinion it was her love and belief in me that made me a success.”
Leaving Cuba
As a young mother, Presman involved herself in Jewish welfare organizations and became the president of the Young Women’s International Zionist Organization in Havana.
But after Fidel Castro came to power in 1959, the Presman family left Cuba and, with one suitcase between them, eventually settled in Miami Beach in 1961.
By 1968, Presman became a naturalized U.S. citizen. Her degree in political science would soon be put to use in South Florida.
“With her natural charm, abundant energy and a large network of exiled Cuban family and friends she passionately immersed herself in local, state and national politics,” her family said.
Entering Florida’s political arena
For 30 years, Presman worked in Florida as a political organizer on mayoral, congressional, senatorial, gubernatorial and presidential campaigns for both Democrats and Republicans. Among them: President Clinton, Florida Sen. and Gov. Bob Graham, Govs. Lawton Chiles and Jeb Bush, and former Miami Beach Mayor Alex Daoud.
“Her fundraising skills and ability to stimulate the Cuban Jewish community and wider Hispanic voters in South Florida made her highly sought after by campaign managers from all branches of government,” her family said. “She became a close friend, supporter and ally of former Senator and Congressman Claude Pepper and she helped elect dozens of judges to state and local courts.
“Fanita was admired and respected for her ability in bringing different people and communities together, regardless of their race, religion, or political affiliation, to strengthen the democratic process,” her family said. “She had an unabashed love for her adopted country and for the democracy and freedom it offered to all.”
Inspiring a Hollywood hit-maker
Sometimes she had to risk disappointing one of her political friends.
Ratner recalls a sit-down moment with Pepper. Ratner was a teenager about to graduate from Beach High in the mid-1980s.
When he was serving as a Florida congressman, Pepper had asked Presman to bring her grandson to his house so that they could have a talk about his future.
“When I sat down with the senator he told me that he was getting me into West Point so that as the first member of my family born in the U.S. I could ultimately be president,” Ratner said.
But the young man, under the influence of movie director Martin Scorsese’s 1980 classic, “Raging Bull,” and a youth spent watching the filming of “Miami Vice” and scenes from “Scarface” in his Miami Beach neighborhood, had what seemed to him a loftier goal.
Ratner said he thanked the Democratic politician and, sure enough, the next day a glowing letter of recommendation arrived that spoke of the fine boy Ratner was and the great man he would become with a West Point education.
“Fanita was proud but to her credit said to me, ‘Your dream is to go to NYU Film School. Follow your dream and not someone else’s. I will break the news to the senator. You apply to NYU and become a director.’ ”
From the 305 to 90210
In the 1990s, Presman was one of the directors of the Stanley C. Myers Community Health Center in Miami Beach. At the time, beloved Miami Beach physical education teacher Arnold Notkin was the health center’s treasurer.
Notkin and his wife, Myriam, were among the 98 victims who lost their lives in the collapse of Surfside’s Champlain Towers South in June 2021.
In 2000, the Presmans moved to California to live with their grandson Ratner at his urging.
He missed them.
“Fanita also had an unwavering love for her family,” Ratner said. “She took a lot of time keeping her entire family united, always calling family members and making sure everyone stayed in contact. As well as making sure her family never forgot their heritage and the sacrifices previous generations made. Keeping the family together made us all stronger and happier throughout our lives because we always felt like someone was there for you especially in hard times.”
Ratner had rented actor Charlie Sheen’s luxury bus to whisk his grandparents to his Beverly Hills mansion since Fanita didn’t like to fly, he told the Miami Herald in 2014 for his grandfather’s obituary.
“That bus was nicer than their apartment at Seacoast Towers,” Ratner said at the time. “That trip became like a second honeymoon.”
After her husband’s death, Presman delighted in sharing her life’s stories, her family said.
“Her twilight years remained full of social gatherings and even as a nonagenarian she could captivate an audience with her colorful stories and rich sense of humor.”
Survivors, services
Presman’s survivors include her children, Marsha Ratner and George Presman, and grandchildren Brett Ratner, Max Pratts, Dash Pratts, Skyler Presman and Chanel Pearson.
Services are scheduled for 11 a.m. Thursday, Jan. 20, at Levitt-Weinstein Blasberg Rubin-Zilbert Memorial Chapel, 18840 W. Dixie Hwy. in Northeast Miami-Dade. Information: 305-932-2700.
This story was originally published January 18, 2022 at 3:45 PM.
